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Pagans: The Visual Culture of Pagan Myths, Legends & Rituals
A fascinating, clear, and detailed historical analysis of the eclectic and beautiful visual and material culture of paganism.
Focusing on a curated selection of pagan art and artifacts, this book explains the iconography and mystic power of pagan ritual objects from around the world. Ethan Doyle White identifies three critical elements of paganism from classical antiquity to today: polytheism, affiliation with nature, and witchcraft and divination. Fundamental symbols are identified and examined closely, and central myths and allegories are clarified to provide new insights into the philosophies and beliefs of pagans.
Pagans begins with an introduction that clarifies what we mean by "pagan." It traces the pre-Christian origins of paganism, the development of the different aspects of pagan belief over centuries, and how materials from the pre-Christian religions of Europe, North Africa, and West Asia are built into the practices of today's Pagans.
The book is organized into three broad sections―"Ancient Ways," "Ritual," and "Community"―each containing three themed chapters. For each chapter, illustrated text is interspersed with double-page presentations of the key figures, stories, and iconography relevant to each theme. Readers will not only come to understand the many symbols that define pagan religions and practices but will also discover the beliefs and philosophies of pagans from around the world, from polytheism to pantheism and from magic and ritual to ideas about the afterlife.
This is the second in a series of books on the material and visual culture of global religions and spiritual traditions, highlighting the iconography and mystic power of ritual objects and images.
- Ethan Doyle White
- 256 pages
- 7 inches W x 9.6 inches L
- Hardcover
- Thames & Hudson
- 2023
- History
- Item #: 978-0500025741
Italian Renaissance Learning Resources
Fra Angelico and Fra Filippo Lippi
The Adoration of the Magi, c. 1440/1460
Tempera on panel, diameter 137.3 cm (54 1/16 in.)
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, Samuel H. Kress Collection
Image courtesy of the Board of Trustees, National Gallery of Art
When Roman ruins first entered the painter’s vocabulary in the fifteenth century, they carried a specific religious connotation. Tangible reminders of the demise of a pagan civilization that had once straddled much of the globe, antique ruins appeared to manifest the inexorable workings of God’s will. In Italian Renaissance paintings of the Infancy of Christ, fragments of classical buildings symbolize the old order overturned by the Redeemer’s birth. For example, the arch of a ruined classical building serves as a portal which the faithful must pass through and leave behind on their way to worship the infant Jesus in the foreground of The Adoration of the Magi, c. 1400–55, by and . The derelict arch most obviously refers to the pagan religion of the Romans, which was superseded by Christianity. It also symbolizes the old Temple of Jewish faith (founded on God’s original covenant with Moses) that was superseded by the new Temple, embodied by Christ. As the savior of the world, the infant Christ heralded a new covenant between God and humankind in which mercy and eternal life vanquished sin and death. The painting visualizes this message by juxtaposing the decaying ancient temple, peopled by naked and vulnerable human figures, with Jesus’s birthplace: the intact, modern stable presided over by the outsized peacock, an early Christian symbol of resurrection and immortality.
Attributed to Domenico Morone
Adoration of the Magi, c. 1484
Oil on canvas, 83.5 x 99.3 cm (32 15/16 x 39 1/16 in.)
Columbia Museum of Art, Samuel H. Kress Collection
Columbia Museum of Art
As the admiration and knowledge of ancient architecture burgeoned, becoming a seminal influence on Renaissance building design, depictions of ancient monuments grew increasingly detailed and sophisticated. The Adoration of the Magi, a painting of about 1484 attributed to , shows the Holy Family resting in a makeshift stable fashioned from a derelict antique temple. The image of Christ’s sanctuary as a repurposed ancient ruin would have struck a chord of recognition among fifteenth-century viewers who were accustomed to seeing antique remains adapted to new and often explicitly Christian uses. (Read An encounter with classical sculpture.) Enhancing this quality of verisimilitude, Morone took care to render the temple in precise detail, articulating each individual block of stone and specifying the structure of the vaults and the ornamentation of the colonnade and cornice. He lavished equal attention on the three kings and their exotic entourage, resplendent in turbans and flowing robes, some bearing scimitars. Through these closely observed details, the artist enlivened the scene with a compelling sense of accuracy and immediacy, making the past come vividly to life before the viewer’s eyes.
