The Stag Lord, The Horned God of the Hunt, The Lord of the Forest, the Dark God. If you recall our lessons, then you will remember that on Samhain the Dark God or Dark Lord is represented by the dying sun. He is nearing the end of his life-cycle and is seen as a protector and a warrior. He is also Death. The End of Life.
He is the Sun God who kisses his Goddess one last time before he is swept away to a new time and place. His Lady lovingly holds him as he prepares to leave. He disappears and is gone when suddenly she sees a white stag standing on the horizon. The stag looks to the sun, and then back at the Lady. He seems to nod his head at her before heading into the horizon with the setting sun.
Called Cernunnos or the Stag King, everything we know about him we only guess from the images of him created by the ancient Celts themselves. They made numerous icons of various gods, and over 60 depict Cernunnos. Yet we only know his name because it is carved on a single icon, made by sailors from the Gallic Parisii tribe.
The images depicting this god are almost always similar in appearance and all of them show his horns, those of a stag. He is generally seen as a mature man with long hair and a beard. He wears a torc, a metal circlet, around his neck. This circlet was a sign of nobility in the olde days. Cernunnos is usually portrayed with animals, especially the stag. He has also been associated with a beast that seems to belong only to him. It is a serpent with the horns of a ram.
The ram-horned serpent is associated with knowledge, death and the otherworld. Cernunnos carries a symbol of this in his left hand, and in his right, he carries another torc,the symbol of having been initiated into nobility.
This appears to have been written with thoughts of this god of the dark world in mind, don't you think? To learn more about 'The Song of Amergin', go here: The Song of Amergin
The Song of Amergin
I am a stag of seven tines,
I am a wide flood on a plain,
I am a wind on the deep waters,
I am a shining tear of the sun,
I am a hawk on a cliff,
I am fair among flowers,
I am a god who sets the head afire with smoke.
I am a battle waging spear,
I am a salmon in the pool,
I am a hill of poetry,
I am a ruthless boar,
I am a threatening noise of the sea,
I am a wave of the sea,
Who but I knows the secrets of the unhewn dolmen ?
