Thursday, July 21, 2016

Meaning in Celtic Knot-Work



On My Stall



If you’ve ever visited my humble stall, and listened to me waffle on, you might have heard me mention that knot-work reflects the thread of life and a sense of connectedness. The incorporation of animals and plants into these designs reinforces this notion. My explanations evolve with my understanding, partly instinctive reasoning, after years spent carving these motifs on stone. But it's always good to back these ‘notions’ up with research. 

knotwork
The famous Sutton Hoo burial buckle, 7th c. AD

In all my years carving I've restricted my use of knot-work, due to a  number of factors: 

  •  It’s complicated, and time consuming, to reproduce the type of work found in the likes of the Book of Kells. There's a lot of planning involved.

  • I feel that knots have become synonymous with Celtic art, and this isn't wholly true. Knot work is a later development and not restricted to the tribes we nowadays term Celtic. If anything the knot was borrowed from other cultures.



Lombard knotwork
Lombard gold disc from Cividale in northern Italy, 6th c. AD



The Thread of Life



As with all ancient designs, the symbology morphs and can be understood to rest upon deep foundations. It contains meaning that works on various levels.  Many ancient cultures saw the world as a vast tapestry; the threads of fate strung together:

 “Do you know the string on which this world, 
and the next and all beings are strung together?”
- Upanishads 3:7:1. 

Life was woven; never remote, never isolated, but linked by these invisible threads.  In the distant East, Tao was the chain of all creation, while the ancient Babylonian word, markasu, means both link/cord and, in myth, “the cosmic principle that unites all things”


In some cultures, such as the Norse, certain goddesses, or female principles were given charge of the threads of fate. In Viking myth the three Norns: Urd (from wyrd, which means fate - but also, what was, or has been), Verdandi (being) and Skuld (what shall be*), sit below Yggdrasil - they are the governesses of time, and therefore govern all.

Knotwork
Norse 'Mammen' Style artwork, 10th c.  AD

Hence looking at some of these fantastic images here with the above text in mind perhaps you can sense that connectedness is rife through these designs.



Wholeness and the Implicate Order


This sense of place and connectivity reflected in quantum physics. David Bohm’s book, “Wholeness And The Implicate Order”, likens the rush of thoughts to a river, in which there are eddies and vortexes of thought, yet all are connected and moving. Although our mind isolates fragments of thought into phenomena, this isn’t actually so. In the quantum world everything is linked, nothing is separate. This ties in with Chaos theory and the famous quote of the butterfly, whose tiny wings could kick-start hurricanes across the globe.

Sometimes I have the uncanny feeling that at an instinctual, intuitive level the ancient peoples grasped fundamental principles of existence. Not fully understanding the physics behind the metaphors - but it suited their cosmologies and sense of sacredness all the same… or perhaps that is my interpretation, my fancy… a hope. Ah, what tangled webs we weave! 


Indeed, But Back to Knotwork!


Thinking of the primary function of a knot in a piece of twine, hempen rope, or blade of grass, binding one to another. Marriage is a binding of two, legally and emotionally, and some later knot work designs, from the Highlands of Scotland, symbolise this idea. 

In the past sorcerers and various cult practices bound demons to their service. Bewitching was to bind, and across the globe the etymology of magical words is often linked to root words for tying or binding.

Odin was bound, and hung from the world tree in Norse Mythology. And there is evidence of cult practices amongst ancient Germanic tribes that involved binding rituals. In one of the earliest human sculptures of a ‘goddess’, the hands appear wrapped in a cord, possibly hinting at an ancient ritual. 

Knotwork could be used as a talisman to protect from evil spirits, much like the idea of labyrinths, in which the malign spirit becomes lost. Knots could be used both beneficially and detrimentally, they could curse as well as heal. But don’t worry, all the knots I carve are ‘happy knots’! ho-ho. 



Celtic Knotwork
Celtic interlace from Edinburgh Museum, 8th c AD



The Endlessly Flowing Knot


John Romilly Allen, in his book, Celtic Art In Pagan And Christian Times, points out that during the Roman occupation of Britain, knots were simple plaits, and hadn't metamorphosed into the intricacies that adorn the Book of Kells, and high crosses of Britain. He traces the change to northern Italy, during the 
he Lombard invasion of the 6th Century A.D. 

Celtic art is a mutation of the Lombardo-Byzantine style, from which fantastical creatures such as centaurs, griffons, etc, were also borrowed. The art-form flourished, developed to exquisite heights. The  subject matter was overwhelmingly Christian, with mythological imagery used out of context, so that a centaur might represent a desert, rather than some episode in Greek myth.

Right or wrong, I think this theory is important in our day and age. Not only in relation to symbolism, for nothing is achieved in isolation: ideas move like people move - religions, creeds, philosophies - all inspire and alter art, reflecting the evolution of perspectives. 

Recently Britain voted itself out of the EU, for better or worse. However it is pertinent to say that movements of peoples are evidenced by art. Ideas from Europe and further afield have always been integral to the island’s culture, and these were indeed altered, developed and adapted by these island’s inhabitants (including Ireland here too). States are modern conceptions, they are the amalgamation of ancient kingdoms, peoples (themselves migrants and movers, invaders or refugees). This has always been the way of the world and no walls or frontiers can stop that. 




Knotwork
Islamic Knotwork from a 12th c. AD Koran




National Museum of Scotland
Celtic Christian Cross showing marriage of styles and mythological monsters. 




Find Knotwork and other designs in my Etsy Shop





References:

1: Romilly Allen -  Celtic Art In Pagan And Christian Times 

2: H.R. Ellis Davidson - Lost Beliefs Of Northern Europe 



In Lost Beliefs of Northern Europe HR Ellis Davidson has the Norn, Skuld, connected with debt, or something owed… as in life.

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