In the upper left corner of Morone’s picture, the statue of a pagan god surmounts a fractured cornice of the building, providing an additional emblem of religious obsolescence. Perched in an arch just below the idol, a peacock reinforces the contrast between the ephemeral and the eternal. The false idol and the newborn Redeemer resemble one another in their nakedness, but while the stone statue is lifeless and neglected, the squirming newborn child embodies divine perfection and the promise of eternal life, bringing the kings to their knees in awed admiration.
Attributed to Domenico Morone
Adoration of the Magi (detail of statue), c. 1484
Oil on canvas, 83.5 x 99.3 cm (32 15/16 x 39 1/16 in.)
Columbia Museum of Art, Samuel H. Kress Collection
Columbia Museum of Art
The Roman ruins seen here and in many other Renaissance paintings hark back to Christian legends in which divine intervention causes the spontaneous destruction of pagan monuments—a stirring alternative to the mundane historical record of war, iconoclasm, and vandalism. According to medieval lore, a temple erected by the Roman emperor had miraculously imploded on the night of Christ’s birth—an event supposedly foretold by the oracle of Apollo, who had declared that the temple would stand until the day a virgin gave birth to a child, a condition that was fulfilled by Christ’s birth to the Virgin Mary. Along the same lines were reports of the miraculous disintegration of pagan statues, a recurring episode in the lives of saints. One such tale concerns Saint Apollonia (d. 249), a devout Christian of Alexandria, Egypt, who refused to obey the Roman Emperor’s edict commanding public worship of the pagan gods. When Apollonia made the sign of the cross before a stone idol, it reportedly shattered into a thousand pieces.
The Venetian painter treated this episode in one of a series of four paintings of c. 1440–50 depicting events in the life of Apollonia. In Saint Apollonia Destroys a Pagan Idol, c. 1442/45, he abandoned the tale of miraculous destruction in favor of a more plausible and pragmatic representation of pious iconoclasm. Apollonia is shown halfway up a ladder, wielding a hammer to destroy a statue of Bacchus, the Roman god of wine and orgiastic excess. Clothing and its absence help dramatize the clash between the pagan and the Christian worlds. The polished sensuousness and lithe form of the nude statue contrast with the enshrouded body of the saint, which is encumbered by volumes of heavy cloth. Bacchus’s nudity reinforces his association with liberty and sensuality, while Apollonia’s gown, which hides her body, expresses her self-abnegating chastity.
Giovanni d’Alemagna
Saint Apollonia Destroys a Pagan Idol, c. 1442/1445
Tempera on panel, 59.4 x 34.7 cm (23 3/8 x 13 11/16 in.)
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, Samuel H. Kress Collection
Image courtesy of the Board of Trustees, National Gallery of Art
The painting suggests the manner in which fascination with classical antiquity had begun to shape the selection and interpretation of Christian themes by the mid-fifteenth century. Although Apollonia is the artist’s ostensible focus, it is the lavish monument at the center of the composition that actually commands our attention. Brighter than any other element and executed in an eye-deceiving, three-dimensional style, the monument conveys a palpable impression of material reality that is lacking in the doll-like figures. Ornamenting the marble pillar, the mighty eagle—emblem of Rome—asserts the empire’s dominion over this distant Egyptian province. In the background, polychromatic marble buildings with elaborate arches, inscriptions, and decorative carvings evoke the luxury and ostentation of the imperial milieu.
