Shemsu-Hor: A 5,000-Year-Old Fairy Tale

Fairy tales usually recall a series of positive images that bring hope and joy for many people. We all love tales. After all, and especially, if fairies are involved, the story to be told becomes a marvelous one, no matter how far beyond the limits of plausibility. That is why we often carry fairies into our daily language. For instance, a common expression about a beautiful girl may be she is “like a fairy.” If we like to underline spiritual beauty as well as the physical, and mention a dignified soul that has the manifestation of universal good will, we borrow the phrase “Fairy King’s Daughter” from popular tales. With all these aspects, the word fairy usually expresses enchantment, beauty and an irresistible charm.

Conversely, the associations with the fairy concept in collective culture would not always reflect such good and pleasant images. For example, when we talk about genies, goblins and fairies, we mean some invisible, freaky and frightening entities that usually have no physical bodies but possess a power that affects the physical world anyway. More common is to call an abandoned, old building “haunted house” where ghosts are the imaginary inhabitants. In folk tales, these invisible entities are sometimes considered “dark creatures” with the potential to do harm to human beings. People prefer to keep away from haunted houses unless they have a special interest in horror movies in Wes Craven style.

In Western culture, the word fairy seems to find its most widespread usage after the twelfth century when The Church declared a holy war on heretic sects. Both the linguistic and folkloric roots of this concept go further back: In prehistory, meaning the ages before the invention of writing, our knowledge is sparse. If we need to start this historical voyage on fairies at some point however, the most suitable era to mark our chronologic tables seems to be the twelfth century with its witch hunts.

These magical beings called fairies and their tales are named accordingly, fairy tales. The adjective “fair” which expresses beauty and justice (as well as white or pale skin) seems to be directly related to the word fairy and could possibly be the etymological origin. But, in linguistic studies that began to appear more frequently in Europe after the Age of Enlightenment, the origin of fairy is often considered to be related to the Latin word “fata” or “fatae” which suggests a connection between fairy and fate. The root verb “fatare” in Latin, on the other hand, means to enchant. According to scholars who began to thoroughly study folkloric beliefs when The Church’s oppression diminished after the seventeenth century, there was a direct relationship between fairy and the concept of “defining fate through magic.”

Fairy is a feminine word which makes the picture quite interesting: It suggests another connection with three female fairies in folkloric tales of Medieval Europe called “Fate” and had the power to affect the fates of both humans and gods. In one of the principal sources of Nordic mythology, The Edda, these female fairies were evidently named Nornir by Odin, the supreme god. In the Hellenic world, we see one of the first “trinity” concepts of history, “The Triple Goddess,” which was probably formed by the predecessor Minoan culture and spread towards the north of the Danube River, then reached as far as Britain. It is almost certain that the cult of goddess Hecate was closely related to the three female fairies who defined fates of human beings.

The Cathars: “Shining Ones” of Albi

After briefly looking at the linguistic and folkloric similarities in Western European culture, we can now focus on the first popular usage of the word fairy on the continent. Although this old usage appeared to be nearly forgotten over hundreds of years, recent studies on the history of religions proved that the word fairy was used in a disdaining manner to define members of a special sect in the twelfth century—the Cathars of Southern France—who emerged in medieval times as the apostles of a radical belief system which looked far different than the one The Church sanctioned.

Cathars were a special group of people who rejected the values of the material world with all relationships it brought along; they chose to live a simple life in harmony with nature, follow a vegetarian diet and collectively share their means. But if the whole story had been that simple, The Church, of course, would not consider this modest sect as a serious threat to its very existence.

The essentials of the creed, called “The Cathar Heresy” by The Church, were based upon the rejection of an ecumenical clergy that controlled and directed the spiritual life of the masses. They were preaching to people to get rid of ambitions that belonged to the material world and to “purify” themselves for better comprehension of the universe and to approach the deity in prayer. Some said they took this principle from the Gospel of Matthew 19:21 (Jesus answered: If you want to be perfect, go sell your possessions and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me) and the name they chose for themselves (Cathari) meant “the perfect ones” in the ancient Greek language.

