Shamanic Landscapes, Structure and Antistructure
Shamanistic landscapes are cosmic, that is, with the axis mundi (center pole, world tree, etc.) or tunnel/flight routes connecting this world we live in (the middle world) with the above world(s) and the below world(s).
But they are also merged experientially with everyday living in a landscape of local features, a specific physical landscape, with its graves, sacred sites, routes to the underworld (tunnels, animal burrows, earth cracks, holes, sewers, subterranea, etc.) and to the upperworld (tops of trees, mountains, towers, clouds, rainbow, storms, etc.).
Thus the shamanic landscape is holistic, merging the cosmic landscape (upper-here-lower) with the local landscape --the actual, real physical features where you live. What is the shamanic landscape of your place?
It is not a landscape of good or evil, light or dark, but all of it swirled together. It is an eristic worldview with an open acknowledgement of conflict and battle and risk. Graham Harvey says, "The shaman is a hero who makes a bold and necessary intervention into cosmic processes. The power to act is precarious and this human action is fraught with danger."
By their liminal actions and movements and roles, shamans are dissidents, anti-centrists, troublemakers, the big risk-takers, the edge-riders.
Traditional societies have both the liminal specialists, "anti-structure" specialists written of by anthropologist Victor Turner -shamans, witches, clowns- who represent chaos, and those of "structure", the elders, priests, medicine societies, and government officials.
On an ordinary human level of everyday social existence, anti-structure or chaos, is often seen as evil, because that is the tumult, the wild destroyer.
And yet the clowns and shaman and witch, chaos-riders, have their roles, because ironically, it is chaos that adds life and change, and upsets stagnation. While chaos and storms can destroy society and the human psyche, so also can dullness, stagnation, and decay.
Both structure and antistructure are needed, chaos and regularity, for life and a healthy human society to be sustained and continue on. At times you need a priest and an elder, but when things get really "bound up" then it is time to call in the shaman and the sacred clown.
Harvey, Graham. Shamanism: A Reader. Routledge, 2002.
Turner, Victor. The Ritual Process.
-------
=====
The following notes from Agnieszka Halemba's The Telengits of Southern Siberia: landscape, religion, and knowledge in motion:
ee (Telengit) and ejin (Daur) - A 'master' or 'host' of a certain place; applied at several levels:
-spiritual entities like the masters of mountains, lakes or rivers
-people, such as the master of a house, or the Emperor
The concept allows people to talk about the inner or concealed power of entities and create relationships with them.
ee/ejin can be understood through such notions as 'power' and 'spiritual energy', such as the ee/ejin of certain places, specific sites or a region as a whole (such as the Altai). Related concepts-
eelü - 'with ee'
eelü jer - 'a place with ee'
eelü ooru - 'an illness which has to be treated by a shaman, not in a hospital, because it was an action by a spirit being that is related to the illness' appearance'
ee - can be used while describing the power of particular places; but also 'masters', 'hosts' or 'spiritual beings'
altaidyng eezi - the power of a particular place, in the Altai
kizhining eezi - a person is ee of their house, herd and belongings; the ee is not a separate entity or additional aspect of a person.
A person with eelü has a kind of spiritual energy or power
jaiachy - a spiritual guardian in human, animal or other form such as a light or sparkle
jerding eezi - the eezi of a place that can take on a human or animal image. Stands for the whole or a part at the same time (metonym).
Altaidyng eezi pertains to a place in the Altai or the Altai as a whole for example- even the master spirit of all the Altai.
-As the Master of the whole of Altai, Altaidyng eezi is most often imagined as similar to the White Old Man, a spiritual being in Inner Asia who is master of mountains and rivers, and can kubulyp - 'transform' into the form of a fox, deer, or other animal - a kind of spiritual energy important for its very essence more than the form/image it takes.
-As the master of a particular place in the Altai, eezi most often in the form of a young, unmarried girl, though there are male and female eeler of all ages.
Each significant place is eelü but only some of the eeler are known to people in a particular form. There are more stories about eeler of certain places than the Altaidyng eezi of all Altai.
The eezi of a particular place can be katu (hard) or jymzhak (soft).
It is difficult to live in a katu eelü place- cattle do not flourish there, the weather is unpredictable, capricious. Most of the male eeler are katu.
A jymzhak eelü place is welcoming to people. Most of the female eeler are jymzhak.
This reminds me of male and female rain.
jer - the earth, a country, a place
altai can substitute for such terms as yurt, house, village, district, country, or world of the dead
It seemed to Halemba that eezi was being replaced by the notion of kudai. A kudai is more like a particular, singular deity, a god, rather than the more subtle multiplicity of eezi and its relationship to the concept of Altaidyng eezi. This is probably a simplification due to the influence of monotheism and Christianity. God is spoken of as kudai. It seems less mystic and more simplified, less differentiated. To Halemba kudai reflected a construction of nationalistic identity as Altai, rather than the older tribal concepts. The older cults connected with specific tribes and eezi territories are being replaced by the simplified kudai concept.