Concern with archaeological accuracy shaped the painting’s imagery. The artist based the eagle-ornamented pillar on a Roman altar that appears in other Venetian paintings of the period and in an album of drawings by Jacopo Bellini. The nude statue of Bacchus was also likely modeled on ancient prototypes known in Venice. Artists were constantly on the lookout for promising antique models to emulate and adapt. It was standard practice to keep drawings of these objects on hand in their workshops as authentic reference materials. (Read An impromptu pilgrimage.) Artists also amassed a great variety of antique remains, such as marble sculptures and fragments, bronze statuettes, gems, coins and medals, and plaster-cast reproductions. These useful collections provided artists with a repertoire of classical compositions, poses, and decorative motifs that could be adapted to diverse projects. Such collections circulated among artists and often passed from one generation to another. In 1471 Bellini’s widow bequeathed his famous book of drawings to their son Gentile, along with a variety of marble statuary, relief sculptures, and plaster casts.
Eight-Foot-Tall, 1,600-Year-Old Statue of Pagan Deity Found in Ireland
Researchers have recovered an eight-foot-tall, 1,600-year-old wooden sculpture from a bog in the Irish townland of Gortnacrannagh. As Pat Flynn reports for the Clare Herald, Archaeological Management Solutions (AMS) discovered the artifact while conducting excavations ahead of a road construction project.
The Iron Age figure was made from a split oak trunk. It has what appears to be a human head and a series of horizontal notches carved along its body.
“The Gortnacrannagh Idol was carved just over 100 years before St. Patrick came to Ireland; it is likely to be the image of a pagan deity,” says dig leader Eve Campbell , an archaeologist at AMS, in a statement. “Our ancestors saw wetlands as mystical places where they could connect with their gods and the Otherworld,” a supernatural realm in Celtic mythology.
Campbell says the team also found animal bones and a ritual dagger at the site, suggesting that animal sacrifices may have taken place there.
Per the Irish Examiner’s Greg Murphy, only 11 similar sculptures have been found in Ireland to date. The Gortnacrannagh statue is the largest discovered so far. Ancient wooden artifacts are frequently found in bogs because the wet, anaerobic conditions help preserve them.
“The lower ends of several figures were also worked to a point suggesting that they may once have stood upright,” says Cathy Moore, a specialist in wooden artifacts, in the statement. “Their meaning is open to interpretation, but they may have marked special places in the landscape, have represented particular individuals or deities or perhaps have functioned as wooden bog bodies, sacrificed in lieu of humans.”
Wood specialist Cathy Moore says sculptures like these may have marked special places in the Irish landscape. Archaeological Management Solutions
According to the History Blog, the statue was found face down and broken into two parts, indicating that it was intentionally “decommissioned” and possibly offered as a sacrifice. While the other 11 similar sculptures were found by accident and removed from their context before archaeologists could investigate the sites, the additional objects found near this figure help establish its likely ceremonial use. Radiocarbon dating places the wooden sculpture’s creation between 200 and 400 C.E.
The bog where the figure was discovered is less than four miles from Rathcroghan, a complex of about 240 excavation sites representing almost 5,500 years of settlement. Per Atlas Obscura, the landscape includes large Iron Age structures, as well as Oweynagat, or “Cave of the Cats,” which is believed to be the point of origin of the Celtic Samhain celebration. The cave was once known as a gateway to the Otherworld.
Rathcroghan is also said to have been the site of the capital and palace of Queen Medb. According to the Ulster Cycle, a group of legends set in the first century B.C.E., Medb was a powerful warrior who at one time ruled much of Ireland.
AMS staff, together with University College Cork’s Pallasboy Project and the University College Dublin Centre for Experimental Archaeology and Material Culture, are making a replica of the statue to display at the Rathcroghan Center. Meanwhile, University College Dublin conservator Susannah Kelly is beginning a three-year effort to preserve the original artifact, which will eventually be transferred to the National Museum of Ireland.
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Livia Gershon is a daily correspondent for Smithsonian. She is also a freelance journalist based in New Hampshire. She has written for JSTOR Daily, the Daily Beast, the Boston Globe, HuffPost and Vice, among others.
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