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Taliesin

Taliesin is actually a title but is now most often used to refer to the 6th century Welsh druid Gwion Bach. I thought his writing referred to an 11-year cycle when he mentioned seven score muses (11 years and four lunar months if the muses represent lunar months) but now I think that that 11 year and four lunar month period was not a cycle but a one time separation between the time of his major call and the time of his release from his low years, and I
discuss that a bit more below. Others other than him refer to the five month separation but he quite precisely refers to a period of eight score muses, which in days is 5.5 lunar months. So I highly respect my possible ancestor's scientific skills.

In this subsection I often refer to the book Taliesin: Shamanism and the
Bardic Mysteries in Britain and Ireland by John Matthews (with additional material by Caitlin Matthews). The Aquarian Press/an imprint of Harper
Collins, 1991 ISBN 1-85538-109-5.

In Taliesin's transformational sequence he spends time in the belly of a hen, which may be related to the period of depression a few years before the first shamanic initiation manic episode. Also his patron Elffin is described as having bread under the fingernails, which I believe refers to waning crescent moon. His inspiration comes at the last few drops of the cauldron, so before the crack of the cauldron at new moon, and then he must run or seek to avoid the goddess's wrath after new moon. He is found in a net, which is very like
my pulling on a net (not sure if it was Haida, oops, Musqueam shellfish)
after my sun stare (http://www.nfld.com/~dalton/sunstare.html) that left me floating in the water near the net.

On p.97 as part of the poem The Hostile Confederacy, several lines read

"Seven score muses
There are in the inspiration of song;
Eight score in every score
In the great abyss of tranquility
In the great abyss of wrath..."

While it can also be interpreted as the vast number of musical, intellectual and other influences on a broad thinker, which also appplies to me, I also interpret the "seven score muses" as the number of lunar months from Gwion's major call (similar or identical to my sun stare, thorn hill climb, and blue rose vision) to his release from his low years. For me, if my low years had ended after that long, 140 lunar months, or about 11 years and four lunar months from Sept. 6, 1991 would have been early 2003 or almost seven years after my low years started on Jan. 29, 1996. But as I discuss below, I have
had to go longer than seven years but I suspect Gwion did not.

The eight score is the 5.5 lunar months (162 days) or six solar rotation periods, in days, separation between waxing gibbous moon psychic test and waning crescent mystic high mentioned in theSummary of key features of my cycles (http://www.nfld.com/~dalton/summary.html) section. The psychic tests are what Taliesin Taliesin describes as "three times in the prison of Arianrhod" (p.238), and the mystic highs are the inspirations of Ceridwen or Ogyrwen. In the book "three times inspired by Ceridwen" is mentioned, and
that could be the three poetic inspirations following after the three times
in the prison of Arianrhod. For me the three prisons of the beginning of January 1993, the end of July and beginning of August 1993, and March 1994
were followed by the three inspirations of June 1993, early January 1994, and late August and early September 1994.

After that the poet seems to imply that he has attained a flowing muse.

p.102: "Gwion has kept the cauldron
Steadily boiling..."

But now I think that this flowing muse comes not right after those early inspirations and trials but after release from the low years which follow
them.

(If druids or shamans had/have any special botanical remedies that helped
keep them stable, I'll try to find that out, eventually, or let me know if
you know.)

The "great abyss of tranquility" might be depression and the "great abyss of wrath" might be paranoia. These great abysses I think refer to the low years which for me began Jan. 29, 1996 and which I thought once would last seven years (and which I think did last seven years for Gwion, as I discuss above, but I have had to go longer, as I discuss below), or until 11 years (or slightly more) after the first high. These low years I think are equivalent
to Gautama Siddharta's ascetic years and the time Myrddin spent talking to
his little piggy (which I think means perineum muscle click divination, which
I now know I should avoid, since the pig is associated with the earth or underworld by the celts and so is the perineal chakra by some) and the cremation ground years in Hinduism. I think these low years are represented
by the 7 years that Cu Chulainn spent serving the smith Chulainn in place of the hound that Cu Chulainn (hound of Chulainn), also known as Setanta,
killed. These 7 years might also be represented by the 88.5 (90 pairs minus 3 birds) pairs of birds associated with Cu Chulainn's birth if the 88.5 are
lunar months.

