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Illustrations are part of a project that shows women from the past,
their believes, customs, ways of life, their magic and wisdoms.
The poems are written by my sister Sonca Menart
The project is financed by Slovenian Ministry of Culture.
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Women sometimes performed magic to postpone pregnancy or to achieve temporary infertility. In Podzemlje in Bela krajina region they believed that the bride would be childless for as many years, as the number of knots she made on her band on the way to her wedding.
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'Lintvarno oko' or 'dragon's eye' was a symbol, carved into a wooden board. It was used for divination by women in Posočje area. The fortune tellers threw three, then five, and finally seven beans on the board and with every throw they narrated what the grains had told them.
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On the Midsummer Night young unmarried girls turned to the elder tree in which, according to the folk belief, good spirits and ancestral souls reside. In Carinthia, girls would shake the elder tree and chant the magic spells as a request to the ancestral spirits to grant them a husband.
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'Devince' are the sacred places where two so called 'female' rivers merge into one. On these special locations wise women called 'vedrine' performed rites of passage for the girls to become 'deve' ('devas' or women). Wise woman poured water on the girl and sprinkled her with flower petals while she urinated into the water. When the river swept away girl's flower wreath, her entry to the womanhood was concluded.
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Barley on the eye used to be magically treated by 'reaping'. In Bela krajina region, for example, the healer swang three times over the diseased eye with a sickle held in their right hand. While doing this, they recited the magic words: “Barley! I didn't sow you, but I reap you! There is no bundle!”
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We once lived...
We had a sight
of how the same life force
flows through our veins
and the roots of the trees.
And we had a knowing
that Nature of our bodies
and the body of the Earth are one.
We healed
with awareness of the Source
from which we spring
and drain away to, in time.
We wove magic
to revive the memory
of the well within us.
We guarded
old customs and tales,
to call for the light and warmth
of ancestors and Home.
We went wild
when we danced with the Force,
like flames of the bonfire
burning in the circle.
We passed
from maidens to women and mothers
under guidance of the midwives -
little crones within the Crone.
We kept the rituals
to honour
the One that leaves
and the One that stays on the path.
We passed away...
We left.
We gaze through Your eyes today.
You can do all that the devil cannot.
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Because it was considered a ‘female’ plant, flax was usually sown by women. In Prekmurje region it was believed that the longer steps women were making during sowing the higher it would grow. Flax was believed to grow even higher if they lifted their babies in the air and showed the flax plant how tall it was expected to be.
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The old custom in Slovenia, 'teritev' - manual extraction of flax yarn stems, was a typical female task. Women who were performing it (named 'terice') were considered to be in a special condition: exuberant, perpetually hungry and thirsty, mouthy, daring but also wild and offensive to men. The men who dared to come close were persecuted by the noise of their tools, their exposed buttocks and rubbed by the remnants of flax stalks when caught.
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From exibition House on the hill:
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For sale (pm me): https://www.facebook.com/694228415/posts/10159119591008416/?d=n
Thank you fot watching!