Another interesting concept is when she takes journey across the land with two different groups, a group of intellectuals and a group of indigenous Telengits:
"The first was more like a pilgrimage to a sequence of significant places, which were expected to be there, waiting for people, as points of spiritual power. The second, with the Telengits, was more about movement itself, about mobility as a mode of knowing." (p. 71)
In fact, there is an idea that mountains can change or move in many indigenous cultures. It is instead later expansions by Buddhism that is related to the subjugation of land. Before, local deities occupied the land, the land "as an agent with great potential for change and movement. These deities were sometimes equated with features of the landscape, so it was impossible to say if a particular mountain was worshipped as a place or as an abode of a certain spirit. The mountains/spirits were often inseparable and were seen as sources of movement, flexibility and change. ...Some of the mountains [called 'flying mountains'] were not always there...they move from place to place, following the prayers of people, their own whim or the orders of powerful kings." (Halemba 71)
"Inhabited parts of central and northern Altai are covered with forests and small hills, while winding valleys separate higher peaks. The rich landscape does not reveal itself all at once, and a traveller cannot see what awaits beyond the next turn of the track. By contrast, the steppe of Kosh-Agach district gives a very different impression. The elements of the landscape appear clearly and orderly before the traveller's eyes. The traveller can be at ease and the perspective extends to where Earth meets Sky. Perhaps both the anthropomorphic images of eeler and the legends about places and landscape become more elaborate, concrete and highly detailed where the landscape itself is more complicated, blurred and difficult to grasp - as in the forest. One goes from one place to the next, grasping each place through clear-cut images and stories. In the steppe, the immediate experience of space becomes more important. Places are there, easily accessible, but are perceived more as indications of power and energy enclosed in space than as separate entities with a life and history of their own. What is most impressive is the vast space of the steppe, with chains of mountain peaks ringing the horizon." (Halemba 72)
arzhan suu - a sacred spring with healing properties
yiyk tuular - a mountain (tuu) that is massive and high but at the same time round and friendly looking. Such mountains are difficult to climb and in most cases climbing them is forbidden. These are mountains that act as shelter, refuge, sacred, safety, wind-proof, quiet, secret, hidden --usually huge round glamorous mountains. Only when one's life is in extreme turmoil is one sometimes advised to climb one, but even then one needs to prepare through ritual and offerings. But some huge and glamorous round mountains are not always yiyk and can turn hostile if mistreated, as if located to the west of the village (the direction in Telengit culture of evil) or if tourists often climb it for recreation (this turns the mountain sour on people). This is because yiyk mountains are also bailu jerler, places with rules or injunctions, with strict rules of behavior to be followed. Mountains, whether yiyk or not, still have eelü - having a Master Spirit (Halemba 67-70)
also such bailu jerler places - arzhan suu, üle, or kam tyt
But they are also merged experientially with everyday living in a landscape of local features, a specific physical landscape, with its graves, sacred sites, routes to the underworld (tunnels, animal burrows, earth cracks, holes, sewers, subterranea, etc.) and to the upperworld (tops of trees, mountains, towers, clouds, rainbow, storms, etc.).
Thus the shamanic landscape is holistic, merging the cosmic landscape (upper-here-lower) with the local landscape --the actual, real physical features where you live. What is the shamanic landscape of your place?
It is not a landscape of good or evil, light or dark, but all of it swirled together. It is an eristic worldview with an open acknowledgement of conflict and battle and risk. Graham Harvey says, "The shaman is a hero who makes a bold and necessary intervention into cosmic processes. The power to act is precarious and this human action is fraught with danger."
By their liminal actions and movements and roles, shamans are dissidents, anti-centrists, troublemakers, the big risk-takers, the edge-riders.
Traditional societies have both the liminal specialists, "anti-structure" specialists written of by anthropologist Victor Turner -shamans, witches, clowns- who represent chaos, and those of "structure", the elders, priests, medicine societies, and government officials.
On an ordinary human level of everyday social existence, anti-structure or chaos, is often seen as evil, because that is the tumult, the wild destroyer.
And yet the clowns and shaman and witch, chaos-riders, have their roles, because ironically, it is chaos that adds life and change, and upsets stagnation. While chaos and storms can destroy society and the human psyche, so also can dullness, stagnation, and decay.
Both structure and antistructure are needed, chaos and regularity, for life and a healthy human society to be sustained and continue on. At times you need a priest and an elder, but when things get really "bound up" then it is time to call in the shaman and the sacred clown.
Harvey, Graham. Shamanism: A Reader. Routledge, 2002.
Turner, Victor. The Ritual Process.
-------
=====
The following notes from Agnieszka Halemba's The Telengits of Southern Siberia: landscape, religion, and knowledge in motion:
ee (Telengit) and ejin (Daur) - A 'master' or 'host' of a certain place; applied at several levels:
-spiritual entities like the masters of mountains, lakes or rivers
-people, such as the master of a house, or the Emperor
The concept allows people to talk about the inner or concealed power of entities and create relationships with them.
ee/ejin can be understood through such notions as 'power' and 'spiritual energy', such as the ee/ejin of certain places, specific sites or a region as a whole (such as the Altai). Related concepts-
eelü - 'with ee'
eelü jer - 'a place with ee'
eelü ooru - 'an illness which has to be treated by a shaman, not in a hospital, because it was an action by a spirit being that is related to the illness' appearance'
ee - can be used while describing the power of particular places; but also 'masters', 'hosts' or 'spiritual beings'
altaidyng eezi - the power of a particular place, in the Altai
kizhining eezi - a person is ee of their house, herd and belongings; the ee is not a separate entity or additional aspect of a person.
