--------------------------------------------------------------
Was sick almost to doomsday with *ECLIPSE*: Hamlet: I, i
These late *ECLIPSES* in the sun and moon portend King Lear: I, ii
The mortal moon hath her *ECLIPSE* endured Sonnets: CVII
Born to *ECLIPSE* thy life this afternoon. King Henry VI, part I: IV, v
This other day, what should follow these *ECLIPSES*. King Lear: I, ii
Silver'd in the moon's *ECLIPSE*, Macbeth: IV, i
Sigh like tom o' bedlam. o, these *ECLIPSES* do King Lear: I, ii
My joy of liberty is half *ECLIPSE*d. King Henry VI, part III: IV, vi
Methinks it should be now a huge *ECLIPSE* Othello: V, ii
Is now *ECLIPSE*d; and it portends alone Antony and Cleopatra: III, xiii
Clouds and *ECLIPSES* stain both moon and sun, Sonnets: XXXV
------------------------------------------------------------
. Mecca Total Solar eclipses 250 years apart
.
. May 30, 1593 Eclipse Mag. at Mecca 0.91
. Dec.21, 1843 Eclipse Mag. at Mecca 0.84
.
http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclipse/0211593/
http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclipse/0611843/
.
. Old Marley was as DEAD AS A DOOR-NAIL
. Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my
. own knowledge, what there is particularly dead
. about a door-nail.
----------------------------------------------------------------
http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEcat/SE1801-1900.html
.
______ Greatest Saros Eclipse Sun Path Center
Date Eclipse U.T. Type # Mag. Lat. Long. Alt Width Dur.
.
1593 May 30 13:05 T 121 1.070 21.3N 16.9W 89 227 06m08s
1843 Dec 21 05:03 T 139 1.016 8.0N 101.0E 58 66 01m43s
------------------------------------------------------------------
<<Expect the first tomorrow, when the bell tolls One.'
. `Expect the second on the next night at the same
. hour. The third upon the next night when the last
. stroke of Twelve has ceased to vibrate.
.
. Eclipse Dec.21 / Dec.24
. 1st Dec.22
. 2nd Dec.23
. 3rd Dec.24
. CHRISTMAS
.
.
<<`It's Christmas Day.' said Scrooge to himself. `I haven't missed it.
. The SPIRITS have done it all in one night. They can do anything
. they like. Of course they can. Of course they can.
------------------------------------------------------------
Elizabeth de Vere (1575-1627)
Engaged, at Cecil's insistence, to Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of
Southampton, who broke it off in late 1594. Married William Stanley,
6th Earl of Derby, 26 January 1595; A Midsummer Night's Dream
may have been written for performance at their marriage banquet.
...................................
Susan de Vere (1587-1629)
Oxford's youngest daughter; she grew up in the household of her
grandfather, Sir William Cecil, and became a Maid of Honour in
the household of Queen Anne, James's queen. On 27 December 1604
she married Philip Herbert, Earl of Montgomery.
During that Christmas season at Court,
eight Shakespeare plays were performed--a record number.
.
As part of Queen Anne's household, she performed in all four
of Jonson's masques between 1605-1610--one of only three ladies
of the court who took part in all four. The other two were
Queen Anne herself and Susan de Vere's mother-in-law,
Mary Sidney Herbert, the legendary Countess of Pembroke.
.
The couple had ten children. Susan died in 1629
. and is buried in Westminster Abbey.
-----------------------------------------------------------
. St. John the Baptist, Patron Saint
- Phillip G. Elam, Grand Lodge of Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons
.
. On June 24th, we observe the festival of summer sun and
. on December 27th, we observe the festival of the winter sun.
.
. The June festival commemorates John the Baptist and
. the December festival honors John the Evangelist.
-------------------------------------------------------
1604 Edward de Vere's ritual death: June 24(OS)
1604 Susan Vere and Philip Herbert: Dec 27(OS)
.
1605 Lunar: 03:44 GST Sep 27(NS) Sep 17(OS)
http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclipse/1321605/
1605 Solar: 12:58 GST Oct 12(NS) Oct 2(OS) [43.4N 0.6E]
http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclipse/0411605/
----------------------------------------------------------
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Troy/4081/Oxford.html
.
