Weaving was both an Original Act and an Act of Resistance.
In ancient Goddess belief systems, the weaver Goddess created the universe. In contemporary art, Fibre Artists set out to dismantle the patriarchal grip on the art world, stitch by stitch.
Weaving through Tragedy
Since weaving is a central theme in Goddess Feminism, I’m delving into the Blood and Fibre of Philomela, a Greek Tragedy, which has inspired many ancient writers, and present day feminist writers alike: Sophocles [born 496 BCE]; Philocles [born 5th C BCE]; Apollodorus in Bibliotheca [born 180 BCE]; Ovid in Metamorphoses [born 43 BCE]; Shakespeare in Titus Andronicus [born 1564 CE]; Margaret Atwood in Nightingale; Emma Tennant in Philomela; Jeannine Hall Gailey in Becoming the Villainess; Timberlake Wertenbaker in The Love of the Nightingale; Erin Shields in If We Were Birds, and Melissa Studdard in Philomela’s tongue [1].
[Trigger Warning]
Philomela’s story
In summary: Philomela was kidnapped and repeatedly raped, for a year, by her brother-in-law Tereus, King of Thrace. He imprisoned her and cut out her tongue to silence her. Tongueless and mute, Philomela wove her story, in red thread, on a white tapestry, which she sent to her sister, Procne, Tereus’ wife, who rescued her. Seeking revenge Procne and Philomela, plotted to cut out Tereus’ tongue, gouge his eyes out, then castrate him. In a last minute plot twist Procne murdered her own son Itys, boiled him, then served him to Tereus, his father, for dinner. To confirm that Tereus had just eaten his son, Philomela, threw Itys’ severed head at her rapist, Tereus.
[Trigger warning]
A warning from history
This is a story about victims transforming into perpetrators, with a warning from history: When perpetrators dehumanize, a survivor’s trauma, if unresolved, can perpetuate trauma, for generations. Violence spirals. The perpetrator becomes the victim and the vulnerable are harmed in the crossfire.
A child is dead.
One young woman, possibly a child herself, has been imprisoned, repeatedly raped and mutilated.
Two young women have committed a crime they ordinarily wouldn’t have committed.
All violence is wrong. No good will ever come of it.
To put Philomela’s story into context, girls, as young as twelve, were sent away to marry much older men. Today we might say their parents trafficked them to older men. These girls were victim to a patriarchal system and the violence within that system, which is why we need to create a gentler world that works for women and children.
Swallows and nightingales
In true Greek style, Tragedy morphs to Romantic Symbolism. As Tereus chases the sisters with an axe, Procne transforms into a swallow, and Philomena into a nightingale. The further tragedy is that the female nightingale cannot sing, even though “Philomela” means “lover of song.” This is a story about the silencing of women as an integral part of patriarchal control.
As a side arm: It appears historical bias led to bird song studies focusing almost exclusively on males. Kerry Williams writes in ” Lost voices: uncovering female birdsong, the rise in female scientists, into this arena, has increased research in female birdsong.
The voice of the shuttle
Sophocles describes Philomela’s tapestry as the “voice of the shuttle,” a powerful tool of communication and resistance [2]. The weaver Goddess Neith, who wove the matrix of the universe, tells us that cosmic patterning is part of matriarchal language. Philomela, whose tongue has been cut out, reverts to speaking in this form of the Mother’s Tongue, the voice of She Who Spins [the universe], which, in this case, is symbol and patterning. Matriarchy exists within patriarchy, when you know how to look for it.
Silencing women, at a time when the Goddess still held power, although she was often set to work on behalf of the patriarch, was symbolic of man’s separation from the Mother Goddess cults of the past, a gradual and bloody transition, which I believe is reflected in the tumultuous tales of Greek mythology, which often feature gender based violence.
Even in the Old Testament the battle against the Goddess raged. There are myriad passages calling for the destruction of shrines dedicated to the Goddess.
Red Thread
Philomela weaving her story with red thread reminds us of Ariadne’s ball of red thread guiding Theseus out of the labyrinth. Following the red thread reveals a sisterhood / female lineage / matrix occluded by the paternal line. Red thread is a metaphor for feminine intuition, wisdom, guidance, collective journeying, connection to source, the Mother Goddess, and the unraveling of patriarchal power structures.
