Nashville Surveyor's Craft, Early TN Temple Builders, and Mound Bottom

Yesterday I took a Confederate Tour of Mt Olivet Cemetery here in Nashville, TN. It gave me some clarity on Eugene Lewis, the gentlemen who had the Cheops built at Centennial park and had it rebuilt as his tomb at the cemetery. It turns out that he was an engineer that worked with the railroad system on Queen and Crescent project. He lived in Dickson County and his home and property are currently up for sale to developers. Researching him, his surveying craft used on the railroad, his interest in the pyramids, and connection to New Orleans let me to another site of historical significance in Middle TN. The 3 pyramid structures at Pack Site, Mound Bottom, and Paint Rock Bluff.

Pattison Forge Tunnel created
by slaves 1818 for Iron industry

This video provides a good overview of burial practices connecting the mounds, astronomy, and teken type structures among the Native Americans. These were the features I found striking at the Mt Olivet cemetery  The Obelisk, the Pyramid, cross in the circle symbol, and astronomical alignments.  The Mace ritual in Egypt was developed before the 1st Dynasty as evidenced in the Narmer's Palette and Macehead, more on this dicussed in this article. In the Pyramid Text the mace is a ritual
instrument symbolizing spiritual illumination.The Mound Bottom Mace inscribed near Nashville, TN is believed to belong, according to this TN Site, to the Native American culture from AD 1,000-AD 1300. Their societies were collectively known as the Mississippian Culture or the Temple Mound Builders. Agricultural innovation was happening at the site with new strains of maize, beans, and squashes being developed to produce surpluses for the rising population concentrated at the site. It is also at Harpeth River State Park that "Montgomery Bell created this engineering masterpiece he named Pattison Forge in 1818: a 200-foot tunnel chiseled by slaves through solid rock at the “narrows” of the Harpeth River. " This site "was the first "full-scale" water diversion tunnel built in the United States. It is also apparently the first "full-scale" tunnel of any type in the United States, according to histories of tunneling. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1994.[2][3]It is now included in Harpeth River State Park.[4] It was built at about the same time, but apparently slightly before, the 450-foot (140 m) Auburn Tunnel of Pennsylvania's Schuylkill Navigation Canal, which began use in 1821." (Wiki). For my personal family tree my ancestors were brought into Savannah from Africa because of their skills with iron. Seeing this ingenuity in Middle TN having been built by those of African descent is only a reminder to me of the theft of skilled labor taken from Africa do drive industry in America.

In The Harpeth River: A Biography by James Crutchfield, he recounts that the tunnel was 16 by 8ft high and delivered 2500 cubit ft of water per minutes. To get the water back into the original channel Bell built the Narrows of the Harpeth. He was a holder of as many as 300 slaves which helped build the tunnel. He was known as the "Iron Master". Or dare I say the Master of the Ironworkers. Crutchfield states, "At some point Bell became a convert of the idea of freeing all of the slaves and helping them return to Africa." This was popular during the period of 1820-1847, the liberation of slaves to Liberia, where my step-father is from. He continues  "Bell presented the offer to his slaves but only about 50 of them were interested in the idea..He tool them to Nashville to catch a boat to New Orleans" then presumably off to freedom. In 1850 he was awarded by London the "The Best Iron in the World" Award.

The Narrows of the Harpeth River has rock art that is reachable by canoe. This is notable because this piece of art is of the sun and crescent moon. The petroglyphs painted here are called Paint Rock Bluff and are on the perpendicular side of the cliff 200 ft above the river and visible for several miles. Chrutchfield notes that they were somehow used in religious ceremonies. "The  sun is estimated to be about five feet across and the distance that the symbols lie below the overhang of the cliff makes it difficult to imagine how the primitive artist reached this place in order to paint these images." He continues, "the Natchez Indians of Mississippi were also sun worshipers  Their society was broken down into castes, the highest of which, the nobles, were actually called "Suns". The principal chief himself was called the Great Sun. He was thought to be the younger brother of the Sun, and every morning would find him on top of a large mound welcoming his older brother upon his arrival in the eastern sky and directing his journey across the skies by a wave of the arm from east to west"(Chrutchfield, 68). This story reminds me of the astrological significance of the story of O'siris and Set. Not the myth of later dynasties but the early story indicators that can be unraveled by astronomy in the crossing of the sun across the sky from morning to sun set telling time like on the sundials dividing (dismembering) the day into the hours-HR (Horus).

