Horse Trials

I was in Bath this weekend. On Sunday we visited Westbirton Arboretum. On the way back, we passed Badminton Stately home and I was pleased to see that the Worcester lodge there has two pyramids either side of it.

Indeed, Gloucestershire itself is home to 10 pyramids, so is somewhat of a hotspot. Badminton, of course, is famous for its Horse Trials. I am currently working on a writing project called "Hippomania" which concerns man's relationship with horses. This has got me thinking on the connection between horses and pyramids.

It would seem there is a strong connection between Horse sacrifice and pyramids. In Vedic India, the greatest of sacrifices was the Ashvamedha (Horse sacrifice). Kings would spend fortunes in elaborate rituals which lasted for weeks. The sacrifice of the horse was often associated with the sacrifice of the goat. Both sacrifices were often associated with Tantric practices. In the Ashvameda, the wife of the officiating priest simulated mating with the sacrificial horse, before the sacrifice itself. The rituals would take place at Pyramidal temples.

The ritual itself an enactment of symbolic of the Cosmogonic Hierogamy - the primordial sacrifice of the world. Prof. Jose Alvarez Lopez, has investigated the connection between Pyramids and the Cosomogonic Hierogamy in detail. The horse is likened to Purusha, archetypally associated with Christ.

This morning I received a mail from a journalist who I had talked to a couple of weekends back. We were discussing follies and she mentioned a folly in Chambourcy in Northern France that was much loved by the Surrealists. Georges Bataille's "L'Acephale" group also were obsessed with this garden. It is called the Desert De Retz. The Desert De Retz reflected 18th Century interest in antiquity and includes an ice-house in the form of a pyramid, an Egyptian Obelisk, a Temple dedicated to Pan, and a Tartar tent.






One of the many famous visitors there was Jackie Onassis. Given that the L'Acephale group were obsessed with the head as a mystical totem, it's maybe not unsurprising the JFK's wife should be unconsciously drawn to such a place. The symbolism of the horse in the funeral of JFK is interesting. The coal black horse at the funeral procession of Kennedy was riderless with a pair of spurred boots facing backwards in the stirrups. This denotes that the deceased person will never ride again and is a feature of Military corteges of high ranking officers.

We must follow the images dictated by our wyrd... English Heretic will be expanding its remit to take in European and hopefully eventually World Heretic sites, threads and commemorations. A new website is under development to take in European Heretic.

Links:

Pyramids in Gloucester:
http://http//news.bbc.co.uk/local/gloucestershire/hi/people_and_places/history/newsid_8220000/8220841.stm

Horse Sacrifice
http://http//.lost-civilizations.net/horse-sacrifice-atlantis-indies-page-2.html

Desert De Retz
http://desertderetz.info/