Notes to the Icon Symbols
by Richard Gilbert
1) Usage. All symbol icons are found at the Wikimedia
Commons website, and are in the public domain.
2) Nomenclature. The titles below for each symbol are those given to each image
at the Wikimedia Commons website (commons.wikimedia.org).
a) “Spiral” (Transformation):
An ancient symbol found on every continent—as the spiral has been found in many
burial sites, scholars consider it to reflect the transformative cycle of
life-death-rebirth.
b) “Otogakure” (Dialect):
Taken from the ongoing Naruto anime (1999-present), written and illustrated by
Masashi Kishimoto. "Otogakure" is a shorted form of "Otogakure
no Sato" ("village hidden in sound").
c) “Schottky diode” (Techne):
"Known as a hot carrier diode, [the Schottky diode] is a semiconductor
diode with a low forward voltage drop and a very fast switching action. The
cat's-whisker detectors used in the early days of wireless can be considered as
primitive Schottky diodes" (Wikipedia).
d) “Compass rose” (Direction):
The compass rose has appeared on charts and navigation maps since the 1300s. It
was originally used to indicate the direction of winds. "In the Middle
Ages, the names of the winds were commonly known throughout the Mediterranean
countries as tramontana (N), greco (NE), levante (E), siroco (SE),
ostro (S), libeccio (SW), ponente
(W) and maestro (NW)" (http://tinyurl.com/ddmowg).
e) "’Heroes’ helix” (Distinction):
An adaptation of a symbol first appearing on the "Heroes" TV series,
it resembles a segment of the DNA helix, and is "a combination of two
Japanese characters which writer and co-producer Aron Coleite has translated as
'God sending great ability'" (http://tinyurl.com/cgught).
f) “Solar symbol” (Place):
The astronomical and astrological symbol for the sun, this symbol has
significance in many fields, including psychoanalysis, semiotics, religion, and
mythology.
g) “Diamond” (Mythos):
Among its varied symbolic references, the diagonals of the diamond represent
the interchange of energies between the divine and mundane worlds, as
well, an image of indestructible awareness (adamantine, vajra).
"Daimond" was reportedly the name of Sir Issac Newton's favorite dog,
who, having knocked over a candle, set fire to some twenty years-worth of
manuscripts. "In another tale, Newton is said to have claimed that the dog
discovered two theorems in a single morning. He added, however, that 'one had a
mistake and the other had a pathological exception'" (http://tinyurl.com/c3ewm5).
h) “Dyad” (Dyad):
"The Greek Pythagoreans called the principle of 'twoness' or 'otherness':
Dyad" (Wikipedia). Numenius of
Apamea (2nd cen. CE), a Neopythagorean and forerunner of the Neoplatonists
wrote that Pythagoras named the divinity "Monad," and gave the name
"Dyad" to matter.
i) "Pallas" (Literary Society):
The astronomical symbol for the asteroid Pallas (one of the largest, and the second
asteroid to be discovered, in 1802), "Pallas" is taken from
"Pallas Athena," the virgin (parthenos)
goddess of Athens, once worshipped in the Parthenon. As a helper of numerous
heroes, she is the inspiratrix of democratic citizenship (the Athenian demos).
j) The Czech and Slovak Píča symbol (Tensity):
The píča is one of a series of yonic symbols (symbols of the vulva),
likened to the ancient Mesopotamian rhomb of the goddess Ishtar-- a goddess of
fertility, love, and war. The divine personification the planet Venus (in the
Babylonian pantheon), one of the most celebrated myths of Ishtar concerns her
descent into the underworld. "Joseph Campbell ... equates Ishtar, Inanna,
and Aphrodite, and he draws a parallel between the violent yet loving Hindu
goddess Kali, the Egyptian goddess Isis who nurses Horus, and the Babylonian
goddess Ishtar who nurses the god Tammuz" (Wikipedia). (Cf.
Campbell, Masks of God, p. 70.)
k) "White moon" (Season):
The upward-facing crescent is a symbol found in Summeria (arguably representing
the crescent Venus rather than the moon), seen joined atop the head of a sacred
bull in Knossos, and elsewhere. The Egyptian Isis wears the horns of a cow, the
cow being sacred to her. "Annually, the planet Venus disappears from one
horizon and, after an interval reappears on the opposite. The connection with
'Horned Ishtar' is inescapable. In the astral-theological system, Ishtar
becomes the planet Venus, and the double aspect of the goddess is made to
correspond to the strikingly different phases of Venus in the summer and winter
seasons" (http://tinyurl.com/bgmnyf).
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