Origins of the Golden Fleece Myth

    In European culture seeking wisdom - especially hidden knowledge - finds its reflection in the symbols associated with gold: the Golden Fleece, the Philosopher’s Stone and the Holy Grail.  For all the qualities it embraces - this eternal and most noble of metals - gold was recognised as the metal of the sun.  It has become the foremost physical medium for the expression of men’s spiritual endeavours and the scientific knowledge about working gold is seen as one of the revelations of wisdom itself.

Detail on a 18th century BC cup from Trialeti depicting a religious ceremony.
(Author's Collection. Copyright 2020)

  The two phenomena: gold and knowledge, especially the knowledge of gold amongst the Colchians, were the genesis for rationalising the myth of the Golden Fleece.  It was this Golden Fleece that was the main goal of the first long-distance maritime adventure in mankind’s recorded history.  The Greek philosopher and mythographer Euhemerus went so far as to interpret the Golden Fleece as a technique of writing in gold on parchment or a book written on skins which describes the method of obtaining gold by means of chemistry.

Fourth century BC example of Colchian goldsmith techniques.
(Author's collection.  Copyright 2020)

  Why is the myth of the Golden Fleece - which emerged from the culture of classical antiquity and pursued its life in the alchemy of Medieval Europe - connected to Colchis?  The answer to this question may be found in Greek written sources that mention Colchis as “rich in gold”, similar to the cities of Mycenae, Sardis and Babylon which were all famed for their wealth.  Perhaps more significantly, the answer lies in the knowledge of obtaining, working and using gold for high spiritual goals - the wisdom that was continuously refined, preserved and passed down throughout the centuries in the territory of Colchis and the entire country of Georgia. Today we witness the demonstration of this wisdom in the golden artefacts found all around the country we call Georgia and we continue to re-discover these techniques and knowledge through our study of these pieces of history.

Colchian fourth century(approx) plaque depicting bull, boar and lion.
(Author's collection. Copyright 2020)

Loose Ends, Part One

    Mexico City is known for many things - especially their upcoming annual celebration of Día de Muertos, but the city’s involvement in the closing chapter of the Bolshevik Revolution is little known.  It was on a sticky afternoon in August of 1940 in the now stylish borough of Coyoacán that the Bolshevik Revolution wrote its final note as the people’s rebellion.  

 Lev Davidovich Bronstein, AKA Leon Trotsky (Author's collection)

     Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky had built the Russian Revolution to empower the Russian people to rise up against their oppressive Monarch, Tsar Nicholas II but their overall idea was to create a system for world-wide revolution - throwing off the "oppressive" cloak of capitalism and empowering the people.  Though the Bolsheviks did a good job of harnessing some of the rampant public discontent extant in Russia at the time, there were many groups actively engaged in subversion in and around St. Petersburg in 1917 and Leon Trotsky was a leader within one of those socialist/communist groups, the  Menshevik’s.  Because of mounting turmoil, Tsar Nicholas abdicated in March of 1917 and an interim government was set up to try and repair the nation’s economy and social unrest all while fighting World War I.  The spark of public agitation was fanned to flames by groups like the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks but it wasn’t until the Germans freed Vladimir Ilyich Lenin from one of their prisons and put him on a train back to St. Petersburg that things began to really heat up.  Just before the October revolution, Trotsky joined the Bolshevik party and was an immediate "insider" who went on to be one of the original seven on the first Politburo which led and directed the Bolshevik revolution. From the October revolution, widespread pandemonium ensued and it was obvious that the Bolsheviks didn’t stand a chance of leading Russia into communism.  The Bolsheviks were ardent writers and loquacious orators but their ability to create useful policy AND put it into place was another thing all together and yet, somehow, they survived.

Secretary office in the house of Trotsky, Mexico City. (Author's Collection, copyright 2019)

    To make a long story short, Russia made a separate peace with Germany, a civil war ensued and countless Russian innocents were murdered while inept policies were implemented and overturned repeatedly and the Bolsheviks blamed everyone but themselves for their failures.  As these failures became apparent, the Soviets (the new name for the Bolsheviks) began to rule the people more harshly.  Questions were met with beatings and dissent with bullets.  During all of this, Trotsky continued to rise through the party ranks.

Trotsky's desk, where he died. (Author's collection. copyright  2019)

Globalism in the American Southwest

    We are not the first culture to have and rely upon international trade.  If we feel that way, perhaps it’s because we coined the term “globalism” to reflect our connected global marketplace.  Unfortunately, that is the only contribution we made to global trade.  The spice roads connected China and Europe via Persia and India for thousands of years before an unknown Venetian sailor in a Genoese prison recounted his travels to the East.

    Cultures are only the sum of their societal input regardless of how diverse they may be.  Life in the Roman Empire was completely different depending on whether you were in Gaul or in Palestine but it was Roman life none-the-less.

Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, USA (Author's Collection. Copyright 2015)

    Perhaps this overview should be applied to the Ancestral Puebloans.  In an attempt to explain the chasm of unknowns associated with their history, today’s scholars are trying to invent their own “Theory of Everything”.  Sadly, they are precluding obvious and significant facts in order to do it.  The largest fact is that the Chaco World conducted significant, long-distance trade not only with their contemporary societies, but also with Mesoamerica and there is evidence of even wider commercial circles.  These Ancestral Puebloans had contact with many external societies and being highly adaptable people, they traded for different goods from different regions: Sea shells from the West Coast, Macaws and cacao from Mesoamerica and copper ornaments which may have come from The midwest state of Missouri in today’s United States.  As we do today, Chacoans used what they could, acquired what they needed and tried to leave a better world for their children.  So, when studying a culture that provides no eye-witnesses and only limited recorded resources, we must be careful not to be fooled by the facts.  Because of this situation of limited resources, we rely heavily upon archaeology and, to a lesser degree, the oral traditions of today’s Puebloan tribes and it is imperative that we do not use any single-source of input if we hope to arrive at a viable conclusion. 

Kin Klizhin Tower Kiva, Kin Klizhin Outlier, New Mexico, USA (Author's Collection. Copyright 2015)

    The conclusion is that Chaco Canyon was, for centuries, a vibrant culture diffused throughout the Four-Corners Region of today’s United States that had contact with their contemporary cultures both near and far.  The level of this contact differed over the centuries but left its indelible mark on Chacoan Culture for the rest of time.  Chacoans assimilated many cultural traditions, both good and bad, and, in the end, all these forces - internal, external, cultural, socio-political and environmental - forced Ancestral Puebloans to abandon their homes and disappear into time.

Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, USA (Author's Collection. Copyright 2015)