<<1. DATING OF KING LEAR
.
. In September 1605 there was an eclipse of the moon.
. In October, there was also an eclipse of the sun.
.
A commonly held belief (that is still held by some to this day) was that
natural events such as these were divine signs warning of impending doom
and disaster. In February 1606, Edward Gresham published a pamphlet that
told of strange events in Croatia that included a report of a woman
giving birth to a boy who had four heads. This was seen as confirmation
of the terrible things to come after the foreboding eclipses of just
4 months earlier. Gresham's pamphlet said:
.
"The Earth's and Moon's late and horrible obscurations, the frequent
eclipsations of the fixed bodies; by the wandering, the fixed stars,
I mean the planets, within these few years more than ordinary, shall
without doubt have their effects no less admirable, than the positions
unusual. Which Peucer with many more too long to rehearse out of
continual observation and the consent of all authors noted to be, new
leagues, traitorous designments, catching at kingdoms, translation of
empire, downfall of men in authority, emulations, ambition, innovations,
factious sects, schisms, and much disturbance and troubles in religion
and matters of the Church, with many other things infallible in sequent
such orbical positions and phenomenes."
.
On December 26, 1606, Shakespeare's King Lear was performed before James
I at Whitehall, almost certainly for the first time given that there are
no references to any earlier performances. In the play, Gloucester says:
"These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us. Though
the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds
itself scourged by the sequent effects. Love cools, friendship falls
off, brothers divide; in cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in
palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt son and father."
.
Act 1, Scene 2 then Edmund continues:
.
"I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what
should follow these eclipses...I promise you, the effects he writes of
succeed unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child and the parent;
death, dearth, dissolutions of ancient amities; divisions in state,
menaces and maledictions against king and nobles; needless diffidences,
banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts, nuptial breaches, and I
know not what."
.
Act 1, Scene 2
.
It is bordering on indisputable that Gloucester's and Edmund's speeches
in King Lear were directly inspired by the recent or "late" eclipses in
Autumn 1605 and Gresham's pamphlet of February 1606. The known recent
events, Gresham's words, his account of cause and effects, his way of
listing disasters that he predicts will come about as a result of this
divine sign, all correlate with these speeches in King Lear.
Shakespeare's conciser accounts are, naturally, vastly superior,
particularly in the way Gloucester's account builds forebodingly from
cooling love to high treason and the alliteration in Edmund's speech,
but I can not imagine any impartial and objective reader of these two
accounts failing to accept their direct correlation. Shakespeare even
goes one step further by augmenting the list of impending doom with a
reference to the recent Gunpowder Plot attempt to murder James I and
Parliament members at the Palace of Westminster on November 4, 1605 as
real evidence of "in palaces, treason" following these eclipses.
Immediately after the Gunpowder Plot of November 1605, various security
measures were put into effect including the closure of all ports.
Unusually, these security measures were announced by public proclamation
and the incident in general aroused intense interest in the country. In
a clear utilisation of these security measures by Shakespeare, he has
Edgar saying in King Lear:
.
"I heard myself proclaimed, and by the happy hollow of a tree escaped
the hunt. No port is free, no place that guard and most unusual
vigilance does not attend my taking."
.
Act 2, Scene 2
.
As Oxford died in 1604, how could he have been the author
of this work that correlates with known, dateable events
and sources that occurred after he died?>>
-------------------------------------------------
Clearly, Oxford didn't die on June 24th 1604
-------------------------------------------------
Elizabethan Review:
. http://www.jmucci.com/ER/articles/lear.htm
.
_Lear's Cordelia, Oxford's Susan, and Manningham's Diary_
. by Warren Hope
....................................................
<<Nelson drew attention to a couplet recorded in the Diary of
John Manningham of the Middle Temple 1602- 1603 that was used
as part of a courtly entertainment before the Queen in the
summer of 1602. Ladies of the court drew lots and each gift
was accompanied by a couplet. Manningham recorded the verses
along with the names of the ladies who received them and
the nature of the accompanying gifts. Manningham wrote:
.
