Sardinia: Land of Dea Madre

I have been back from my study trip to Sardinia and Italy for over a month now. As I re-settle into my familiar life, I feel different. Traveling to lands and sacred sites where evidence of the Goddess is irrefutable gives me a new spark and added hope. Since these times in which we live are indeed perilous, as the global wanton dis-ease of the hatred of women spreads, going unnamed and unnoticed, while simultaneously claiming victory as the number-one most inhumane, degrading, violent, deadly, destructive, disastrous and unspeakably painful force on our planet, I felt nurtured by the living presence of the Great Mother, Dea Madre, in Sardinia.

When one has an opportunity (and I am fully aware that this opportunity is not afforded most people in the world, therefore, I am deeply and profoundly grateful for it in my life) to stand on and touch the Motherland where her children lived in complete and total respect for her presence and abundant bounty, one can experience a profound change at a cellular level. While I believe this same consciousness existed here in the soil of my birth (USA), there is something tangible still existing in Sardinia, an island off the coast of Italy, thought by some to be Atlantis, whose rugged and serene shores are graced by the turquoise-sapphire waters of the Mediterranean. Sardinia herself is the Great Mother. Her immense beauty and great diversity--oak cork groves, stunning grottos sheltering millions of years-old stalagmites, mysteriously shaped granite rocks carved by the mistral winds of time, millennia-old olive trees, brilliant red poppies dancing among ancient ruins, stunning ancestral triangle wells of the Goddess, Neolithic sacred sites, beehive shaped rock-hewn structures, uterine shaped giant tombs, and ancient Goddess figurines-have given her the name "Dea Madre", or Goddess Mother.

Because Westerners, white ones in particular, have generally not been raised with the lineages and legacies of our ancient ancestors, many of us are bereft of a true deep connection to the wisdom of the mother-as if we are cast adrift floating on a turbulent sea waiting for rescue, not knowing our own plight. In Sardinia "Dea Madre" lives in the hearts of the people-she is a primal living legacy. Here in the USA, Goddess reality is usually marginalized into some sort of "esoteric feminism", suggesting that feminism itself is a non-viable world-view. Nothing could be more viable. In Sardinia, everyone seems to know Dea Madre. Even though Christianity made its arrogant presence known in Sardinia, it did not entirely usurp the pagan/goddess reality it encountered. To this day, in some parts of the interior, people practice earth-worship and paganism, maintain a form of matriarchal family structure, hold land in common and pass on healing ways through the oral lineages of women.

I asked our guide about the rich Italian strega (witch) tradition. He replied that strega has a reputation like witch does in our culture-something bad and scary, quite similar to the demonizing of women healers in patriarchy, as in the inquisition. I was saddened to encounter this reality. It shows the presence of the ubiquitous layer of patriarchal domination that we must eradicate. Even though I was sad about yet another way in yet another place of the normalized disrespect of women, I was nonetheless happy to hear what he had to say about the Sardinian women living deep in the interior. He spoke of female healers in a very respectful way. He told us the Sardinian women healers, known as majarzas, keep paganism alive and do not accept money for their services. He was proud to report this-proud to be Sardinian where paganism/earth spirituality is still a way of life for some, and very clear about communicating that Christianity had not taken the earth out of his people.

Tracking the African roots of the Goddess was the focus of our study trip, organized by feminist cultural historian, Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum, whose theory about African migrations and return Semitic migrations found validation as we uncovered crucial evidence she identifies as central to her theory. For instance, we visited ancient Neolithic burial sites, like the necropolis of Montessu, circa 3500 BCE--graves cut into the hillside with spirals and pubic V's etched in stone, flushed with red ochre and the Dea Madre carved into rock (excitedly pointed out to us by a tour guide who was just leaving the site who wanted to make sure we saw her. His words about her came off his lips as easily and as naturally as a simple greeting. Not only was I stunned by her carved image in the rock, I was also stunned by his "of course, there is Dea Madre, you must see her" passionate manner. A man, no less--a man not threatened nor in competition with the Goddess Mother. That, in and of itself, was also a remarkable experience). Lucia's "theory" (I personally don't view this as a theory at all, but rather irrefutable fact), explicitly explained in her book, dark mother, African origins and godmothers, posits that African migrants traversed every continent of the globe, taking with them the values of a dark woman deity-equality, nurturance and justice with compassion-some 50,000 years BCE. We visited other sacred sites confirming this-the likes of which I did not know before going to Sardinia. Some of the iconic Goddess Mother imagery bears a likeness to the Cycladic Goddess imagery, and some of it I had never seen before, though the corpulent round shape of her was very familiar to me from my travels to other sacred places in Europe, and through the work of the late eminent arecheomythologist, Marija Gimbutas, as well as through other feminist researchers and scholars like Monica Sjoo and Barbara Mor.

