Hi again,
Sorry to have kept you hanging. Although I have taken a special
interest in your question, I was hesitant about posting an answer
before as I didn't really have anything conclusive, just clues that
may or may not have been relevant. I now feel I can give you a better
idea, now that I have communicated with three experts.
The first person I discussed this case with, like I told you before,
felt they resembled Voodoo, Juju or Tahitian Magical glyphs, (perhaps
depicting a deity), but they were symbols that he had never
encountered before. This was his opinion. He added that the "vibe" he
got from them was not positive, and that's really all he could say
about it. The other person, who knows more about these religious
practices, also did not recognize the symbols as being Voodoo, Juju or
Haitian, though the "vibe" she got was more neutral. So, I was left
with a big question mark. I decided to contact University of
Saskatchewan history professor Frank Klaassen, who is one of the
world's leading researchers on medieval magic, and I was waiting for
his response.
Here's a page on Professor Klaassen
http://www.usask.ca/communications/ocn/03-oct-31/news02.shtml
I have to say I was dissapointed that I had nothing concrete to go on
at this point, and though I don't profess to know a great deal about
these matters, I appreciate the power of symbols, and the vibration
they can carry. To me these symbols did not mean much, but I was very
interested in how you described them to me, and what your motivation
was to have them tattooed on your body. I got the impression your
perception of the symbols was positive, or you wouldn't have tattooed
something on your body that you felt uncomfortable with. This is what
I wanted to establish with you first.
Anyway, I decided to do some random searching on the internet to see
what I could uncover. For some reason, the letter "cheema" (pronounced
"ch") from the Coptic Alphabet immediately caught my eye on this page:
http://www.geocities.com/nu_isis/fonts.html
(bottom row, 5th column)
"The Coptic alphabet is variant of the Greek alphabet containing a
number of extra letters for sounds not found in Greek. The extra
letters come from the Demotic form of the Egyptian script. The Coptic
alphabet came into being during the 3rd century BC after the Greek
conquest of Egypt and the subsequent spread of Christianity.
(..)
Coptic, a Semitic language which evolved from ancient Egyptian. Coptic
was an official language in Egypt until around the 13th Century AD,
when it was replaced by Arabic. Nowadays Coptic Christians all speak
Arabic as their every day language, but use Coptic in their religious
ceremonies."
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/coptic.htm
Then by chance, I came across John Dee's "Hieroglyphic Monad" (Monas
Hieroglyphica) - a glyph created by Dr. John Dee for his seventeenth
century treatise on symbolic language.
"This is John Dee's enigmatic treatise on symbolic language. Although
published in 1564 at age 37, he considered it valuable throughout his
life. The Monas is a highly esoteric work. In it he claims himself in
possession of the most secret mysteries. He wrote it in twelve days
while apparently in a peak (mystical) state: ?[I am] the pen merely of
[God] Whose Spirit, quickly writing these things through me, I wish
and I hope to be.? He claims it will revolutionize astronomy, alchemy,
mathematics, linguistics, mechanics, music, optics, magic, and
adeptship."
http://www.esotericarchives.com/dee/monad.htm
Though the Hieroglyphic Monad isn't identical to your tattoo in every
way, if you stretch your imagination you can see similarities if you
compare the two carefully.
Your symbol
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~oien0017/photos/02.jpg
Hieroglyphic Monad glyph
http://www.esotericarchives.com/dee/monad24.gif
Then later today, Professor Klaassen responded:
"Although I am usually dubious about finding exact matches in cases like
this, the figure actually looks very much like the Hieroglyphic Monad of
John Dee. He regarded this symbol to be a kind of archetypal key to the
structure of creation. For what it is worth this would be a very benign
thing to have tattooed on one's body.
There are several on-line sites with pictures and translations of the
text. I cannot vouch for their accuracy, but the pictures are accurate.
The link below shows the frontice piece of the book by John Dee (the
monad is in the middle) and you can see a re-rendering of the figure at
the bottom of the page on the left."
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Oracle/8465/monad/1monad.htm
As his response confirmed my findings, I now feel confident enough to
post an answer.
This has been a very interesting exercise for me on many levels, and I
hope you find this information useful.
Sorry it took some time!
If you have any questions, feel free to request clarification.
All the best,
jackburton-ga |
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