Also in John Matthews book Taliesin..., on p. 90, is the following quote

Seven years your right, under a flagstone, in a quagmire,
Without food, without taste, but the thirst you ever torturing,
The law of the judges your lesson, and prayer your language:
And if you like to return
You will be, for a time, a Druid, perhaps. (
Ancient Irish Poem)

So that was yet another (but still significant) Irish (and note that my cultural background is largely Irish-Newfoundland) instance of seven years of low years, and I don't have an explicit Taliesin mention of seven years of
low years, just "the great abyss of tranquility" and "the great abyss of
wrath" which indicate the low years to me, plus the "seven score muses" which as I discuss above if it indicates seven score lunar months from Gwion's
major call to his release from his low years it indicates a low year period
of about seven years. So in that sense I have an indirect mention by Gwion of
a seven year low period.

But at one point Taliesin mentions that he is now "three score" years of age, and for a while I thought that the "three times inspired by Ogyrwen" might be his initiation in his late 20s (for me it was at 27.5, or 2.5 solar cycles) near a solar cycle peak plus two later solar cycle peaks 11 and 22 years
later, and that the inspirations of Cerridwen are individual highs within
each Ogyrwen period of years, rather than Cerridwen and Ogyrwen meaning the same thing. However now (March, 2005) I no longer think there will be an 11 year cycle but hopefully after release from the low years a fairly continous flowing muse, as in the quote "Gwion has kept the cauldron Steadily boiling...". However I might be wrong. But for now I think the inspiration of Ogyrwen and the inspiration of Cerridwen mean the same thing, the waning crescent highs, though I have had five and not three, but if the intial major one of 1991 is considered separately and the very short one of July 1994 is
not counted I have had three other waning crescent highs.

During the pre-new-moon episode, referring to the Taliesin legend again, the "three drops of wisdom" of the goddess can be extracted, but the poet must
wind down carefully at and after the "crack of cauldron," the crack of new moon. This pattern is more likely to occur when the solar cycle is from
medium to active average levels, when there is unusual local weather such as clear sky lightning or high winds, and when there are M class solar flares
the week or so before new moon (plus sunspot numbers above 75). The 5.5 lunar month separation is also related to the following quote from Matthews' book, p.321,

"its inspiring brew
ages over five cauldrons, (brewing)."

i.e., after five full months after the full moon by which any anxious/panicky/fear/mixed/dysphoric symptoms have wound down, the druid can start hoping for a controlled creative hypomania in the waning moon, at least in medium to high levels of the solar cycle. This occurred for me three times from 1993-94 and I had two without precursors in 1991,94. Before such a new moon there can be a mystic dark/starry night of enlightenment, or several, or
a sense of inspired mystic play, or a rush of ideas, or all three. After new moon, when the good enlightenment feeling runs out, and sometimes just after new moon without a high before new moon during the solar low years (for me twice, in Jan, Apr., 1995), there can be a low/dark night of the soul experience. Then beginning in the solar sunspot cycle low years there can be
a "time in the wilderness." but I have found these do not end when the
sunspot cycle comes back up next. I know that significant solar flares, which sometimes I think caused clear sky lightning by effects on the ionosphere,
were important precursors to my waning crescent highs, but I no longer think
I will have an 11 year sunspot cycle variation in the long term.

The picture of p.256, symbolic of The Defense of the Chair, highly moved me, since I can relate it to my own shamanic trek, from naked sundance in the shallow ocean water, up through layers of thorns overnight (the rings of
fire) to see the glowing sky blue rose near the top of the thorns, which I
had to "salmon leap" over, under the raven skies of two days before new moon, and finally, after trying to find a shakuhachi (or native?) flute player's
door (I was glassless and it was an Asian garden type entrance, perhaps with gate locked) I ended up at the place next door, which had a fountain. The diagram on p.256 has ocean waves on the outside, then rings of fire, then a fountain in the middle, with a tower and chair. The overflowing fountain may
be related to the drops of elixir of Kundalini yoga. This was on Musqueam territory, not far from the global Museum of Anthropology, though while on
the thorns I hoped that this atoned for the Beothucks plus linked sky and sea and sent wild notes of music back to Newfoundland (now still partly Mi'kmaq territory).

Also, regarding my blue rose vision, the first poem in The Book of Taliesin refers to "the mountain of roses". (I think in the surviving manuscript the first page of that poem is missing.) Here is a quote from that poem:

There are three fountains
In the mountain of roses,
There is a Caer of defence
Under the ocean's wave.
Illusive greeter,
What is the porter's name?

And Taliesin's being born in a leather coracle might really be his rebirth in his first manic episode, which in ancient times might have been treated by placing him in sensory deprivation inside a cowhide, and in my case was
treated by a stay on a mental health ward and some lithium.

--
David Dalton dalton@nfld.com http://www.nfld.com/~dalton (home page) http://www.nfld.com/~dalton/dtales.html Salmon on the Thorns (mystic page) “Goin' away far across the sea/But I'll be back for you/I'm gonna tell
you everything I know/Baby, everything is true” (Van Morrison)

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