A magnificent structure, said to be constructed circa 1500 BCE by the mysterious Nuraghi civilization (a Bronze age culture from 1500-500 BCE that built large stone bee-hive like structures. There are several thousand of these structures, called nuraghe, throughout Sardinia, and this culture is the subject of much debate.), a sacred well renamed by Christians as St. Cristina's, took our breath away. There in the countryside was this magnificent sacred 3500 year-old ritual well, its triangular/yonic opening carved into the earth with steps leading down to the sacred waters of the goddess. To us, it was unmistakably a well constructed in the shape of Tanit, the North African goddess of Carthage, widely known throughout the ancient Mediterranean. The stairs descend to a small pool of water, held by a large rounded stone-hewn structure resembling a uterus deep within the earth. Looking up through the uterus-shape one could see spirals of light winding to the top where a perfectly round opening emerges above ground. At the equinox, the sun's rays penetrate the triangle, touching each step as the light meets the sacred mirror waters within the body of the mother, reflecting directly up through the womb-opening at the top at ground level. Every 18 ½ years the moon, at the solstice, on her path of descent, is mirrored in the circular opening, her light bouncing off the sacred water within, traveling up the stairs, emerging from the yonic gateway at ground level. This sacred place is indeed an amazing feat of astronomical architecture. This year, 2004, the moon will work her magic at this most holy well at the time of the winter solstice. I could feel the presence of Dea Madre as I sat at the edge of the stairs, witnessing the dripping water from the uterine wall of stone, scooping the precious water in my hand and anointing myself with it. I could feel the deep veneration and peace of her wisdom and the very ancient, global, yoni-versal (meaning the "song of the yoni"-from my perspective, a truly wonderful way to perceive the "universe") presence of her being.

After such an experience, I was shocked to hear a male tourist view the well and exclaim "phallic" something. Though I don't know exactly what he was saying, as he was speaking Italian, I could feel his lack of understanding at what he was viewing. I felt deeply protective, and felt a call to educate. I went to the small information sign posted to the side of the well, and spoke to the woman who had been with him (the man had apparently gone off somewhere else) and told her that it was not a phallic site at all, that it was a sacred site of Dea Madre, whose likeness was shown on the sign, though with vague explanation. She listened to my English as best she could, and I felt that we had an understanding that women are sometimes able to share regardless of cultural and linguistic differences. It is common to find a strong male bias in archeological explanations, both in scholastic writing, in museums and at sacred sites, so why wouldn't the man have thought this to be another "god/he" place? However, I remain impressed by the general acknowledgment of Dea Madre in Sardinia. A recent publication about this sacred well, Il tempio a pozzo di Santa Cristina, by Franco Laner, which I bought at the small on-site gift shop, speaks to the goddess mother symbolism of Tanit. Thank Goddess.

As we wound our way through the pristine beauty of the countryside of Sardinia, we stopped at archeological sites and museums that further validated the evidence of Dea Madre as well as the presence of African influence. For me, this tour was more than academic interest. It was a deepening of my connection to the understanding of ancestral origins, sacred earth spirituality, reclaiming the true religion of our planet, restoring feminine power to its rightful place as well as uncovering the layers of truth smothered by the patriarchal lies of his-story. Entering a church in the capital of Sardinia, Cagliari, I was completely taken aback by the deep ebony statue of a nude African tribal woman resting in the corner to the left of the front entrance. Her presence was totally astonishing. The explanation was that St. Augustine, to whom the church is dedicated, was African, and I might add, a terrible misogynist. And yet, here in the house of "god" was this African woman divinity. I felt the church was really hers. There were also many symbols of female divinity and paganism, such as a carved snake coiled around the base of a pedestal, spiral and yonic motifs on altar boxes and remarkable black madonnas.

