BEARS OF ANCIENT FOLK LORE

Due to my interest in the image of the bear in our family crest, I decided to blog this extract from a book that I read during the December recess of the very reknown writer, psychologist and Social Sciences researcher, CP Estes, who quotes the following about the ancient bear in her notorious work " Women who run with the Wolves" :

The Spirit Bear (pp.357-358)

"What does the symbol of bear, as opposed to fox, or badger, or quet­zal, teach us about dealing with the angry self? To the ancients, bear symbolized resurrection. The creature goes to sleep for a long rime, its heartbeat decreases to almost nothing. The male often impregnates the female right before hibernation, but miraculously, the egg and sperm do not unite right away. They float separately in her uterine broth until much later. Near the end of hibernation, the egg and sperm unite and cell division begins, so that the cubs will be born in the spring when the mother is awakening, just in time to care for and teach her new offspring. Not only by reason of awakening from hi­bernation as though from death, but much more so because the she-bear awakens with new young, this creature is a profound metaphor for our lives, for return and increase coming from something that seemed deadened...

"The bear is associated with many huntress Goddesses: Artemis and Diana in Greece and Rome, and Muerte and Hecoteptl, mud women deities handed down through the Latina cultures. These Goddesses bestowed upon women the power of tracking, knowing, "digging out" the psychic aspects of all things. To the Japanese the bear is a symbol of loyalty, wisdom, and strength. In northern Japan where the Ainu tribe lives, the bear is one who can talk to God directly and bring messages back for humans. The crescent moon bear is consid­ered a sacred being, one who was given the white mark on his throat by the Buddhist Goddess Kwan-Yin, whose emblem is a crescent moon. Kwan-Yin is the Goddess of Deep Compassion and the bear is her emissary...

"In the psyche, the bear can be understood as the ability to regulate one's life, especially one's feeling life. Bearish power is the ability to move in cycles, be fully alert, or quiet down into a hibernative sleep that renews one's energy for the next cycle. The bear image teaches that it is possible to maintain a kind of pressure gauge for one's emo­tional life, and most especially that one can be fierce and generous at the same time. One can be reticent and valuable. One can protect one's territory, make one's boundaries clear, shake the sky if need be, yet be available, accessible, engendering all at the same time...

"The hair from the throat of the bear is a talisman, a way to remem­ber what one has learned. As we see, it is invaluable."

(New readers can scan the rest of our family history in my blog archives.)