Philomela was raped at a time when rape was considered a crime against property, not against women.
Shame
Patriarchal rape culture, is based on power, ownership and control. Shame is weaponized. However in Ovid’s Metamorphoses Philomela is defiant.
“Still my revenge shall take its proper time,
And suit the baseness of your hellish crime.
My self, abandon’d, and devoid of shame,” [3]
The shame is not hers. It belongs to her assailant. Victim shaming blights us today, but was victim shaming part of Greco-Roman mythology? The Goddess Adios personified shame, meaning shame was deified. Ovid was a Roman poet delving into the psychology of Greek mythology, rather like contemporary writers do today. However he is a male observer, born into the rape culture that was the Republic of Rome, enjoying male privilege, which is why revisiting rape mythology, time and again, through a feminist lens, exploring themes such as reclaiming the voice, is critical, especially when the remnants of biblical shaming abound.
[Trigger warning]
Revenge
The sister’s revenge is deadly. Their dish is definitely served cold and is garnished with unbelievable horror. Tereus is left in no uncertain terms that his brutality and betrayal stop there. His son [his property] is dead. His patrilineal lineage (at least with Procne) has been terminated and he is alone, choking on grief, guilt, remorse and anger.
Without going into the psychology of infanticide, the taboo, or profiling murdering-mother archetypes, in mythological terms, Procne and Philomela were whipped into a divine Bacchanite frenzy. Since the Furies, Goddesses of vengeance and punishment, were present at Procne’s and Tereus’ wedding, in mythological terms, at a time when decapitations, castrations and abductions were part of the course, Tereus’ punishment was deemed appropriate, and the unraveling of their marriage inevitable.
Procne was exercising the power of the Three Fates, who span the thread of life, measured it, then cut the cord at death. Severing the metaphorical umbilical cord is part of the power of the Mother Goddess.
[Trigger warning]
Gender bias
Both Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653) and Reubens (1577-1640) painted Procne and Philomena throwing Itys’ decapitated head at Tereus, after he had eaten his son’s body [4]. Apart from style, I cannot see much difference in the way this subject has been rendered by a female and male artist (the paintings were created within a year of each other), other than, in Reuben’s painting, the sister’s breasts are exposed. In Gentileschi’s painting they are not.
What I can say is, Gentileschi’s choice to, as a rape survivor, paint themes of revenge, has been described as her acting out revenge fantasies. Meanwhile Reuben’s fascination with mythological violence, teamed with objectifying women, is described as “sensual” and “exuberant.” This is how patriarchal belief systems works: Women are reactive, men are exemplary.
Challenging the narrative
Decapitation is a theme that ricochets through mythology: Medusa, Orpheus (his decapitated head continues to sing); Judith decapitating Holofernes; Kali’s garland of skulls. Through the feminist lens, decapitation, a patriarchal power tool, reduces women to mere bodies, without personality or voice. When the role is reversed, when the victim becomes the executioner, it challenges the patriarchal narrative. When Medusa’s decapitated head takes on a power of its own, she too challenges the patriarchal narrative.
Shapeshifting and escape
Philomela’s transformation into a nightingale reflects animist beliefs that spirit resides in all things, including birds and stars, which is why mythological characters transform into animals or are immortalized as constellations. As a bird, Philomela’s metamorphosis may hark back to ancient beliefs embodied in the silent presence of bird-headed, Mother Goddess icons.
Pull the thread
Weaving was both an original act and an act of resistance. The red thread connects us to stories that horrify, infuriate and empower. Pull the thread and see where it leads.
References and citations
[1] Philomela. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philomela
[2] Klindienst, Patricia. The Voice of the Shuttle is Ours. http://oldsite.english.ucsb.edu/faculty/ayliu/research/klindienst.html
[3] Dryden, John; Addison, Joseph; Eusden, Laurence; Garth, Sir Samuel (translators). Ovid. Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books, translated by the most eminent hands (London: Jacob Tonson, 1717) Volume II, p. 201
[5] English translation of Ovid. Metamorphoses. Tr. Brookes More. Boston. Cornhill Publishing Co. 1922, Perseus.