Black madonnas are plentiful in Sardinia. Lucia's observation is that black madonnas appear along African migration routes. Patriarchal explanations say they are black because they are reflecting the fact that they were carved from wood, or that they are covered with smoke from a fire. However, when I stand in the presence of a black Madonna, I can feel her ancient origins wearing the garb of Christian co-option. I have felt this before in a church in Malta. In one church we came across a Dutch artist whose particular area of interest was Ethopia. He had a display of his art depicting the black Madonna amidst her people-it was so inspiring to me that I bought one of his vibrant and brightly colored paintings: the black Madonna at Pentecost surrounded by shining, adoring African faces. To me, his rendition of the Madonna holds within it the memory of the very ancient dark mother of all (see my article Luminous Dark Mother at www.awakenedwoman.com under my previous name, Leslene McIntyre). The adoration in the eyes of the people he painted glows with the same deep love one can witness between mother and child.

Many places in Sardinia abound with tales of miracles of the Madonna. Even though my interest usually circles around more ancient cultures, I found myself completely amazed at the religious focus on Dea Madre in her contemporary form as Mother Mary within the more christianized places of Sardinia. The focus was not on Jesus-it was on the feminine-the mother, Dea Madre. In one small sanctuary we visited, we found a rosary in the gift shop in the shape of the biological symbol of the female! It was reminiscent of Tanit, as the ancient memory of the Goddess appeared before us in this form. We were all stunned, astonished, moved. And needless to say, many of us purchased the rosary. The picture on the little card tucked in the pocket of the carrying case is a black Madonna.

In many churches of the Black Madonna, and no doubt, churches in general, there are traces of early paganism, Goddess spirituality and earth-worship. We saw amazing black stone spiral pillars surrounding black Madonnas, yonic symbols, spiral motifs, snakes, rosettes, statues of nurturing women, and folk art. In Rome, I was deeply struck by a magnificent large stained-glass window of three honeybees, well known to be sacred to the Goddess, particularly in pre-patriarchal Crete and the Mediterranean. Honeybees are a cooperative matristic society, something we could all stand to learn from and remember from our ancestors. There they were, in great colored-glass beauty, emanating the radiance of the goddess as the light of the sun held them in her warm embrace. This church, as are so many, was built on a holy goddess site of the ancient Near-Eastern Goddess, Cybele.

In one church I visited, I had a very unusual experience. Some churches have a place where one can purchase religious art-postcards, iconography, posters, and rosaries. When I went to pay for some postcards, the elderly man behind the counter came around and spoke to me in excited Italian, which I didn't understand. He beckoned me to sit down, and kissed me on both cheeks. He gifted me a large poster of Mary and a card with a picture of St. Monica, the African-born mother of St. Augustine, with a poem titled "Prayer for Mothers." I couldn't help but feel that he knew on some level I was a Goddess Mother devotee, a mother myself, and that Dea Madre, Mary, St. Monica and myself were all the same Mother. I also felt he had a deep reverence for mothers in general, which is rare, and had absolutely no shame in expressing his true and deep veneration of the Goddess to me. Though he probably did not use the word "Goddess", his sharing about her was unmistakable.

Visiting the Villa Giula Etruscan Museum in Rome was a very interesting experience. After having seen the ancient tomb of the "Giants", Coddu Vecchu, a Nuraghi megalithic monument in Sardinia resembling a large uterus with a yonic entrance carved in stone in the front, I was deeply impressed by the people who built such a structure. I was then amazed to see hand-fashioned terra cotta uteri resting on the shelves of artifacts from the Etruscan culture in the museum in Rome. The mysterious Etruscans, inhabiting northern Italy somewhere between 900-800 BCE, were a pre-Indo European culture favoring egalitarianism far more than the Greek and Roman world. I felt I was seeing once again another thread of the ancient Mother Goddess as she wove her way through the chthonic, psycho-spiritual, biological flowing memory-field of her many children, first from Africa to the rest of the world.

The actual building of yonic/womb/tomb structures and the handcrafting of clay wombs by peoples from these two different cultures spanning hundreds of years reveal a definite message for anyone willing to see. Upon viewing the clay uteri, I remembered that my friend had previously pointed out to me a famous and unusual swaddled baby Jesus figure in a church we had visited. It struck me that the swaddling looked very much like the clay uteri I had viewed in the museum. Perhaps the swaddling was symbolic of the mother's womb. Viewing the clay forms also gave me pause for reflection on the great stone beehive type structures of the Nuragi. My mind swirled with pictures of honeybees, beehives, and the bee-body shape of the clay uteri. I could feel a kind of ancient intuitive connectedness with the ancestors across time.

