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The Caucasian Eagle (NEW CONCEPTS)
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Of all the varieties of eagle, the Caucasian Eagle is perhaps the most singular. Little of fact is known. The ancient sources, of which there are many, frustratingly cannot agree, other than this was a gigantic bird, who originates from that range known as the Caucasus Mountains, just as we might say the Nemean Lion was to be found in Nemea, or the Lernaean Hydra found in Lerna. Perhaps you can help me understand him a tad better?
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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The Caucasian eagle is part of a famous Trickster-Hero myth, and possibly not imagined as a living beast, but an automaton constructed by the metal-working god Hephaestus. Who knows? You could speculate, much in the way of those historians that like to pretend that myths are based on historical fact, that the automaton was the invention of Hero, the Greco-Egyptian mathematician and engineer who practised his trade in his native city of Alexandria, Roman Egypt (10 AD – 70 AD) . Hero is now thought of as an early designer of theatrical automatons, a early pioneer of cybernetics, as well as the inventor of the world’s first vending machine. How curious.

You might wonder if I made that up, I didn’t, it is in Wiki. Hero's invention of the first vending machine will soon become fact. That is until someone comes up with an earlier inventor. Historians are obsessed with discovering the earliest because they think in a linear way. It is the fashion. They all do it.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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The Caucasian eagle is best known for its supporting role in the cruel punishment of the hero-trickster Prometheus, who we are told made the mistake of stealing the “secret of fire” from Hephaestus. For his misdeeds, the immortal Prometheus was shackled to the mountain range by unbreakable chains forged by Hephaestus, and then each day attacked by the eagle, who would then feast on his liver. Each night the liver would regenerate, so that the next day the eagle could then return and inflict further punishment. It is a cycle. It turns out being immortal can have its disadvantages. The future can last a painfully long time unless a critical event breaks the cycle.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Both Greeks and Romans in part conceived of historical change as cyclical, they did not suffer from the modern western historical obsession with its mainly linear view of time, linked to cause and progress. The ancients also believed in divination. A common symbol of augury was a snake. Snakes shed their skins. The snake shedding its skin symbolises a renewal event as a new cycle starts.

Eagles are famous symbols which feature on many ancient sculptures and coins, these feature giant flying eagles with snakes in their talons. In the story of the Caucasian Eagle the symbol of renewal is actually the liver of Prometheus. Livers are also a sign of renewal and augury. The day/night cycle is actually part of a longer lunar cycle, that waxes and wanes. Within this trickster myth the renewal symbolism is linked to a important future critical event.

Whenever you have a “Re” word you might want to look for cycles, the renaissance, the reformation, a revolution. Marxism is after all a circle, primitive communism to communism, marked by critical moments called revolutions. Divination of "critical moments", not science, was the mother of history . How could it be otherwise?
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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The liver is also the biggest organ in the body (aside from the skin which the Ancients wouldn't have recognised as an organ -- and nor do we). This presumably is why it was singled out for special attention (lots to go round for the augurs?) because they couldn't have known what is was for. Nor do we unless we're specially interested in these things.

We ourselves single out the heart although most cultures regard it as just another tupenny-happeny organ. Everyone pays special attention to the brain but I think that is because it seems to be where we view the world from not because it's anything special to look at. If it was sited in two lobes where the kidneys are we would probably eat it devilled on toast.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Mick Harper wrote:
The liver is also the biggest organ in the body (aside from the skin which the Ancients wouldn't have recognised as an organ -- and nor do we). This presumably is why it was singled out for special attention (lots to go round for the augurs?) because they couldn't have known what is was for.

There is a regenerating liver in the Tityos myth. Tityos is staked to the ground in the underworld where two vultures were set to feed on his ever-regenerating liver. I did a bit of research on this before starting the thread.

wiki wrote:
Liver regeneration is the process by which the liver is able to replace lost liver tissue from growth from the remaining tissue. The liver is the only visceral organ that possesses the capacity to regenerate.

