THREAD: On the Gorgon and female rage

(also: look, the Gorgon is female.)

What is a Gorgon? Our earliest literary record of the term is in the Iliad (~900 BCE), Bk V.849-850 (Fagles) where Pallas Athena dons an ægis* to fight Ares:

“right in their [the ægis] midst the Gorgon's monstrous head,
that rippling dragon horror, sign of storming Zeus.”

*The ægis is a shield ?? An animal skin ??? a hunting bag ??? a ritual or shamanic pouch ??? no one knows. However it is DEFINITELY used to protect.

In the same text, we see the earthly counterpart of the gorgoneion worn by Agamemnon on his shield:
“There like a crown the Gorgon's grim mask,
the burning eyes, the stark, transfixing horror
and round her strode the shapes of Rout and Fear” (XI.39-41)

Hesiod, in the epic poem Theogony (~700BCE), tells that there are three Gorgons—Medusa, Stheno, and Euryale—who are sea monsters and daughters of two primordial ocean deities, Keto and Phorcys.

Ovid would retell the story of the Gorgon about 600 years later, but the gorgoneion continued to be depicted on coinage, vessels, and drinking cups as one among many apotropaioi theoi or “averting gods” whose power is to turn away evil.

In Ovid’s Metamorphosis, Medusa is described as the only Gorgon with snakes in her hair, whose appearance was altered by Pallas Athenas after being raped by Poseidon inside Athena’s temple (Bk IV.753-803). The story is below:

Let me run that back: Athena transformed Medusa's beautiful hair to serpents and made her face so terrible to behold that the mere sight of it would turn onlookers to stone.

In a society where you have no personhood, legally and politically, and your place in the oikos is that of the kyrios’ belongings, I’d turn a man into stone and get them to fear me if I could.

(Oikos, household; kyrios, lord of the house. See also: kyrie.)

“Leave me alone,” to this day, is a wish often said aloud. But telling a man to leave you alone, at a bar or a park or a supermarket or wherever, is dangerous: retaliation is always a possibility.

The Gorgon offers a refuge from these fears. There is no fear of retaliation if the attacker, the offender, the rapist is turned into stoned, turned away, running away.

I’m reminded of @LINGUA_IGNOTA_’s song IF THE POISON WON’T TAKE YOU MY DOGS WILL here, especially these lines: “If you lay your life down, no man can take it / Abandon your body so no man can break it / Make worthless your body, so no man can break it”

If we are talking syntax, in Greek texts, the Gorgon is always referred to with feminine articles and “tenses.” NOWHERE EVER ! EVER ! is it not referred to as female ! There are a lottt of doubts about Greco-Roman mythology but this is not one of them.

Γοργώ / Γοργών are feminine third declension, and Γοργόνειον (Gorgoneion) isn’t (neuter gender), but that’s because it’s referring to a fucking head

Now, the Algol-Gorgon connection.

The constellation of Perseus, of which Algol is a part, was discovered by the astronomer Ptolemy in 2th century AD.

A 1515 printing of his 2c AD manuscript, Almagest, lists the following star as the 12th entry in the list of stars in Perseus:

‘Lucida earum que sunt in capita Algol’ (English: the bright one in the head of the Demon)

It is noteworthy that between ~200 and 1515 AD, this manuscript was revised and updated by Persian astronomer Abd al-Rahmān al-Sūfī, before its [F I N A L] update by Tycho Brahe; in the Greek original, this 12th star is simply called “the Gorgon’s head.”

The word “Gorgon” itself may have the same proto-Indo-European root as the Sanskrit "garğ,” defined as a guttural growling of a beast.

The Arabic name of this star, رأس الغول (raʾs al-ghūl), certainly *sounds* similar...

I don’t know enough about proto-Indo-European or Arabic to go on about possible etymological connections, which, if any of my mutuals would like to pick this thread up, you’re more than welcome to!

If we are taking Ptolemy’s original descriptions of the constellations as the basis of Medieval/Renaissance astrological magick, it certainly seems like they are one and the same.

If we are taking al-Sufi’s Book of the Images of the Fixed Stars as the basis (for Islamic astronomers and astrological magicians have been onto this stuff way before Renaissance authors were) for astrological magic, I’ll hold my judgment until the text has been translated.

In any case, the connections between Algol, Medusa, femininity, and monstrosity are historically informed.

So, this? This is some absolute ahistorical bullshit.

Further recommended readings:
1. On the use of gorgoneia in Greek architecture, a PhD dissertation. https://repository.brynmawr.edu/dissertations/142/
2. The World’s Eye by Albert Potts, chapter 4: the Eye of Medusa https://books.google.com.vn/books?id=rFvu92GyDQoC&pg=PA20&hl=vi&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=3#v=onepage&q&f=false

3. My favorite translation of the Iliad. Fagles fucking blew it out of the water with this one https://griersmusings.files.wordpress.com/2018/10/homer_the_iliad_penguin_classics_deluxe_edition-robert-fagles.pdf

4. More information about beta-Perseid, or Algol. [whispers] shiny http://www.astropical.space/algol.php 

P.s.: I would like to give thanks to Mother Algol for her continued protection and blessings, as well as her allowing this thread to be made in full successfully!