Because I was on a spiritual pilgrimage paying homage to the Goddess Mother, which is my passion, I was deeply impacted by the patriarchal split I experienced as well. This split is everywhere-including deep within our own psyches. It is a split reflecting the usurpation of the ancient values of woman-centered life and female divinity by androcentrism and narcissistic, phallocentric, "religious" domination. At the same time I saw the black Madonna in the extravagant churches I saw the black Madonna begging on the steps of the church, outside the heavy doors. The dark-skinned women, old and young alike, sitting at church entrances, begging for money to eat, to feed their children, or for medicine, posed a stark contrast to the veneration of the black Madonna icons gracing the very ornate inner sanctuaries of these gilded structures, considered to be places of worship. My heart ached for the obvious and arrogant inequality, as the men inside the churches (priests, etc.) didn't seem to see their Madonna sitting on the steps outside, begging for mercy.

When I gave them money, their faces lit up with a kind of eternal/maternal love that held no anger or malice. I was particularly moved by one woman. She was very old, it seemed, bent over like a tree that had been constantly blown by a forceful shaping wind. She walked the sidewalk in front of a church, humbly holding her small cup in front of her. I could not see her face, as she was so bent over, though I could feel her timelessness. I stuck a bill under her fingers so that she had a grip on it. I said "Buon giorno" to her, and she replied, "Buon giorno" in a sweet, quiet voice. I felt she was Dea Madre, bowed by the pain of women's oppression, walking, walking, waiting to be seen. The gift of her sweet presence will be with me for the rest of my life. I feel to be that sweet in the midst of such burden is something that only an old woman can know.

Then there was the dark-skinned gypsy mother with her two children sitting on the sidewalk-Dea Madre of the streets. Her darkness wasn't because she was carved from wood or covered by smoke. Her two children fearlessly approached me, holding out their small hands, eager to receive anything my white privilege would give them. I gave them some loose coins, which felt like a pittance. I walked along on my way, the image of their mother staying with me, her presence asking me to open my heart. I went back to her and gave her some money and took some bag lunches we had been given that were packed with an abundance of food and gave them to her. I looked into her face, and saw myself. I experienced her open heart brimming with love and gratitude welling up in her deep brown eyes. There she was once more, the begging Dea Madre. These women meant more to me than I can say. I know that when the women and children are cared for the same way the stone churches are, Dea Madre will truly bless us with her grace. Until that time, we are destined to suffer in confusion, because if she who gives birth, and has done so since the dawn of time, beginning with the first dark mother of Africa, is not venerated, then so goes all life.

I have brought home with me the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of a little-known place that will live in me for a very long time, particularly the many faces and mysterious presence of Dea Madre. I am thrilled the archeological evidence in Sardinia provides Lucia with further affirmation of her passionate discourse on our African heritage and human beginnings, for the values of the dark woman deity must be restored in order that peace be remembered and sustained. It is equally important we remember the dark mother as the mother of all, for she is the living truth. Our ancestors knew what we must remember. This truth is finding its way into the scientific community as in astrophysics, for instance, in which the "Mother Universe" theory explaining what happened before the so-called big bang (which I call the big she-bang) posits our genesis from "a timeless dimension that has always existed and always will, bearing daughter universes down an endless corridor of time." (U.S. News and World Report, Mysteries of Outer Space, p.14, December 2003.) A theory, I might add, not unlike the very way the honeybee recreates itself.

To Dea Madre

I feel you sighing through the starry mists of ancient mistral time
Your great granite breasts nurture Earth and Sky
My daughter-self, fruit of your great sacred womb
Breathes your sweet essence.
Liquid turquoise and sapphire gently lick your sandy softness,
Red, blue, purple, yellow and pink
Ecstasy
Flowers across your expansive earth body.
Red magenta blood cork trees glisten in your
Musty forests.
Great, great grandmother olive tree,
Roots alive held deep in your dark body,
Branches catch the whisper of your voice on the wind….
Dea Madre
My heart weeps for you and for me and for us all
You, begging on the sidewalk, dark eyes shining
You, walking the cement sidewalk, pacing, waiting
You, dark mother, your children with hands open
Searching my face for coins
My heart opens
I can think of nothing else
I see you and my spirit cries
"What has happened?"