Dr . Steve Cosh referred me to six large hexagrams that had been found in room J/K Keynsham, Bristol, England. I went to the Rockefeller Museum library and saw on MOSAIC Vo. 25, 1998 p. 12 a painting of this mosaic, made by S.R. Cosh, The hexagram lines are made in the shape of Guilloche. Between each two points there is a swastika. Above the left upper hexagram there’s a cross. The six hexagrams fill the floor of a hexagonal room and encircle a hexagon that serves as a frame for a six petalled flower. This kind of a hexagram mosaic that fills a whole room reminds me of the 3rd century Roman room full of hexagrams in Villa Romana del Casale in the town of Piazza Armerina in Sicily; only there each hexagram is a frame to a bust.
Following is an excerpt from Dr. Steve Cash’s email to me:
There are many interlaced squares in Romano-British mosaics but very few interlaced equilateral triangles(hexagrams). The only ones I can cite are from Keynsham, Bristol, England. It is a grand villa with rooms of hexagonal plan at either end. One has a scheme of hexagons, six of which surrounding the central hexagon contain hexagrams. I assume that this is because of the shape of the room and the usual interlaced squares have been adapted on a purely geometric basis. The mosaic also features Medusa and is probably early fourth century.
Reference:
Mosaic no II, 204.5 in Cosh SR and Neal DS 'Roman Mosaics of Britain
Vol II South-west Britain' 2005.
4 comments:
By interlaced squares do You mean something resembling an eight-rayed star, (just like the ones to be found in mosques) ?
Lucian.
Exactly. I found many interlaced squares in Britain's mosaics. Usually I read that they are decorative elements but I think they have a religious meaning. This shape appears on the Lelingrad codex - see:
http://star-of-david.blogspot.com/2006/05/leningrad-codex.html
errr ... six is the figure of the perfection of Creation (the entire Creation was completed in 6 days; the Seraphim -which are the highest in rank of the Holy Angels- have 6 wings [twain covering their body, twain covering their face and with twain flying]; Adam [the King of the entire Creation -- seen and unseen] was created on the 6th day)
Seven is the figure of the perfection of the Godhead. [God rested on the Seventh Day, which he has also sanctified for Himself].
In Christian Theology, both of these figures are adopted and given an extra-meaning. For instance, Adam was the 1st Prophet. Like all Prophets, according to the Jewish 'integral age' concept, he was conceived (or born) and died on the same day/date [and since he was created on a Friday, he also died on a Friday]. In Christianity, Jesus was the Last and Greatest of all the Prophets (fulfilling all Prophecies). If we are to apply this same concept to Him [which the Christians did as early as the 2nd-3rd centuries at least], then, since He died on a Friday, He also was conceived on a Friday. ... And, what we get from that in return is a perfect symmetry (in Christian Theology, of course), between 'the first man, from earth, earthy' [St. Paul speaking about Adam], and 'the second man, the Lord, from heaven' or 'the last man' [St. Paul speaking about the Christ]. They were both conceived and they both died on the same day: Friday, the sixth day of the week -- six representing humanity [see the resemblance to Adam, the first man], Christ being (from a Christian poin of view) fully man [and, of course He died with His humanity, not with His immortal Divine Nature].
The figure seven is the day of Rest. And, indeed, according to the Christian teaching, Christ rested on the seventh day, the Saturday, in the grave, after re-creating, through His Passion the fallen humanity.
And He rose up on the eighth day, which is the Sunday. Therefore, in Christian thought, (6=Man; 7=God) the number Eight represents the figure of the God-Man Jesus the Christ.
Please excuse me for my VERY lenghty parenthesis, but what I'm trying to say here is that the first 2 numbers were fully represented by the six-pointed Star of David, (whose utter symmetry, quite frankly, simply cries out for a center). So, in order to represent the distinctly-Christian Eight, they've simply crossed two squares, in the same manner the Jews intersected the triangles, since the Shield clearly in no way whatsoever could be made to represent the Eight.
And I think that because this number has a very important significance in Christianity (and I've seen a few icons of Christ in which His entire body is surrounded with an eight-rayed hallow, constructed exactly like two intersected squares; and an icon of the Trinity, in which the Dove above was likewise surrounded by the exact-same-shaped aura of light).
Oh, yeah, ... and another thing (which was actuallly the point I was trying to make all along) : this is NOT the first, NOR the last thing that the Islam ever 'stoled' or 'borrowed' from us ... (beginning with the fact that the entire Coran makes simply numberless references to Christian Apocrypha, to the N.T., to Christian oral Traditions, ... and ending with their stand-on-your-knees-and-bow-your-head-to-the-ground type of prostration).
Lucian.
P.S. : regarding the so-called number of the Beast: it doesn't represent imperfection (as some have thought), but perfection! ... only that it represents the perfection of Creation, ... NOT that of the Creator! And bowing to it represents the stupid confusion and ulterior meaningless replacement of the Creator with His (no matter how important) Creation! Creation is senseless without its Creator! Try to imagine that the evils today are clothed in shiny vestments: we use so-called Humanism to dispose of the Creator (this from a religious point of view -- 'evolutionism'), and to 'preach' :) all sort of anti-human things (like abortion -- only we call it 'choice'). We 'baptize' all those evil things in a seemingly unevil veil. Only we delude ourselves by doing that! Try and compare this bowing to Creation [rather than 'honoring', or 'respecting' it (which, by the way, we should do -- see the fifth Commandment, for instance)] with the words of Jesus : "If you shall love mother and father [allusion to the same 5th commandment] more than Me, you are not worthy of Me; etc."
Oh, yeah, and guess what! ... it appears in Hinduism as a sacred symbol also! See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_of_Lakshmi.
Lucian.
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