Tezos

What Survives The Gods

Creator

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Description

The threads around the wrist. In Tamil country these are called kāppu, tied before a vow so the vow will not wander. Rome had its vittae, the woolen bands worn by the Vestals, replaced each March when the fire was relit. Memory worn at the pulse. Marigolds came to the Old World from the Valley of Mexico. The Mexica called the flower cempōhualxōchitl and strewed it along the roads the dead walked home on, once a year, in the month of Miccailhuitl. Portuguese ships carried the seeds east in the sixteenth century. Now the same orange appears at temple gates in Tamil Nadu, on altars in Oaxaca, on doorways in Bali. Three cosmologies reading one color as welcome. What survives of a religion after its gods are forgotten is often the hand. The palms meeting. The bowl set down. Ritual is a grammar that outlives its meaning, as Latin outlived Rome.

Traits

Tag

arcania

Tag

ritual

Tag

offering

Tag

devotion

Tag

hands