For the Cathars, property and material wealth were the main obstacles in front of a human being who wanted to reach the truth; for this reason they rejected any kind of property with material value. Instead, they developed an alternative way of life in which they could collectively supply and share all the essential needs of people. Of course, achieving the status of purity and perfection was not something everybody could easily attain; it required patience and dignity. People who chose this lifestyle had to step into the path to be “pure and perfect” first; then, they had to experience the status of enlightenment. In other words, following the path of Cathars meant to be purified and enlightened by the light of God.

This article’s goal is not to analyze the philosophy of Cathars and other heretic sects of medieval times; that wouldn’t be an easy task to perform in the modest limits of a magazine feature. So, we’d better be content with stating that the Cathars who settled in Southern France became a serious headache for The Church beginning with the twelfth century. And, this headache was not something new. In fact, after Christianity had become the official religion of the Roman World and all other faiths and creeds that had not fit into The Church’s guidelines had been declared heresy, similar sects and groups flourished in almost all the lands where the ancient pagan beliefs were widespread, and all those sects were harshly crushed.

According to one opinion, after the heretic sect of Bogomil (Beloved of God) had been the target of a prosecution—which looked like a massacre in ninth century Balkans—a small group of survivors who escaped the wrath of the Empire found refuge in Southern France and started the “Cathari Movement.” The predecessors of the Bogomils were the “Paulician” sect that emerged as a resistance to the Orthodox Church in Anatolia. Their origin, in turn, had its roots in ancient Persian belief systems and partially Mesopotamian creeds.

In other words, the Cathars were in fact one of the rings on the chain of resistance which was led by the followers of the belief systems much older than The Church. This is why Pope Innocent III, who realized the seriousness of the situation, organized a crusade to Southern France to destroy this sect. All Cathars were either slayed by the crusaders or put to death by torture after trial by the Inquisition Courts, initially established by The Church to prosecute and punish them. When the movement was completely crushed, almost all Cathars became the victims of a bloody massacre, except a handful of lucky “Perfecti” who found the opportunity to escape to the Pyrenees and find asylum in the northern parts of Spain.

In addition to the physical violence, The Church also ran an ideological campaign against Cathar philosophy. They called them names—the most popular one “the fairies”—used to humiliate the Cathars as sinners who had left God’s path and dealt with genies and fairies. Leaders of the Christian theocracy had already issued an edict which stated that fairies were dark creatures that cooperated with Satan and those who were keen to fairies would be accused of witchcraft and declared a heretic. It is ironic to note that the word fairy, chosen as an insult to the Cathars, was in fact considered exaltation by them.

The Elven of the Celtic Land

One of the names attached to the Cathars was “Albigenses,” which meant the inhabitants of Albi, a town in Southern France, or more correctly, “Languedoc Region.” Some scholars claim that a bunch of Bogomils, who survived persecution in the tenth century, managed to flee to this little town and tried to start over spreading their philosophy. Whether or not the movement was inspired by Bogomils, there were enough elements since very early times in Albi that would help the town host Cathars. Albi is believed to be founded as early as the fourth century, which means some people had arrived to this region and settled down after the Roman Empire chose Christianity as the official religion and had begun terrorizing the believers of this ancient faith. The original name they chose for their settlement was “Albiga,” which meant “The Place of the Albi’s.”

In Latin, “Alba” means bright white or gleaming or shiny. France is one of the lands that the Celts arrived and settled down beginning in the eighth century BCE. The name of the southern regions that included Albi was “Gallia” (The Land of the Celts) for Romans until the second century CE. So, it is safe to assume that the earliest inhabitants of the town belonged to some Celtic tribes, though they were later Romanized by the Empire’s irresistible force. What does Albi mean in the ancient Celtic language? Interestingly, this word was used to name an elite and special race called “The Shining Ones”—the legendary race known from popular folk tales by the name “Elven” or elves.