A person with eelü has a kind of spiritual energy or power
jaiachy - a spiritual guardian in human, animal or other form such as a light or sparkle
jerding eezi - the eezi of a place that can take on a human or animal image. Stands for the whole or a part at the same time (metonym).
Altaidyng eezi pertains to a place in the Altai or the Altai as a whole for example- even the master spirit of all the Altai.
-As the Master of the whole of Altai, Altaidyng eezi is most often imagined as similar to the White Old Man, a spiritual being in Inner Asia who is master of mountains and rivers, and can kubulyp - 'transform' into the form of a fox, deer, or other animal - a kind of spiritual energy important for its very essence more than the form/image it takes.
-As the master of a particular place in the Altai, eezi most often in the form of a young, unmarried girl, though there are male and female eeler of all ages.
Each significant place is eelü but only some of the eeler are known to people in a particular form. There are more stories about eeler of certain places than the Altaidyng eezi of all Altai.
The eezi of a particular place can be katu (hard) or jymzhak (soft).
It is difficult to live in a katu eelü place- cattle do not flourish there, the weather is unpredictable, capricious. Most of the male eeler are katu.
A jymzhak eelü place is welcoming to people. Most of the female eeler are jymzhak.
This reminds me of male and female rain.
jer - the earth, a country, a place
altai can substitute for such terms as yurt, house, village, district, country, or world of the dead
It seemed to Halemba that eezi was being replaced by the notion of kudai. A kudai is more like a particular, singular deity, a god, rather than the more subtle multiplicity of eezi and its relationship to the concept of Altaidyng eezi. This is probably a simplification due to the influence of monotheism and Christianity. God is spoken of as kudai. It seems less mystic and more simplified, less differentiated. To Halemba kudai reflected a construction of nationalistic identity as Altai, rather than the older tribal concepts. The older cults connected with specific tribes and eezi territories are being replaced by the simplified kudai concept.
Another interesting concept is when she takes journey across the land with two different groups, a group of intellectuals and a group of indigenous Telengits:
"The first was more like a pilgrimage to a sequence of significant places, which were expected to be there, waiting for people, as points of spiritual power. The second, with the Telengits, was more about movement itself, about mobility as a mode of knowing." (p. 71)
In fact, there is an idea that mountains can change or move in many indigenous cultures. It is instead later expansions by Buddhism that is related to the subjugation of land. Before, local deities occupied the land, the land "as an agent with great potential for change and movement. These deities were sometimes equated with features of the landscape, so it was impossible to say if a particular mountain was worshipped as a place or as an abode of a certain spirit. The mountains/spirits were often inseparable and were seen as sources of movement, flexibility and change. ...Some of the mountains [called 'flying mountains'] were not always there...they move from place to place, following the prayers of people, their own whim or the orders of powerful kings." (Halemba 71)
"Inhabited parts of central and northern Altai are covered with forests and small hills, while winding valleys separate higher peaks. The rich landscape does not reveal itself all at once, and a traveller cannot see what awaits beyond the next turn of the track. By contrast, the steppe of Kosh-Agach district gives a very different impression. The elements of the landscape appear clearly and orderly before the traveller's eyes. The traveller can be at ease and the perspective extends to where Earth meets Sky. Perhaps both the anthropomorphic images of eeler and the legends about places and landscape become more elaborate, concrete and highly detailed where the landscape itself is more complicated, blurred and difficult to grasp - as in the forest. One goes from one place to the next, grasping each place through clear-cut images and stories. In the steppe, the immediate experience of space becomes more important. Places are there, easily accessible, but are perceived more as indications of power and energy enclosed in space than as separate entities with a life and history of their own. What is most impressive is the vast space of the steppe, with chains of mountain peaks ringing the horizon." (Halemba 72)
arzhan suu - a sacred spring with healing properties
yiyk tuular - a mountain (tuu) that is massive and high but at the same time round and friendly looking. Such mountains are difficult to climb and in most cases climbing them is forbidden. These are mountains that act as shelter, refuge, sacred, safety, wind-proof, quiet, secret, hidden --usually huge round glamorous mountains. Only when one's life is in extreme turmoil is one sometimes advised to climb one, but even then one needs to prepare through ritual and offerings. But some huge and glamorous round mountains are not always yiyk and can turn hostile if mistreated, as if located to the west of the village (the direction in Telengit culture of evil) or if tourists often climb it for recreation (this turns the mountain sour on people). This is because yiyk mountains are also bailu jerler, places with rules or injunctions, with strict rules of behavior to be followed. Mountains, whether yiyk or not, still have eelü - having a Master Spirit (Halemba 67-70)
also such bailu jerler places - arzhan suu, üle, or kam tyt