The site in Middle TN is very similar to the Cahokia site.

The Nashville Site is not as well preserved as the Pack site that it is a part of is privately owned by separate individuals and not a state park. 

Seshat, Ocean Goddess and Creation Stories in East Africa

We stand tall because we stand on the shoulders of our ancestors...

My notes from Sept 2, 2012,
Mawu sent Adanhu and Yewa from the sky with Ayida Weddo. To me this story sounds very similar to the Adam and Eve story. The slaves brought over who carried these stories thought so as well, it was why they accepted the doctrine because it was their truth, but told in the way of the foreigners that brought them here. They noted that the key difference was the Christian inclusion of the fruit in the creation story (Dahomean Narrative: A Cross Cultural Analysis by Melville J. Herskovits). They stated Legba does not give fruit. In my opinion this is because the fruit in the bible creation story is symbolic of knowledge.

Mawu was the moon god. Lisa was the sun god. In their creation story only Mawu can give sekpoli (breath of life). Their story includes a monkey and Veve of Damballa (sky godm Damballah-rainbow serpent, becongo of Angola and Bantu) with a 7 pointed star on top. They associated this with Christ, Our Lady of Mercy, St Patrick, and Moses. The Black Madonna of Czestochowa.

What was striking to me in how this connects to Egypt was Ayida Weddo representation of holding up the heavens, the rainbow serpent. They also associate red with male, and blue with female. This reminded me of Shu & Nut in the Egyptian pantheon.

Yewa was said to make record of tombstones and was associated with the final resting place. There were several other attributes:

1. maintained garden of rare flowers
2. virgin
3. looked in his EYEs (sin)
4. Fest day is 10/30
5. cemetary tools are known, other tools are secret
6. knowledge of embalming, body preservation, passing over.
7. she likes silence, no sex
8. Day is Thursday
9. maiden-old maids, fierce, independent, crone, wisdom
10. Egg is placed on a mound of flower in ritual to her
11. rules mind, intellect, cosmic equilibrium
12. Veve Damballah emblems all have stars, some with a heart , cross, two right angles inverted.

Yeye means mother, Awa means our. so her names means Our Mother. She was compared to Our Lady of the Homeless and the Virgin of Montserrat. The number is 11 and its multiples (Seshat was noted as the women of the 11th hour in instances of transformation into the otherworld and the souls travel to heaven. She stood at the last gate in the journey into the Duat, only achieved after the soul could defeat the serpent.)

"Behold", said Ra, "I will send SHU to breath upon GEB, and he will have air that is sweet and blue, and I will kiss him and all manner of vegetation will clothe him." Now the hands (PTAH) pushed together GEB and NUIT, and from this union came forth all manner of living things. 

During this union the great serpent APEP entered into many of the living beings and told them, "Perhaps RA was not so vigilant, and what of it if he saw them do things that he would not approve of; he was not the all-powerful and the night was just as beautiful as the day..."

In Egypt Nut (sky goddess):

1. Having power over the water Khort-Neter
2. Sycamore Tree of Nut
3. Egg of Nekek-ur
4. Wore a blue robe or rainbow colored robe.
5. Apep-Rainbow Serpent

September 9, 2012 notes

I came across info on Yoruba then back to New Orleans and Voodoo, Marie Luvoux. I listened to a webcast where she was described as the "architect of New Orleans" she had a Congolese background. 