The Elven appear in almost all Celtic subcultures where they were usually considered in folk tales to have a transcendental or even superhuman status. Just like the Latin word Alba, the name given to this race or group meant gleaming or shiny. In many ancient folk tales of the British Isles, we notice the words “elf” and “shining” were used interchangeably and in a way to complement each other. More interestingly, in the works of some important poets including Chaucer, the words elf and fairy were considered synonymous and used as substitutes. When we look at the picture this way, it becomes clear that even before The Church theologians humiliated them by calling fairies, the locals of the town Albiga (later, Albi) where the Cathars settled down, were familiar with the fairy concept and exalted it.

The counterpart of fairy in Celtic culture has been “elf” since very early times; the same word appears as “Alb” or “Albi” in Teutonic folklore. Oberon, the King of Fairies mentioned in medieval French tales, was known in older versions as “Alberon.” The name of the protecting guardian of Nibelungen was Alberich, meaning The King of Elfs. Even in present times, the elf concept is still alive in Celtic-Germanic popular names like Alfred or Albert: the former means “Elf Ruler” and the latter “shine of Elf.”

We just saw that the concepts of “Shining Elf – Gleaming Fairy” possessed very vibrant and strong elements in the fourth century culture of the Albi founders. We should note that the light mentioned here was not a physical light source but an ability “to reflect the divine light.” So, there is a metaphor here—just like we do not mean a person on stage under the spotlights when we talk about an “enlightened man,” but we stress a mental enlightenment. That is to say, the concept of “shining race” hidden in the words Elf and Fairy, presented an idealized model for the human race that had its defects and deficiencies: getting rid of the carnal defects meant purified and “shine.” This was the objective of a faith which stated that only after humanity achieved this level, a “golden age” could begin on earth and an order of justice and equality could be established.

The ultimate target for humanity was to be like the “shining ones (elves) of ancient times.” With these aspects, the elf or fairy appear as a role model for purification and perfection rather than being a spooky ghost or genie with supernatural powers that belong to “the other world.” Similarly, this is like the “perfection” model of the Cathars who emerged in Albi, six centuries after the town was founded.

Alba Longa: The Path That Leads to Ancient Rome

So, can we find a relation in similar context between the Latin word Alba, Elf and Albi which could build a bridge to connect the Celtic-Teutonic folklore to the Cathar philosophy? It seems this is not hard to do. We already said that Alba meant bright white. On the other hand, “Albiga,” the older name of Albi, gives us other clues too. Maybe the founders of the town were not just inspired by Celtic-Teutonic folklore; maybe this name also had a symbolic meaning for the Roman culture.

The roots of Ancient Rome are acknowledged in the town Alba Longa, where the legendary brothers Remus and Romulus were born. According to the famous Roman historian Titus Livius, the hill on which this city was built belonged to the “heavenly gods” (ones “that shine with divine light”) among which we can name Jupiter, and the name Alba Longa chosen to exalt these deities. In other words, the name given to the city chosen for a new beginning is connected to the concept “shining with divine light,” and also gives us clues about a stargazing culture.

It can be argued that the founders of Albiga in Southern France chose this name with Alba Longa on their mind while yearning for “the old, secular Rome,” at a time when Christianity became the official religion of the Empire and the ancient faiths began to be persecuted. We can see similar parallel names in other parts of Europe, too. For example, Britain was called “Alba” in the official jargon of Ancient Rome. The oldest name for England was “Albion.” In the Balkans, the region where founders of the Bogomil movement lived was called “Albania”; just like today’s modern country. Whether Albi’s founders were inspired by these ancient names or the Celtic Elf-Fairy concepts affected their name preferences, two things seem quite certain:

Albi, the town which later became the heartland of the Cathar movement, was one of the settlements in Europe that resisted the Christianization of Rome with its historical roots.

The concept of a “bright–shining race” whose origins probably were far older than the Celtic culture was always kept alive in this region.

If we keep on tracing the roots of the fairy concept, we inevitably arrive at Alba Longa, where Rome was founded. According to Titus Livius, Arcanias, son of Aenias, founded the city dedicated to the “shining ones.” Aenias was from Troy, as both Livius and Virgilius stated, and he was one of the survivors who managed to escape the destruction that came after the famous war by sailing to the Mediterranean Sea. So, Livius and many other historians tend to see Rome’s roots in Troy.

