Moving

or a while now I've been thinking of giving this blog a fresh face, and I've finally started the process. Check out my new digs at solesisterjuliet.wordpress.com. I'm still tweaking things there, but that is the fun part, right? I'll post 'alerts' here for awhile, but the wordpress site will be THE site shortly.

Barbara Butler McCoy

[[Photo: Roundhouse Railroad Museum; Savannah, GA; August 2011]]

Musings.17: Barbara

ven as I write this I am amazed and excited to share quite an interesting development regarding illuminated Christian texts in the Western world, such as the "Book of Kells" in Ireland, that is appearing in this work.

The story until recently has been that of "ragged scribes in a lonely struggle to preserve Christian culture from the forces of darkness." One's imagination shifts into overdrive picturing Irish monks perched at tall desks in the scriptoriums of monasteries at the edge of Western civilization, the Dark Ages rolling inexorably toward the island. One hears the sea through the slit windows, crashing against the rocks and shore.

As related in a recent story in the magazine The Economist, scholars are studying religious texts from the library at the monastery of Saint Catherine on Mount Sinai "whose foundation in the mid-sixth century roughly coincides with the spread of Christianity, and hence Latin writing, from Ireland to Scotland - whence it later shifted to the north of England."

"...the Sinai collection is vast and diverse. Along with over 6,000 early printed books, there are 3,300 manuscripts in a dozen languages, mainly Greek, Georgian, Slavonic and three Semitic tongues - Arabic, Syriac and Aramaic."

Put simply, as Christianity was spreading from Ireland to Scotland roughly 1,400 years ago, the monastery of Saint Catherine on Mount Sinai and its library of Christian manuscripts was being founded. Christians in the East were preserving texts at the same time the monks in Ireland were copying and preserving such texts.

Michelle Brown, professor of medieval manuscript studies at the University of London, and paleographer and art historian, has extensive experience studying and describing northern European manuscripts held by the British Library. She "believes that scribes from the British Isles may have worked on the slopes of Mount Sinai, writing in Latin." The Irish monks may not have been as isolated as previously thought.

Beyond the use of ornate capitals at strategic points of a manuscript (or the opening of blog posts), how does this story relate to Melissa's latest dream? The answer is - Utah. A companion piece to this article discusses efforts to digitize ancient manuscripts from various sources. The data and images are secured in repositories under the mountains of Utah.

I was happily surprised when I realized Melissa's dream was alluding to this story in The Economist. While I have no idea where in the mountains of Utah these repositories might be I needed moonlight and a body of water in the mountains. Consulting my atlas I found Moon Lake, east of Salt Lake City, near the Uinta Mountains, the High Uintas Wilderness Area, and the Uinta and Ouray Indian Reservation.

Now I must propose a more startling question: Why is all of this pointing to a link between Melissa and William Shakespeare's 'Juliet'? This blog, as I hope you recall, is to explore the character 'Melissa' as it develops. I promise you I did not see this coming!

The first hint of Juliet I find in this, oddly enough, is at the end of the dream when the crow and the swan appear together with the 'J' - shaped dagger that Melissa carries away in flight. My mind flashed to the instrument of Juliet's 'death', then I recalled Benvolio's boast that he would make Romeo "think thy swan a crow." (I.iii.94) That triggered the realization that Romeo leapt the orchard wall after the ball to try to get a further glimpse of Juliet. So, I saw a correspondence to the opening of this dream - Melissa standing in an orchard.

The strongest connection I see, however, is found in Juliet's musing there on her balcony: "Deny thy father and refuse thy name." (II.ii.37) We saw evidence that Melissa may be doing just that when she discovered the abandoned St. Clair Shores. The message from her father is rather clear, I would say, but Melissa appears to be ignoring it.

Irish monks. Monks at Saint Catherine's on Mount Sinai. Illuminated Christian manuscripts. Mountains in Utah. The crow and the swan. The dagger.

Some questions answered, others proposed.

[[Bibliography: "Illuminating a dark age." The Economist 18 December 2010: 149-151]]

[[Photo: Apothecary shop in Hendersonville, NC; June 27, 2011; Barbara Butler McCoy]]

Swan: 'Melissa'

he serenity in the snowy moonlit orchard felt complete, so much so that it was moments before I realized I was in a dream. Happily, my Crow was there and he seemed eager to lead me hop by hop, branch by branch, through the orchard. I tried not to disturb the silence, but once or twice I happened to kick some withered apples on the path (Rome Beauties, perhaps?).

We hadn't gone far when I began to see fleeting movement among the trees. I thought it mist at first, but when I stopped and focused on the movement I realized the 'mist' was a woman's filmy gown floating around her as she danced a winding path beneath the branches.

I heard neither birdsong nor human music accompanying her dance, only silence, sylvan silence. She appeared so ethereal I was surprised to see snow sift over her satin slippers when once she passed nearly close enough to touch. I resisted my urge to touch the hem of her rose-sprigged gown and followed my Crow out of the orchard and beyond, until he bade me climb upon his back. We flew.

We flew to a place that reminded me of "The Faraway Nearby" - majestic mountains, sovereign in the landscape. I saw a lake or pool lit by the moon, and I saw two parallel strips of light, almost like a landing strip in the mountains.

When we drew closer I saw that the lights were actually discarded pie tins affixed to sticks. I also saw that the landing strip was still under construction, so to speak, and that the 'technician' was the little girl who'd played music for the King of Faery, who'd fashioned wings for leprechauns in the labyrinth.

Too soon we landed and I had to walk on land once again. My Crow was hushed and watchful, as if awaiting someone or something. I waited with him. In the deepest darkness before dawn a magnificent swan flew in to land on the lake. The ripples of the swan's landing had barely ceased when, without warning, Cupid darted from a blind and shot a fatal arrow into the swan's heart.

She (the swan seemed to me to be female) struggled to reach us and collapsed, successful, at the Crow's feet. He ministered to her with sweet and exquisite care. When it was evident that she was gone he hopped a short distance away, then returned with a steel dagger fashioned as the letter 'J'. After he dropped the dagger into my lap he held up one of the swan's wings.

Horrified, I realized he wished me to cut off her wings, to mutilate that magnificent creature! I could not bring myself to do it - until I remembered that logic and cause and effect in dreams do not follow the rules of material life.

That is the only way to explain how I was then able to gird my shoulders with those wings and fly off with my Crow, dagger in hand. Only with a dreaming mind can I credit that the swan herself flew off with us.