. Blank: LA[DY] Susan Vere
.
. Nothing's your lott, that's more then can be told
. For nothing is more precious then gold.
.
Susan Vere is the recipient of a priceless gift one that is both
"more then can be told" & "more precious then gold," a very
special kind of "nothing" indeed. The couplet is in fact
a riddle, awarding Susan Vere an inexpressible & precious gift
that merely appears to be "nothing." What could that be?
.
. A look at the text of King Lear unravels the riddle.
.
In the first scene of King Lear, the scene that precipitates the
action of the play, a kind of drawing of lots take place. Lear divides
his kingdom and announces the "dowers" or dowries to be awarded to his
three daughters. He gives equal portions of the realm to Goneril and
Regan and their respective husbands, Albany and Cornwall. He reserves
the largest portion of the kingdom for his youngest daughter, the
unmarried Cordelia. To be awarded this portion, she is to declare
publicly her love for her father in terms that will please him
no doubt by renouncing marriage in her father's lifetime.
The dialogue, beginning with the words of Lear, runs:
.
. what can you say to draw
. A third more opulent than your sisters?
.
Speak.
.
. Cordelia: Nothing, my lord.
.
. Lear: Nothing?
.
. Cordelia: Nothing.
.
. Lear: Nothing will come of nothing.>>
---------------------------------------------------
Susan Vere & Philip Herbert 4th Earl Of Pembroke
.
. Marriage Date: December 27th, 1604
. the Festival Day of St. John the Evangelist
......................................................
. JOHN 1:1-3 (1560 Geneva Bible)
.
In the beginning was the *WORD*, and the *WORD* was with God, and the
*WORD* was God. This same was in the beginning with God. All things
were made by it, and without it was made *NOTHING* that was made.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
. *NOTHING* is truer than truth
...............................................................
. Very like Cordelia, Susan Vere DID indeed marry in
. her father's lifetime but ONLY after he had become
. disenfranchised of EVERything but the *WORD*
------------------------------------------------------------
. Edward de Vere faked death: June 24th, 1604
. the Festival Day of St. John the Baptist
.
<<John's ministry and life ended when he admonished Herod and his
wife, Herodias, for their sinful behavior. John was imprisoned and
was eventually beheaded. Saint Jerome wrote that Herod kept the
head for a long time after, stabbing the tongue with his dagger in
a demented attempt to continuously inflict punishment upon John.>>
.
<<In addition to being the initial Patron Saint of Freemasons, the
Baptist was also considered to be the Patron Saint of the following:
. Bird dealers, convulsions, cutters, epilepsy, furriers,
. hailstorms, Knights Hospitaller, Knights of Malta,
. lambs, monastic life, printers, spasms, and oars.>>
-----------------------------------------------------------
. St. John the Baptist, Patron Saint
.
- Phillip G. Elam, Grand Lodge of Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons
.
<<By history, custom, tradition and ritualistic requirements,
. the Craft holds in veneration the Festival Days of
.
. St. John the Baptist on June 24th, and
. St. John the Evangelist on December 27th.
.
Eleven or more medieval trade guilds chose John the Baptist as
their Patron Saint. Even after exhaustive research by some of the
best Masonic scholars, no one can say with any certainty why
Freemasons adopted the two Saints John, or why they continue to
celebrate feast days when they once held a far different significance.
.
St. John the Baptist was a stern and just man, intolerant of sham,
of pretense, of weakness. He was a man of strength and fire,
uncompromising with evil or expediency, and, yet, courageous, humble,
sincere, and magnanimous. A character at once heroic and of rugged
nobility, the Greatest of Teachers said of the Baptist:
.
"Among them that are born of woman,
. there hath not arisen a greater than John the Baptist."
.