The earliest layers on this ancient site were dated to the beginning of the third millennium BCE which suggests a possible relation between Troy and the Minoan settlements of the Eastern Mediterranean. Maybe both Troy and the Minos civilization were founded by the same people after migrations from the Near East and Anatolia towards the Balkans and the Aegean Islands. While discussing details of this subject is not our main concern right now, let’s direct our attention to the Near East which appears as the premier source of the “shining ones” concept.

The highlands around the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus and Northern Black Sea steppes had been on the immigrant route of the Indo-European tribes, some of which had chosen these regions as their new land. Another Indo-European people, the Persians, had settled down around the southern and eastern parts of the Caspian Sea. Since the Persian-originated Manicheism is considered among the creeds that affected the Cathar philosophy, we have enough reasons to look closer at Ancient Iran.

In ancient Persian culture and Zarathustrianism (Zoroastrianism), we find one of the oldest examples of the word that was imported to the Western languages as “fairy, faée or fatae”: This word is “Peri” meaning “the beauty that shines in heavens.” A synonymous word in the Zarathustra culture was “fravashi”—again, a feminine word that mentions a “shining beauty.” In ancient Pahlavi language, Peri appears as “feroi” or “ferai.” In ancient Persian thought, the fairy concept includes the qualities of shining and brightness as well, but it definitely appears as a “celestial entity.” This aspect equips fairy with supernatural assets and makes it a spirit having both negative and positive qualities. We find good fairies and bad fairies in ancient Persian culture—just like the dualism of the “Good God” (Ahura Mazda) and the “Evil God” (Ahura Mainyu).

Now we have a fairy concept in hand that has its roots in the Near East, Anatolia and Iran, which underlines the qualities of “brightness and shining.” It usually points to an ideal race (Elf), imposes a model for “perfection,” and appears as “celestial being,” though not a deity but having a status much closer to god than human beings. Further, we can direct our attention to Egypt to find new rings added to the chain.

Fairy and “Per-Ra”: The Dynasty of the “Shining Ones”

There are some consonants that replace each other while the words were being carried from one language to another – the consonants P and F are one of those interchangeable sets. Usually they can be substituted for each other during such cultural exchanges; just like the way “Peri” had become “Fairy” in English. The Pahlavi word Ferai, we mentioned above, appears to be one of those words which were transformed during such cultural interactions. If we reverse the transformation and trim the word to make it conform to the Ancient Egyptian word structure, we get the word “Per-Ra,” which means “the House of Ra.” Sir E. A. Wallis Budge would have probably interpreted it as “The House of the Sun-God.” Budge himself strongly contributed to the widespread understanding that sticks “Ra” and the “Sun-God” concept together.

While true the word Ra had eventually begun to be used to denote the Sun-God in early dynastic periods, it was not yet designed as a proper name for the deity but rather a quality, or more correctly, an epithet. It initially meant “shining,” “brightness” or “light bringer” in the Egyptian language, and a term belonging to the celestial realms. In other words, this tiny single-syllable word included both the “light” and “highness” concepts. Moreover, it was one of the forerunners of the “Lord” concept in ancient Near Eastern cultures. So, the epithet Ra, which originally meant “the one that shines high above,” had eventually become the name of the Sun-God. Initially, it did not appear as a proper name for the deity or the sun itself.

When we look at the word Per-Ra with all these in mind, another possible interpretation becomes apparent: “The Shining House”. We should remember here that the word Per (house) also meant dynasty in the Ancient Egyptian language (just like in some Western languages) as well as a physical building. Hence, the word Per-Ra actually points at a special group of people, like “the shining dynasty” or “the bright rulers.” At this point we find a similarity with the name of that special race in Celtic culture, the Elves.

