Place: Part V– Mystical, Legendary and Mythical

The Spider - Nazca Lines

I’ve always sought out my own mystical place, somewhere in nature that was able to transport me into a more transcendent way of being, although I don’t think I would have described it the way early on. When I lived in Silverado Canyon, in Southern California’s Santa Ana Mountains, I simply walked out my front door and hiked up the crevice of a foothill. I’d find a big rock and sit in the sounds of nature. My favorite was in the misting rain. I was beyond grateful to be tucked away there in Cleveland National Forest, in the midst of pristine beauty. It was an easy jump from the mundane to the sublime.

There were other times in my life that I had to exercise a lot of creativity in searching out a mystical place, like the orange grove by my work place, or the small canal running through a vacant suburban lot. Always though, there has been some Place.

Some mystical places are recognized the world over as sacred. The Nazca Lines in the Nazca Desert in southern Peru is a complex of lined “drawings” in the soil depicting hundreds of animal and human figures, some spanning 1,200 feet. These figures are thought to be part of the astronomical and religious practices and beliefs of the ancient Nazca people whose culture flourished between 100 BCE and 800 BCE.

The Great Pyramid of Giza, in Greater Cairo, Egypt, is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It was built, around 4,500 years ago, supposedly based on astronomical correlations like the Nazca Lines. Its construction also reflects a belief in the afterlife, containing the burial place of the 26thcentury BC Egyptian pharaoh, Khufu and his wife

Other areas around the world are infused with legend, forming an intersection between what is and can be known over against what is not and cannot be known. Some of these legends lead back into deep history where the lines between myth and factual record are blurred.

Herodotus, the 5thCentury historian who is often called the “Father of History” wrote of a legendary place called Hyperborea. Some researchers believe that Lake Seydozero in Russia’s Northwest is the location of ancient Hyperborea. They believe that evidence shows the remains of an observatory and carved runes. Stories of a race of giants living beyond the North Wind reinforce ancient legend concerning Hyperborea.

Herodotus also writes of the great Egyptian Labyrinth, legendary in his time. He describes the structure of “two stories” containing “three thousand rooms.” He writes of “baffling and intricate passages from room to room and from court to court” that “were an endless wonder.” Some believe that this structure may hold ancient mysteries of humanity and that it still lies beneath the earth’s surface, buried deep in the sands not far from Cairo, according to the article, “Labyrinth” on the Wikipedia site.

The Lost City of Atlantis, The Rainbow Bridge of Asgard, Mount Olympus and other similar mythological places are embedded into our cultural stories in such a way that they constitute a reality that has shaped us to some degree, perhaps without our recognizing it.

Plato’s story of Atlantis, sometimes linked with the ideal society, comes down to us, according to him, from a period more than 900 years before his time, then the story is perpetuated through Aristotle and other subsequent students. By the 3rd Century AD we find that Tertullian believed Atlantis to be a real historical place. Since he was one of the earliest Christian authors and theologians, it makes one wonder where the doctrine of perfection truly originated. Myth has a way of entering mainstream thought.

In nature or in a place rich with cultural history there is always potential for a deeper experience. We can expand our relationship with place through connecting with the mystical, with myth, and with legend. The choice is ours. The earth itself is ancient, and many things around us have an archaic resonance, an ancient story.

What door in your “Place” is waiting to be opened?

Writing Prompt for the Week: Myth and Mainstream