Yemaja(Yemoja, Yemaya, Yemaja) is considered to be the greatest deity in Santeria. She is of all time. She is the mother of all things. In the bible the creation story/eden and serpent-knowledge. Without Yemaya their would be destruction and death she germinates the seed. 

Comes from the Ifa Nigeria Oresha. Osha-of the sea. Olugun-bottom of the sea. among the Benin/Ghanian/Togo-spirit of the ocean. She is transatlantic slave trade, mother of water. In voodoo-Hegway capt of the sea. La Terena-sustunance from ocean, mother of the waters. The ocean bring her number is 7. 9/7 is her birthday. 9/10 is Marie Lavous. 9/8 Oshun. 7 is the master number. 3 Trinity, 7 creation, 9 completion. Divine Mathematics. Her food offerings are watermelon, celery, watercrest, molases. Her day is Saturday.Yemaya/Yemoja/Yemoja- color is blue and white. Our lady of Regla and Our Lady of Immaculate Conception. Ymoja Yemowo Mami Wata.

• Brazil the names are Yamanja, Iemanja, Janaina. 
• In Cuba Yemaya Yemayah, Iemanya. In Haiti La Sirene, La Siren (Mermaid). 
• USA Yemalla, Yemana, Yemoja. Uruguay Ienanja. 
• Dominican Republic Yemalla, La Diosa der mor ( sea goddess). 

Her symbol symbolizes anything ocean related. 2 tailed mermaid, 7 bracelets, 7 blue and 7 white beads.
Food Fish, coconut, watermelon, cantaloupe, white wine, seafood, coffee, lettuce.
Feast Day is 9/7 (Santeri). 2/2 (Brazil).
Chakra is heart.
Animals are dolphins, ducks, geese, swans, sea horses, and blue butterflies.

Veve Baron Samedi

Legend holds that one must not look at Ashaba, she is so beautiful you can not look at her directly. Benin Fa - spirit of celestial palm tree (Ifa).

Veve of Maman Brigitte

Veve of Maman Brigitte

"Yemonja is Yeye mo eja or mother of fishes. She is not just the to layer of the Sea(because that is where most of the fish live) she is also the Orisha of the Ogun river in Nigeria and the spokes person of Olokun the Orisha of the Ocean. We call on Yemonja or Ora so that she can send our prayers to Olokun. Remember there are different Yemonjas, Ashaba, Asesu, Ogunte, Mayelewo, etc." Orijuwon

Seshat, "She is drawn with her standard atop her head, wearing the spotted leopard skin robes of the Setem priests, the funerary priests who are drawn on temple friezes with the spotted robe and mask of Yinepu (Greek: Anubis). Where other Gods hold the was-scepter in hand, she bears one of notched palm leaves that terminates at the bottom with a tadpole which rests on the symbol of eternity"http://www.lowchensaustralia.com/names/egyptian-goddesses/s.htm

OME. The palm tree, from the leaves of which the dresses used by the dancers of the OBUDU are made.

The leopard is known by the names ATALAGBA, OGYUHA, EKME, and OGIAME or queen.
OGIAME reminds me of the XIVILI word KAMA, royal wife or queen. OGIE-CI is the word the Bini use for the King indigenous to the country, equivalent to NKICI CI of the BAVILL
When a man killed a leopard he had to take it to the OBA, who gave the hunter a boy and a girl in exchange for it. The OBA used to try very hard to obtain the leopard alive, so that he might sacrifice it. On doing so he would put his finger into its blood and make a mark with it on his forehead, from his hair to his nose. Fans for his use were made of the leopard's skin, or it was made into a coat for the great war chief EZOMO or OJUMO. The claws also were strung together and worn by this chief as a band around his head.
Women were not allowed to look at the leopard's face.
The dance connected with the leopard ceremonies is called IGWE.

