The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #104331 Message #2148914
Posted By: Jack Blandiver
14-Sep-07 - 05:51 AM
Thread Name: Folklore: The Green Man
Subject: RE: Folklore: The Green Man
All such carvings would have originally been painted; in some places the tradition still exists, most famously perhaps in the cloister of Norwich Cathedral where one of most iconic of all 'Green Men' is predominantly leafed in gold.
As for getting 'hung up on the nomenclature', it is the very name 'Green Man' that has lead to 'his' unquestioned paganisation in recent years. Take away the name, and what one is left with an un-named ecclisial foliate grotesque often set quite deliberately within the context of other religious iconography of the time.
There are good arguments to be made for the Roman Catholic church adopting many elements of pre-Christian & 'pagan' belief. After all, it doesn't get any more 'pagan' than naming the most important Christian festival after an Anglo-Saxon hare goddess and celebrating it on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox! But the 'Green Man', perhaps somewhat ironically, would appear to be an entirely Christian invention.
If certain elements of folklore are indeed evidences of a continuation of an ancient belief system as has been suggested (but never actually established - see above 29 Aug 07 - 09:40 AM), this has nothing whatsoever to do with the 'Green Man', who is not, and has never been, a folkloric image. It is only very recent years it has become so, which is perhaps a subject worthy of discussion in its own right - whereby such an absolute orthodoxy might have arisen as though overnight without any foundation whatsoever.
That Anne Ross helped instigate this orthodoxy by her highly suspect & often downright glib, unsubstantiated observations does, I'm afraid, cast something of shadow over her reputation otherwise.
As I say, even church & cathedral guide books sell their 'Green Men' as being pagan. Recently in Durham Cathedral I caused mortal offence by suggesting that the 'Green Man' one of the (Christian) ushers pointed out to me as being 'pagan' was more likely a graphic depiction of one the most central aspects of Roman Catholic theology. Anglicans, it would seem, are obviously happier with paganism than they are with Roman Catholicism.
I say again, I'm not pushing any sort of religious view here, just taking a look a something that has always intrigued me in the eventual hope of establishing some sort of balance on the subject, which, for the most part, there isn't.
The new edition of Fortean Times (FT228 - October 2007) has just come through my letterbox & I see they've printed my letter (p. 76) on 'Green Men' which might, I hope, stimulate further discussion on the subject!