You can actually see the TRIPLE GODDESS symbol (probably originating from Classical Greek lunar symbolism), depicting three phases of the moon: waxing crescent, full moon, and waning crescent.

The TRIPLE GODDESS. In ancient Indo-European mythologies, various goddesses or demi-goddesses appear as a triad, either as three separate beings who always appear as a group (the Greek Moirae, Charites, Erinnyes and the Norse Norns) or as a single deity who is commonly depicted in three aspects (Greek Hecate). Often it is ambiguous whether a single being or three are represented, as is the case with the Irish Brighid and her two sisters, also called Brighid, or the Morrígan who is known by at least three or four different names. In most ancient descriptions of Triple Goddesses, the separate deities perform different yet related functions, and can appear as any age they desire.

The term Triple Goddess was popularised by poet and scholar Robert Graves, in his "work of poetic imagination," The White Goddess. Graves believed that an archetypal goddess triad occurred throughout Indo-European mythology. He was not the originator of this theory, and it appears as a recurrent theme in the "Myth and Ritual" school of classical archaeology at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. The "Myth and Ritual" school is often associated with Cambridge University and with Oxford University in England.

The theme of the goddess trinity can also be found in the works of Jane Ellen Harrison,[1][2][3] A.B. Cook, George Thomson, Sir James Frazer, Robert Briffault[4] and Jack Lindsay to name a few. The Triple Goddess mytheme was also explored by psychologists involved in the study of archetypes Carl Kerenyi,[5] Erich Neumann, and even Carl Jung.[5] One of the most recent of archaeologists to explore this theme is Professor Marija Gimbutas whose studies on the Chalcolithic period of Old Europe (6500-3500 B.C.E.) have opened up entirely new avenues of research.[6][7]

The publication of the complete texts of the magical papyri from Greco-Roman Egypt[8] provide exhaustive examples of the imagery usually wrongly attributed to Graves. In one hymn, for instance, the "Three-faced Selene" is simultaneously identified as the three Charites, the three Moirae, and the three Erinnyes; she is further addressed by the titles of several goddesses:

... they call You Hekate, Many-named, Mene, cleaving Air just like Dart-shooter Artemis, Persephone, Shooter of Deer, night shining, triple-sounding, Triple-headed, triple-voiced Selene Triple-pointed, triple-faced, triple-necked, And Goddess of the Triple Ways, who hold Untiring Flaming Fire in Triple Baskets, And You who oft frequent the Triple Way And rule the Triple Decades...

She variously described within the one poem as young, bringing light to mortals ... Child of Morn, as Mother of All, before whom gods tremble, and as Goddess of Dark, Quiet and Frightful One who has her meal amid the graves. She is exalted as the supreme goddess of time and space,

...Mother of Gods And Men, and Nature, Mother of All Things... ...Beginning And End are You, and You Alone rule All. For All Things are from You, and in You do All Things, Eternal One, come to their End.

The Greek Magical Papyri reveal elements of the culture of Greco-Roman Egypt that were drawn not only from Classical and Egyptian tradition but also from earlier cultures such as those of Mesopotamia and the Near East. The triplicity of the Goddess in these texts is one of the most recurrent themes.

This imagery was well-known to those with a Classical education and continued in poetry throughout English history. A case in point is the Garland of Laurell by the English poet, John Skelton (c. 1460 - June 21, 1529):

Diana in the leavës green, Luna that so bright doth sheen, Persephone in Hell.

The Goddess triad is an essential feature of the Shakti forms of Hinduism and a distinction is made between the separate goddesses Sarasvati, Lakshmi and Kali and their manifestation as three aspects of MahaDevi ("The Great Goddess") when they are named MahaSarasvati, MahaLaksmi, and MahaKali. In the annual festival of Navaratri images of the Triple Goddess are carried in procession throughout India and in Hindu communities worldwide.

An archetypal Goddess triad is not limited to Indo-European cultures, and can also be found in some mythologies of Africa and Asia. The triadic theme also appears in medieval Christian folk traditions ? notably with the three Marys.

In one of the ironies of religious history, St. Augustine of Hippo, mocked the pagan religions of his time for believing in a goddess who could be both three-and-one at the same time. This was in his second book, The City of God. By the time he wrote his third book, On the Trinity, he had become a staunch proponent of the Trinitarian structure of the world and had obviously resolved this conflict within himself or, at the very least, brought his thinking into line with the new orthodoxy.

Images of Goddess triads are well attested from both inscriptions and sculptural sources from the time of the Upper Palaeolithic. The shrine rooms of Catal Huyuk which dated from 7500 B.C.E. contain bas-relief images of a Goddess in three forms.

While there is no controversy about the fact that a wide variety of ancient cultures worshipped some types of Goddesses who at times were seen as threefold, many scholars consider Graves' statements that they fit a "universal" pattern to be highly speculative, and his lumping together of diverse cultures in the quest for this universal pattern to be inappropriate. Graves attempted to apply his theory of "Maiden, Mother, Crone" to Goddesses who do not fit that pattern, such as the triple goddesses of Celtic Mythology, whose triple aspects are based on function, not age. The Celtic Goddesses also cannot be said to fulfil roles that are static or well-divided. The three aspects of Celtic Triple Goddesses may all be Goddesses of war (such as in the case of the Morrígan) or manifestations of different types of creativity (such as with Brighid). The existence of triple goddesses in a variety of cultures does not mean that those cultures experienced these goddesses in the same way, or that there were universal religious patterns that could be applied to all these diverse cultures.

More info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_goddess

Remember that the LUNAR GODDESS is also related to QUICKSILVER (and PLATINUM). Mercury (Greek-hydra gyros, liquid silver; latin-argentum vivum, live or quicksilver). Associated with the moon, as well as with the sea and various lunar goddesses, or women in general, the metal was referred to by alchemists by the name luna.

Burckhardt explains: Sulphur, the original masculine power, and Quicksilver, the original feminine power, both strive towards the wholeness of their one and eternal prototype. The latter is at the same time the reason for their opposition and of their mutual attraction - just as the masculine and feminine natures long for the integrality of the human state, and as a result of this seek both to separate from one another, and to unite with one another. By means of their physical union both try to re-establish the image of their common eternal prototype. This is the marriage of man and woman, sulphur and quicksilver, Spirit and soul.

Amor,

Vanesa aka Sirius

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