Sacred Signs
Symbols and Cosmologies
Streamable video surveying cosmic maps, labyrinths, vulva signs, ancestor eyes, the blessing hand, stars, and spirals, spirals, spirals. We look at the Ankh and Tyet of Isis (knots as amulets); the Reed Bundle of Inanna; Ollín ("movement") and the Goddess of Teotihuacan; Nyame Dua (Ashanti, “altar of the Divine"); Four Moments of the Sun (Congo); Nun and Nummo (Egyptian and Dogon). Sri Chakra ("holy wheel") considered to be the embodiment of Goddess in India, and Tai Ji ("the great ultimate") in China.
Signs and patterns on ancient ceramic painting, calabash art, embroidery, tattoos and body paint. "The women's belt," from Isis to bronze age Denmark to the Maidu in California. Images drawn from ancient ceramic paintings, petroglyphs, amulets,
embroidery, statues, codices, tablets, tattoos, and body-painting, from
all over the world. Signs in ground "paintings" vévés (Haiti), kolam / rangoli (India).
Video Sacred Signs ©2018 Max Dashu
Course Curriculum
Your Instructor
Max Dashu founded the Suppressed Histories Archives in 1970 to research and document global women's history, reflecting the full spectrum of the world's peoples. She uses images to teach, scanning the cultural record: archaeology, history, art, orature, linguistics and spiritual philosophies. From her collection of some 50,000 images, she has created 130 visual talks on female cultural heritages, foregrouding Indigenous traditions, with attention to patterns of conquest and domination. She is internationally known for her expertise on ancient female iconography, matricultures and patriarchal systems, medicine women and shamans, witch hunts, and female spheres of power.
Dashu's legendary visual talks bring to light female realities usually hidden from view, from ancient female figurines to women leaders, priestesses, clan mothers, philosophers, warriors and rebels. Her courses scan the cultural record—archaeology, history, art, orature, linguistics, and spiritual philosophies—making this knowledge more accessible to all education backgrounds.
Dashu has been presenting her visual talks for more than four decades, at universities, conferences, museums, community centers, bookstores, galleries, libraries and schools, in North America, Italy, Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Britain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Bulgaria, Austria, Australia, Mexico and Guatemala.
Max Dashu's book Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700-1000 (Veleda Press, 2016) has been acclaimed as a sourcebook on European ancestral traditions. Her forthcoming Pythias, Melissae, and Pharmakides: Women in Hellenic Culture will be the second book in her 16-volume series Secret History of the Witches.
Dashu has published in various journals and anthologies, including Goddesses in World Mythology (Praeger 2010) and the Encyclopedia of Women in World Religion (ABC-Clio 2018). She created two videos: Women's Power in Global Perspective (2008) and Woman Shaman: The Ancients (2013). Her daily posts on the Suppressed Histories Facebook page are followed by 181,000 people, and 72,000 more have viewed her articles on Academia.edu.
Articles, gallery and resources on the Suppressed Histories Archives website
Books by Max Dashu from Veleda Press
History Sibyl audio podcasts: www.sourcememory.net/maxdashu
Veleda blog by Max Dashu: www.sourcememory.net/veleda
Daily posts from the Suppressed Histories Archives on Facebook
Art by Max Dashu: www.maxdashu.net
Suppressed Histories Portal on Instagram
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Frequently Asked Questions
I will be adding more content to this course in the future, but for now it is a stream on demand video.