So, do we know such a dynasty in Egyptian history? Actually, all ruling dynasties saw themselves as “the ones that shine like the gods”; in fact, the word Per-O (Pharaoh) meant “Great House” in Ancient Egyptian, or “Great Dynasty” as we just saw above. But it is possible to say that the word Per-Ra had a special “shining” quality in its meaning.

The oldest inclusive historical study on Egypt is “Aegyptica,” written by the Egyptian priest Manetho in the fourth century BCE. We do not have the original copy of his work, but from the citations that other historians used in their own manuscripts, we understand that Manetho roughly divided the history of Egypt into three phases. According to Manetho’s chronology, which seem in accordance with another important source historians call “The Turin Papyrus,” the dynastic period, or the “era of the human kings” in Egypt had started 5,000 years BP with King Menes. Before him, there appears an intermediate period when Egypt was ruled by a special race or “demigods.”

Finally, for the very first phase in Egyptian history, Manetho tells us about an era when the land was ruled by gods (Neteru). Our modern Egyptologists, whose attitude seem very selective on evaluating Manetho’s chronology or the Turin Papyrus, acknowledge the data for the dynastic periods as real, while rejecting the other two phases as being imaginary and “mythological.” So, half of the same source is accepted as genuine while the other half considered a “fantasy”.

On Manetho’s chronology, the rulers of the phase that preceded the “human kings” era had a special name: “Shemsu-Hor” meaning “The Followers of Horus.” Could these ancient rulers who were almost erased from collective memory, belong to the same “Per-Ra” or “The Shining Dynasty” for whom we have just traced the similarities with the Elf and fairy concepts?

The “Shem People” and Shemsu-Hor

At this point, maybe we need to take a short break and browse the pages of The Old Testament.

“The Nephilim were on earth in those days and also afterward […] These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.” (Genesis 6:4)

These verses appear in a controversial passage of Genesis, the first book of Moses, where the story tells about a very critical period just before God decided to destroy mankind for their sins and corruption by sending a great flood to earth. On Sumerian King Lists, we see a bunch of rulers that are told to reign before the deluge who enjoyed extraordinarily long lives, reminding a kind of demigod. Similarly, Genesis gives us a strange clue on the verses quoted above: Who were those “mighty men of renown” and where did their “fame” come from?

The word that was translated to Western languages as “renown” was originally “Shem” in Hebrew, meaning “well-known name.” So in fact, the verse in Genesis 6 tells us “These were the mighty Shem people of old times.”

Confusing enough? But the enigmatic verses about Shem go further in Genesis. We read the story of a people who had “mud bricks instead of stone blocks” and tried to build a high tower that was supposed to reach the heavens:

And they said, let us go and build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. (Genesis 11:4)

The verse above tells the story of human beings who survived the deluge and multiplied on earth with their primary concern to “make themselves a name.” According to some Bible scholars, this verse states a “will to be famous” by making their names immortal. But for us, the interesting point here is reading the word “Shem” once more, which supposedly means “name” or “fame.”

The root of the word Shem is a verb which means “to be known” or “to be named” and it has been used as the equivalent of “name” in Hebrew. But with careful observation, it is not hard to see that this “name” was related to a very special being, namely, God. So Shem does not refer to just any name but a very important one.

According to scholars of Mesopotamian and Near Eastern cultures, Shem gets its origins from the Semitic Akkadian word “Shumu” which means “His (Her) Name” and was used to denote the most important deity. This conforms well to both tradition and taboo in Judaism about calling the name of God: The holy name of Yahweh, the Tetragrammaton (YHVH) is not allowed to be pronounced except in some very rare rituals—a strict taboo. In the Holy Books, which believers read, God is referred to as “Ha-Shem,” meaning “His Name,” or simply “The Name.” So we can safely say that the word Shem is strongly connected to God.