What do we know about John the Baptist? John was a Levite. His father
Zechariah was a Temple priest of the line of Abijah, and his mother
Elizabeth was also descended from Aaron. The Carpenter from Nazareth
and John the Baptist were related. Their mothers, Mary and Elizabeth,
were cousins. John the Baptist was born 6 months before the Nazarene,
and he died about 6 months before Jesus. The angel Gabriel separately
announced the coming births of the Great Teacher Christ and John
the Baptist. Zechariah doubted the prophecy, and was struck dumb
until John's birth. John lived in the mountainous area of Judah,
between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea. John's clothes were made
of camel's hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist.
His food was locusts and wild honey.
.
John had a popular ministry. It is generally thought that his
ministry started when he was about the age of 27, spreading
a message of repentance to the people of Jerusalem. We are told
that John the Baptist baptized Jesus after which he stepped away
and told his disciples to follow Jesus.
.
John's ministry and life ended when he admonished Herod and his wife,
Herodias, for their sinful behavior. John was imprisoned and was
eventually beheaded. Saint Jerome wrote that Herod kept the head for
a long time after, stabbing the tongue with his dagger in a demented
attempt to continuously inflict punishment upon John. After he was
murdered, John's disciples came and buried his body, and then went
and told the Great Teacher all that had happened. The Carpenter
responded to the news of John's death by saying, "John was a
lamp that burned and gave Light, and you chose for a time
to enjoy his Light."
.
On June 24th, we observe the festival of summer sun and on December
27th, we observe the festival of the winter sun. The June festival
commemorates John the Baptist and the December festival honors John
the Evangelist.
.
These two festivals bear the names of Christian Saints, but ages ago,
before the Christian era they bore other names. Masonry adopted these
festivals and the Christian names, but has taken away Christian dogma,
and made their observance universal for all men of all beliefs. St.
John's Day, June 24, symbolically marks the summer solstice, when
nature attains the zenith of light and life and joy. St. John's day
in winter, December 27, symbolizes the turn of the sun's farthest
journey - the attainment of wisdom, the rewards of a well-spent
life, and love toward one's fellow man.
.
The first Grand Lodge organized in England in 1717, on the
Festival Day of the Baptist. The United Grand Lodge of England
was created in 1813 on the Festival Day of the Evangelist.>>
-----------------------------------------------------
1) Halliday's _Shakespeare_ has a photocopy of the
. original Revels that states Hallamas Day of 1605.
.
2) The first of November, 1605, had a rare
. transit of Mercury across the Sun.
.
3) October 12, 1605, had a rare
. TOTAL eclipse of the sun across Cyprus.
http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclipse/0411605/
http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclbin/query_eo.cgi
.
4) Black Othello refers to a major black eclipse in Cyprus.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
. Othello, The Moor of Venice Act 5, Scene 2
OTHELLO: My wife! my wife! what wife? I have no wife.
. O insupportable! O heavy hour!
. Methinks it should be now a huge ECLIPSE
. Of sun and moon, and that the affrighted globe
. Should yawn at alteration.
--------------------------------------------------------------
EDMUND: I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read
. this other day, what should follow these ECLIPSES.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
. King Lear Act 1, Scene 2
.
GLOUCESTER: These late ECLIPSES in the sun and moon portend
. no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can
. reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself
. scourged by the sequent effects: love cools,
. friendship falls off, brothers divide: in
. cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in
. palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt son
. and father. This villain of mine comes under the
. prediction; there's son against father: the king
. falls from bias of nature; there's father against
. child. We have seen the best of our time:
. machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all
. ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our
. graves. Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall
. lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the
. noble and true-hearted Kent banished! his
. offence, honesty! 'Tis strange.
.
EDMUND: This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,
. when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit
. of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our
. disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as
. if we were villains by necessity; fools by
. heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and
. treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,
. liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of
. planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,
. by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion
. of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish
. disposition to the charge of a star! My
. father compounded with my mother under the
. dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa
. major; so that it follows, I am rough and
. lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am,
. had the maidenliest star in the firmament
. twinkled on my bastardizing. Edgar--
.
. [Enter EDGAR]
.