I decided I was trying way too hard.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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I think you are right. The Ancients were short on petrie dishes. What about bird's gizzards? Didn't the Romans use them to decide when the next Carthaginian War was due? After all they come separate in a plastic bag so the augurs wouldn't have had to get their hands all gungy. Very important for Julius Caesar, pontifex maximus, in his snow white toga.

"Now hands that do gizzards can be soft as your brain..."
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Mick Harper wrote:
I think you are right."


Seems a massive coincidence. So quickly dismissed.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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That is a good point. In Megalithic Empire, we associate early religious sacrifice with the Megalithics' habit of paying for village transits with one of their animals and the consequent feast. Presumably 'priests' would use the offcuts for divination. It is interesting that modern Megalithics eg gypsies have a reputation for this kind of thing.

But presumably the divinatory parts of an animal would always be the least scrummy bits. Not 'Behold, the fine marbling on the sirloin says Yes, war with the Carthaginians.'
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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In my view on the Wiley continuum "bad," "dubious," "interesting," "good", it was an "interesting." That doesn't mean it is dismissed, it means that I can't show it is good. If you try to prove all your initial ideas, you will normally end up doing it an ortho way, that surely defeats the object.

So I could, for example, find out after a lot of trying that ancient Greek battlefield surgery was at a knowledge level for this to have been witnessed, but doesn't this simply add to ortho? If you are questioning ortho does it actually really help? This is of course not to refute anything said by anyone else.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Divination, or the understanding of critical moments, is greatly misunderstood, or outright ignored, by those historians whose worldview is solely based on historical cause and effect. To get a different understanding we need to change the actors, audience and notions of time and space, we imagine those just mentioned are based within a Dark Age, of which little is known other than it is part of a cycle.

For our narrative, the actors are a Queen, her Oracle, some Scribes. The Queen consults the Oracle about whether to invade a neighbouring territory, the Scribes record the outcome, the omens are favourable. An army is raised, a battle is fought, a famous victory is won. The Scribes record the tactics, the heroic deeds. Shortly after a victory parade will be held. It will not be long before the Queen consults the oracle again, with another victory predicted. A mighty circular empire around the Queen's kingdom is being built. Triumphal monuments are erected. Coins minted. A linear history gets written post facto by later scribes. A Dark age is replaced by a Golden age, due to good omens and a famous warrior Queen. The modern historian might put this down to the Queen's exceptional generalship, or a technological advantage in weaponry (they might even acknowledge that the accounts are exaggerated on the grounds that history gets written by the winners). The ancients have mentioned the oracle, the heroism, and the cycle of dark and golden, night and day.

Both ancient and modern paradigms are incorrect, we are left with scripts dated years after the event, scripts that in fact tell of imaginary battles that never took place still celebrated in legends, and evidenced in stone and coin.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Heracles killed many monsters. In the case of the Caucasian Eagle, he wisely sought the permission of Zeus to kill the eagle, and bring an end to the suffering of Prometheus. The Hero unlike the Trickster did not dare to antagonise a god. Zeus agrees to the request, he reasons that the actions of the Hero to release the Trickster will heighten Heracles' standing, both amongst men and gods alike. Heracles shoots down the giant eagle with poisoned arrows, and then he along with Prometheus jointly break the giant chains shackling the Trickster to the mountain.

The ending of the cycle will lead to Heracles' future apotheosis. Heracles, the favored son of Zeus, will become divine. The giant eagle becomes the constellation Aquila.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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The image of a young Heracles was remarkably common in the ancient world, spread throughout the empire we think of as created by Alexander the Great. Typically it shows a youthful head wearing a lion-skin headdress. On the reverse of these silver and bronze coins were the Hero's weapons, maybe a combination of a bow and arrow-case and a large club. The image, for those who see the merit of a linear chronology, had already appeared on the coins of Amyntas III whose most famous son was Philip II, father of Alexander the Great. Amyntas is historically considered the founder of the unified Macedonian kingdom. Thanks to Alexander, the coins can still be found today, anywhere between Macedonian and India.
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