In his best-selling book, The Twelfth Planet, where he presented a quite radical theory, Zecharia Sitchin rejects the interpretations of classic Biblical scholars about the Nephilim being “men of renown” and about the builders of the tower saying “let us make ourselves a name.” Sitchin comes up with a logical argument and points out that Shem should be related to the Semitic words “Shamu” and “Shamaim” which meant the heavens or the sky. But he goes further in his claims by asserting that a word with such a celestial connection could only mean a “rocket” or a spacecraft when the verse was clearly stating “to build a tower whose top may reach to heaven.” So, according to Sitchin, the verse about the Nephilim in Genesis 6 refers to a people “who use spacecrafts” by calling them “The Shem people.” Similarly, for Sitchin, the tower builders of Babylon in Genesis 11 were not talking about “making themselves a name” but saying “let us go and build ourselves a spacecraft to reach the heavens.”

I personally think that Sitchin’s extraordinary claims go far beyond being fantastic and sound odd enough, though it is not easy to dispose them as being “total nonsense.” On the other hand, I agree with him about the relation between “Shem” and “Shamu” or “Shamaim.” Moreover, this connection may even help us to understand the roots and origins of the fairies and elves, which we have been chasing.

Gazing the Stars

Now let us go back to Manetho and the ancient records of Egypt. We said that just before the reign of the dynasties or the “human kings” in Egypt, a superior race had ruled the land according to Manetho’s chronology; they were called “Shemsu-Hor” in the Egyptian language.

The word “Shemsu” was derived from the ancient Egyptian verb “Shemsi,” which meant “to follow”; and “Hor” (or Heru) is the original name of god Horus. There are various views on the celestial qualities of Horus that differ according to the interpretations of certain temple cults or initiate schools: The Sun (related to Ra) or Venus (related to Osiris.) Horus has a very famous epithet connected to his celestial position on the eastern horizon: “Hor-Akhty” which means “Horus of the Horizon.”

In relatively late periods when the Sun-cult totally dominated the official theology, this epithet directly referred to the “rising sun” and “regeneration” concept. But in much older astronomical and esoteric resources, “Hor-Akhty” meant the “Morning Star” phase of the planet Venus. Either way, Horus appears to be a celestial and “shining” entity, beyond his role in mythological tales. This is why the astronomical records and sky charts showing Horus rising on the eastern horizon was named “horoscope” which meant “Following Horus” in Greek, when Egypt was ruled by a Hellenistic dynasty, following conquests by Alexander the Great’s.

Now, if the word “Shemsi” (to follow) also had a metaphorical meaning like to “keep an eye on,” “to chase” or “to watch,” and if the ancient Egyptians used it to refer to the activity of star gazing, this special name given to the legendary pre-dynastic rulers of Egypt could well be the “followers of the Sun” or “the followers of Venus.” In both instances, we talk about “shiny celestial objects” that move high above.

Footprints of a “Lost Civilization”?

In their first collective work The Keeper of Genesis, which questioned the roots of the Egyptian stargazing tradition, Graham Hancock (author of The Fingerprints of the Gods) and Robert Bauval (author of The Orion Mystery) address “Shemsu-Hor” as a group of sages who preserved the ancient wisdom of astronomy that they inherited from an ancient, unknown civilization. In other words, according to Hancock and Bauval, “Shemsu-Hor” was a special name used by the theologians of Heliopolis, when they referred to a sect of “wise priests” who lived before the dynastic periods in Egypt. But just who were these pre-dynastic priests? The authors think that they belonged to a “lost civilization,” namely Atlantis, which was almost wiped off of the collective memory of humanity. Those magnificent monuments like the Giza pyramids or Karnak Temple are, in fact, a time capsule they left for us to decode.

Again, let us put these theories of a “sunken continent” aside without underestimating them, of course. “Shemsu-Hor,” who appears (probably) as the oldest “rulers cult” in the history of human civilization, seems closely connected to the heavens and “those who shine above,” as well as wisdom and enlightenment. We do not know how much of it reflects the reality and how much of it deals with metaphoric symbols, but it seems that the legendary Shemsu-Hor…

Symbolizes a wisdom, dignity and transcendental superiority to “ordinary” people. We find the “shining” and “brightness” in their nature.

They are connected to the “heavens” and “highness.” Whether this refers to a privilege that came with an immense wisdom on astronomy or an actual state of “wandering in the sky” is uncertain.