Naples Archaeological Museum Picture of Sculpture of Atlas with Farnese Globe on his shoulders. Roman Copy of Hellenistic original, 2nd Century AD.  Oldest known representation of the celestial sphere

"Orpheus," says he, "introduced from Egypt the greatest part of the mystical ceremonies, the orgies that celebrate the wanderings of Ceres, and the whole fable of the shades below. The rites of Osiris and Bacchus are the same; those of Isis and Ceres exactly resemble each other, except in name." Now, as if to identify Bacchus with Nimrod, "the Leopard-tamer," leopards were employed to draw his car; he himself was represented as clothed with a leopard's skin; his priests were attired in the same manner, or when a leopard's skin was dispensed with, the spotted skin of a fawn was used as a priestly robe in its stead. This very custom of wearing the spotted fawn-skin seems to have been imported into Greece originally from Assyria, where a spotted fawn was a sacred emblem, as we learn from the Nineveh sculptures; for there we find a divinity bearing a spotted fawn or spotted fallow-deer (Fig. 21), in his arm, as a symbol of some mysterious import. The origin of the importance attached to the spotted fawn and its skin had evidently come thus: When Nimrod, as "the Leopard-tamer," began to be clothed in the leopard-skin, as the trophy of his skill, his spotted dress and appearance must have impressed the imaginations of those who saw him; and he came to be called not only the "Subduer of the Spotted one" (for such is the precise meaning of Nimr--the name of the leopard), but to be called "The spotted one" himself. We have distinct evidence to this effect borne by Damascius, who tells us that the Babylonians called "the only son" of the great goddess-mother "Momis, or Moumis." Now, Momis, or Moumis, in Chaldee, like Nimr, signified "The spotted one." Thus, then, it became easy to represent Nimrod by the symbol of the "spotted fawn," and especially in Greece, and wherever a pronunciation akin to that of Greece prevailed. The name of Nimrod, as known to the Greeks, was Nebrod. * The name of the fawn, as "the spotted one," in Greece was Nebros; ** and thus nothing could be more natural than that Nebros, the "spotted fawn," should become a synonym for Nebrod himself. When, therefore, the Bacchus of Greece was symbolised by the Nebros, or "spotted fawn," as we shall find he was symbolised, what could be the design but just covertly to identify him with Nimrod?


* In the Greek Septuagint, translated in Egypt, the name of Nimrod is "Nebrod."


** Nebros, the name of the fawn, signifies "the spotted one." Nmr, in Egypt, would also become Nbr; for Bunsen shows that m and b in that land were often convertible.


We have evidence that this god, whose emblem was the Nebros, was known as having the very lineage of Nimrod. From Anacreon, we find that a title of Bacchus was Aithiopais--i.e., "the son of Aethiops." But who was Aethiops? As the Aethiopians were Cushites, so Aethiops was Cush. "Chus," says Eusebius, "was he from whom came the Aethiopians."



Atlas (/ˈætləs/; Ancient Greek: Ἄτλας) held up the celestial sphere

The first part of the term "Atlantic Ocean" refers to "Sea of Atlas", the term "Atlantis" refers to "island of Atlas".

(the idea of Atlas carrying the Earth is not correct according to the original myth) on his back. One of Heracles's labours was to collect the apples of the Hesperides, guarded by Ladon. Heracles went to Atlas and reasoned with him. Eventually, Atlas agreed to collect the apples, and Heracles was left to carry the weight. Atlas tried to leave Heracles there, but Heracles tricked him and Atlas was left to carry the heavens forever. In his epic Odyssey,Homer refers to this Atlas as "one who knows the depths of the whole sea, and keeps the tall pillars who hold heaven and earth asunder".

The armillary or celestial sphere is traced to Hipparchus (said inventor of trig), who traces it to Eratosthenes (said inventor of geography). Eratosthenes was a "Greek" mathematician, geographer, poet, athlete, astronomer, and music theorist. A lot of specialties for one man to invent..... Needless to say, although given a title as a Greek he was born in Libya and was the Chief Librarian of the Great Library of Alexandria. He died in Alexandria. Both Libya and Alexandria, Egypt are in Africa.