. And pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old
. comedy: my cue is villanous melancholy, with a
. sigh like Tom o' Bedlam. O, these ECLIPSES do
. portend these divisions! fa, sol, la, mi.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
October 12, 1605 This occurrence of saros 137 was observable from London
with a m.901 shortly after noon. Preceding this by 15 days, on the
evening of Sep 27 a Partial Lunar Eclipse was also observable from
London. It is these two Eclipses that most authorities believe
Shakespeare refers to in Act I, scene ii, lines 112-113 of King Lear
when the Earl of Gloucester despairing of the coming disorder attributes
it to "these late Eclipse in the Sun and Moon portend no good to us.."
.
1605 Oct 12 12:58 T 137 0.802 1.034 43.4N 0.7E 36 192
.
A noontime October 12, 1605 solar eclipse (total over Montségur)
covered the star Spica: "the maidenliest star in the firmament"
------------------------------------------------------------
1598 Solar: 10:08 U.T. Mar 07(NS) Feb 25(OS) [47.7N : 8.0W]
1598 Lunar: 05:33 U.T. Feb 21(NS) Feb 11(OS)
.
1601 Solar: 12:49 U.T. Dec 24(NS) Dec 14(OS) [46.5N : 21.5W]
1601 Lunar: 17:57 U.T. Dec 09(NS) Nov 29(OS)
.
1605 Solar: 12:58 U.T. Oct 12(NS) Oct 02(OS) [43.4N : 0.6E]
1605 Lunar: 03:44 U.T. Sep 27(NS) Sep 17(OS)
------------------------------------------------------------
. 6 Apr 1605 => Historian John Stow dies
. 4 May 1605 => Augustine Phillips' will
. 17 Sep(OS) 1605 => Lunar eclipse
.
. 12 Oct(NS) 1605 => Solar eclipse over Montségur
Loading Image...
.
. 21 Sep(OS) 1605 => MERCURY TRANSIT
. 5 Nov 1605 => Gunpowder plot
-------------------------------------------------------------
<<HIGH ON A SACRED MOUNTAIN in Southern France, the whitened ruins of
Montségur are a reminder of the last actively visible gnostic school in
the West, the Cathari. In March, 1244, 205 Cathars were burned alive,
rather than renounce their creed. A memorial solar cross silently
testifies to their martyrdom.
.
The Grail legends, the Courts of Love, the troubadours, all blossomed
under the benign guidance of the gnostic Cathari. The spirit of the
land, then known as Oc, was that of tolerance and personal liberty, most
rare in any age. Much of their faith rested upon a form of Manicheaism
brought to Gaul in the 8th century by missionaries from Bulgaria and
Yugoslavia. The close affinity of Druidic teachings, the rallying of the
poor to resist Church and secular tyranny, and the appeal of an elite
strata of the faith to the aristocracy, made rich soil in which the
teachings could take root. Cathar doctrines, proselytized largely by
readings of the Gospel according to John, provided a highly workable
alternative to the confusion and misery that existed.
.
The outer appearance and practices of the Parfaits were simple. They
worshipped in forests and on mountain tops, utilizing the strong
tellurgic currents of the region. Their initiations were held in a
series of limestone caves, chiefly near the Pic de St. Barthalemy.
Renouncing worldly riches, they wore plain dark blue gowns, ate
vegetarian foods, and kept strict vows of chastity in keeping with their
belief that it was sacrilegious to procreate. They held to the tenet
that Christ was cosmic, (and so could not be crucified), that suicide
was sacred, and that the role of woman was equal to that of man with the
only stipulation being that a woman could not preach. Marriage, baptism,
and communion were not recognized as valid rituals.
.
By 1215, the Council of Lateran established the dread Inquisition.
The murder of two Dominican Inquisitors at Avignonet was the pretext for
resuming attacks against the fortress-temple. The brave Cathari and
their supporters resisted for six months. but, through an act of
treachery, the difficult mountain was scaled, and in march of 1244,
Montségur surrendered. Singing, 205 Cathars marched down the mountain
and into the large bonfires awaiting them. A memorial solar cross
silently testifies to their martyrdom.>>
.
http://home.fireplug.net/~rshand/streams/gnosis/legend.html
--------------------------------------------------------------
Art Neuendorffer