Note: If we reflect again on the data we recovered on Shemsu-Hor to those verses in Genesis, the Nephilim who were called “the Shem people” appear both to be somehow related to the heavens and a group of disciples that belonged to an ancient stargazing cult. Then, the verse about the builders of the tower becomes something like this: “Come, let us make ourselves an observatory to help us reach to the heavens!” – giving clues about a society who built the first magnificent examples of Ziggurats.)

With these qualities Shemsu-Hor appears to be the most suitable candidate for the hypothetical dynasty of “Per-Ra,” who ruled Egypt before the “human kings”—just like the “Peri” or “Ferai” of the Persian or the “Elven” or “Albi” of the Celtic/Teutonic culture. Maybe the Cathars who preached about purification and enlightenment in Albi before being declared heretic by The Church, were trying to imitate “the renown men of old times,” who knows? Those people, who claim to achieve the “perfection” of the ancient times by being illuminated from the light of God, were facing the wrath of The Church who denounced them by saying “They are the servants of Satan!”

Alright, but just who was this Satan?

The Church Fathers had given the name “Lucifer” to Satan, who had tried to tempt Jesus and become the adversary of God. Here we find another irony because “Lucifer” means “The Light Bringer” or “The Shining One”!

Though being the dominant faith in prehistoric times, “Mother Goddess” cult lost its supreme status after the patriarch “human kings” era began. The most powerful remnants of this ancient creed in the Bronze Age appear to be the Sumerian goddess “Inanna”—the equivalent of Semitic “Ishtar” or Canaanite “Astarte.” The sacred stone of this highly popular goddess was “lapis lazuli.” This shiny material is called “Lacivert Stone” in Persian, meaning “dark blue,” which took its name from its color. Lapis Lazuli is a shiny navy blue stone; though, it is not a “source of light,” it reflects the light directed on it. It is also called “the shining stone.”

Satan Loves “Dark Blue”

No need to say the name “Lucifer” given to Satan by The Church Fathers comes from the same root as “Lacivert”—the “shining stone” that brings the light. Moreover, “Lacivert” was the symbol of a goddess, Inanna—a female. Then, Lucifer became Satan and the women who worshipped this “light-bringer” began to be called “the witches”: those who genetically pass wisdom from mother to daughter. In other words, the women who were the manifestation of the triple role which Hecate had: The Maiden, The Mother and The Crone.

“Fairy” is a feminine word and considered to be related to Satan during the days when The Church was persecuting believers of the ancient faiths; even the Cathars were named “the fairies” by the Inquisitors to humiliate them. In Celtic language, the oldest usage of “Elf” is “Albi”—again, a feminine word. After all these, an unavoidable question comes to mind: Considering women were seen as being prone to “evil” and “sin” by the male-oriented patriarchic ideologies of the monotheistic religions, could the “ancient faith” that was feared to revive, be the “mother goddess cult,” whose traces are apparent since prehistoric times? In fact, could the women accused of cooperation with Satan symbolize the sediments of an old fear lurking in patriarchic minds?

Let us put everything aside…That “enlightened race” who seem to be connected to “the heavens”…

The Elven, the fairies and even those “Shemsu-Hor”…

…were, in fact, the pale collective memories of an ancient era when women were in power in a “more advanced” society?

Had such a race ever existed or was it an ideal that was created in some people’s imagination?

If they really existed, who were they and where did they suddenly go?

When we begin to dig to reach the oldest times of human civilization, we try to take a snapshot at every level we access about our past. In these photographs, we spot some people whom we cannot see clearly because those parts of the image always appear to be hazy. Are they the Shemsu-Hor or fairies or Elven or the sages of a lost civilization, aliens from outer space? Or—just ordinary people like us? Or, maybe there is no one in the background of the picture, but we tend to see somebody among the gray shadows that appear here and there.

Anyway, I personally believe that clarifying this picture is the key to understand who we really are. And whatever you say, I cannot help feeling the “scent of woman” from the place where this snapshot was taken—the scent of a caring, nurturing, loving, protecting, wise, productive, tender and tempting woman.