Ursi's Eso Garden

The labyrinth in its many shapes and forms has, throughout the ages, been recognized and used as an archetypal symbol of healing, rebirth, re-generation and transformation. The spider-web labyrinth design is based on the sand drawings of the Tchokwe people of northeast Angola. These drawings (sona) are linked through dots in the sand and show the skill of a visionary/sangoma.

According to Credo Mutwa, African labyrinths have existed for eons in Africa and are an integral part of every tribe in some shape or form. Apart from divination, the labyrinth is also used as an initiation tool into Umlando, the Great Knowledge.

The African Labyrinth

The medieval labyrinth at Chartres Cathedral in France lies at the heart of a renaissance in the spiritual use of labyrinths, some 800 years after it was originally constructed.

Photo: Jeff Saward

Alchemical, astrological, and medical-chemical (chemiatric) texts are notoriously difficult and often made completely inaccessible through interlarding with "occult" ciphers. These are "sigils" that are neither abbreviations nor hieroglyphic symbols, but belong to a category of their own. They were probably meant to exclude the profane reader or else to place on record an imagined discovery or new recipe for transmutation without giving the secret away. Some of the sigils are consistent and what they stand for has been known for a long time in a well-established tradition. However, there are innumerable variants and problems of deciphering that remain.

The great luminary shone with an intense heat upon the large golden heads of sun-flowers.
And I saw a naked boy, whose head was wreathed with roses, galloping on a white horse and waving a bright-red banner.
I shut my eyes for a moment and when I opened them again I saw that each ray of the Sun is the sceptre of the Emperor and bears life. And I saw how under the concentration of these rays the mystic flowers of the waters open and receive the rays into themselves and how all Nature is constantly born from the union of two principles."

‘The Green Man’, a name coined by Lady Raglan in 1939, is a mediaeval image usually found in churches. Carved in stone or wood, depicted on stained glass, illuminated manuscripts and where else, he can be recognised as a face, often grotesque, with foliage sprouting from his mouth, nose, eyes or ears. Alternatively, he may be a face composed entirely of leaves. Exterior or interior, he features on capitals, corbels, choir stalls, bench ends, fonts, screens, roof bosses - indeed, any surface open to ornamentation.

The Green Man is one of the commonest decorative motifs which we can put a name to, yet there is very little indication of its meaning. We know what an angel is; we know what a mermaid and a dragon are but we know almost nothing about the face made out of leaves.

The Search for the Green Man
by Nigel Rushbrook.

Many pictures from the Green Man in Canterbury, Kent, Devon and Green Man Curiosities.

Many pictures from the Green Man in Bremen, Köln, Dessau, Erfurt, Frabkfurt and more.

A sequence of medieval Heads-with-Leaves (aka Green Men, Foliate Heads etc.) from Chester Cathedral, UK; filmed by Sabrina Eden with music by Sedayne.

For more see:
Heads with Leaves

Many pictures and 6 clips at the bottom of the page.

Sacred Geometry is the blueprint of Creation and the genesis of all form. It is an ancient science that explores and explains the energy patterns that create and unify all things and reveals the precise way that the energy of Creation organizes itself. On every scale, every natural pattern of growth or movement conforms inevitably to one or more geometric shapes.

As you enter the world of Sacred Geometry you begin to see as never before the wonderfully patterned beauty of Creation. The molecules of our DNA, the cornea of our eye, snow flakes, pine cones, flower petals, diamond crystals, the branching of trees, a nautilus shell, the star we spin around, the galaxy we spiral within, the air we breathe, and all life forms as we know them emerge out of timeless geometric codes. Viewing and contemplating these codes allow us to gaze directly at the lines on the face of deep wisdom and offers up a glimpse into the inner workings of the Universal Mind and the Universe itself.

The ancients believed that the experience of Sacred Geometry was essential to the education of the soul. They knew that these patterns and codes were symbolic of our own inner realm and the subtle structure of awareness.

At the center of the pointer of the Aztec Calendar there appears the face of Tonatiuh, the Sun. For this reason, the commonly-know Aztec Calendar has been identified as La piedra del sol, or the Sun Stone. We shall refer to the Aztec Calendar by its common name.

The Aztec Calendar's design is based on a set of concentric rings, divided into eight segments. The concentric ring around the fase of Tonatiuh consists of the Nahui Ollin, signifying 4 movement.