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Welcome to my Courtyard. Here I conduct my social activities at AncientWorlds and in Athens. You can leave me a message on my personal message board or take a look at my friends list. Soon you will be able to check my calendar of events as well.
Also, here is the story of my nature and life. There are still many things not known about me that I might or might not reveal. Only time will decide...
Morrigan
Morrigan is the goddess of battle, strife, and fertility in Irish and Celtic Mythology. Her name means either "Great Queen" or "Phantom Queen," and both names are entirely appropriate for her. She represented war as the Irish saw it: chaotic, glorious, bloody, loud, and heroic. She is a bloodthirsty, deceitful, and savage goddess. Morrigan appears as both a single goddess and a trio of goddesses. The other deities who form the trio are Badb ("Crow"), and either Macha (also connotes "Crow") or Nemain ("Frenzy"). Morrigan frequently appears with the guise of a hooded crow. She is one of the Tuatha Dé Danann ("Tribe of the goddess Danu") and she helped defeat the Firbolg at the First Battle of Mag Tuireadh and the Fomorians at the Second Battle of Mag Tuireadh.
She comes as a carrion crow or a hag, portending or causing violent death. Yet she is no mere demoness. She fights for her race, the Túatha dé Danann, against the invading Fomoire. She has a strange relationship with Ireland's great warrior Cú Chulainn: by fighting him, she forces him to rise to his greatest glory.
Once She confronted and attacked him attacking him in the forms of a crow, a gray wolf and a hornless red heifer. He was able to fight all of them off, but She had the last laugh: when he was dying in battle years later, She turned into a hooded crow and perched on his dying body as his enemies approached to finish him off. She did not actually fight, but urged on Her chosen armies and intimidated the ones She wanted to lose with Her fearsome war cries. She survived into medieval times as Morgan Le Fay, the witch who haunted King Arthur and his knights.
She is also know by other names — Nemain, Fé, Macha, Badb, the Washer at the Ford — she shows aspects of motherhood, sorcery, prophecy and teaching.
Origin
The origins of the Morrigan seem to reach directly back to the megalithic cult of the Mothers. The Mothers (Matrones, Idises, Disir, etc.) usually appeared as triple goddesses and their cult was expressed through both battle ecstasy and regenerative ecstasy.
The Morrigan, a shapeshister, could appear as a beautiful woman or as a crow. Another guise of the Morrigan, the Washer at the Ford, The Washer is usually to be found washing the clothes of men about to die in battle. In effect, she is choosing who will die.
During the Second Battle, the Morrigan "said she would go and destroy Indech son of De Domnann and 'deprive him of the blood of his heart and the kidneys of his valor', and she gave two handfuls of that blood to the hosts. When Indech later appeared in the battle, he was already doomed." (Rees 36)
"The function of the goddess [the Morrigan] here, it may be noted, is not to attack the hero [Cu Chulainn] with weapons but to render him helpless at a crucial point in the battle.
Morrigan is also known as: “Great Queen”, “Specter Queen”, “Supreme War Goddess”, “Queen of Witches”, “Goddess of Magic”
The Celts believed as they engaged in battle, the Morrigan flew shrieking overhead, often in the form of a carrion crow or a raven, calling up a host of slain soldiers to a macabre spectral dance. When the battle was ended, the soldiers would leave the field until dawn so that the Morrigan could claim their trophies of heads, euphemistically known as "the Morrigan’s acorn crop."
The reigned over the battlefield, helping with her magic, but did not join in battles. With her, Fea (Hateful), Nemon (Venomous), Badb (Fury), and Macha (Battle) encouraged fighters into battle madness. The Morrigan is also known as the goddess of rivers, lakes, and fresh water. She is considered Patroness of priestesses and witches; Mother of Life and Death.
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