Pestle found in August, 2012 on Historic Huguenot street between the Deyo and Bevier houses; this tools have been used for cooking, medicinal purposes, and spirituality dating as far back as 2500 B.C. Photo Credit: Julia Ponder

Bee Balm, a red flower with medicinal properties that grows in the Hudson Valley. Photo Credit: herbsguide.org

The Sandstone Pestle found on Historic Huguenot in August of 2012 is an object that dates back as far as 2500 B.C, and shows us how valuable sturdy tools were in a time that lacked modern amenities. Pestles are representative of cultures that relied heavily on plant matter as a source of food, and its second life as a nutcracker indicates a people who had a strong relationship to their objects, even after they were broken.

There is an old folklore told among the Muncee people of the story of the maiden Lanawee and her lover, “The Arrow.” Before the night of their wedding, the two lovers’ families met and were getting ready for the following day when The Arrow was taken sick by small pox, which had been plaguing the local people. Within the night the Oswego bridegroom died of his ailment. Lanawee was so stricken by grief that she in turn killed her self in the very spot that her betrothed had met his end, meaning to sacrifice herself to the Great Spirit in exchange for the good health of her people. Lanawee held a knife to her chest and shouted to the sky, “Lay me with The Arrow, I am but a blighted flower!” before taking her own life. The next morning when their families returned both bodies had disappeared, and in the place where their bodies had been grew bright red flowers, which are today widely called by the name Bee Balm. After finding the bodies,  the relatives of Lanawee and The Arrow decided to hold a celebration in honor of the departed and used the Bee Balm to decorate their clothing and hair. Later on, tea was made out of the plant, and was named after The Arrow’s place of origin, Oswego, and therefore become Oswego tea which was said to cure smallpox (Pritchard 298).

Photo Credit: Julia Ponder

Photo Credit: Julia Ponder

A mortar and pestle would have been used to crush and grind the flower that made Oswego tea, this pestle would have been very similar to the one found on Historic Huguenot street in 2012 by SUNY New Paltz Professor, Joe Diamond and his crew.The pestle is made of sandstone and has a cylindrical shape with a flat bottom, which is slightly rough, and has edges that have been worn dull with age. It is heavy in the hand, a completely solid item that is not easily broken; its smooth and rounded top fits nicely in the palm, while the bottom flat part of the pestle indicates its original form was different, and that we are actually only holding part of an original piece. Most likely at some point in its history this tool was broken in half, but was kept still after it was broken and used. The pestle is hypothesized to have been at least twice as large when it was first made, currently its size is about five inches in length and three in width.  There is indication that the pestle served another purpose in its second life as nut cracker, due to the indent on its upper left side where it was most likely used to crush acorns. Although it is impossible to tell the story of a single individual who might have owned this tool, we can let our imaginations make inferences as to where and when it belonged, and what significance it had to a culture which lacked all modern amenities.

Today, Pestles are usually seen with a mortar, but the one found by Professor Diamond’s crew was alone. Archaeological digs on the North East coast have many times discovered pestles that have attached effigies, most commonly a bear’s head, but also that of phallic symbols. Bears were sacred spiritual animals to the Algonquin people (Diamond). Pestles with bear effigies most likely did not serve the purpose of grinding, but were “fetishes or the guardian spirit of women” (Lenik 141).

Complete Pestle and Mortar on display at Historic Huguenot. It was found in Hurley, NY and donated by Reuban B. Crispall, October 1965. Photo Credit: Julia Ponder

The tribes of the Munsee were predominant in the New Paltz area, conducting trade and having confrontation with the setters (Grumet 48-49). Is it possible that this pestle could of traded hands between the Huguenot’s and the Muncee, and that an effigy could have been broken off in order to use this tool for other purposes? This question is quite possibly unanswerable, and expert Joe Diamond believes that this was just your ordinary everyday pestle; an object of simplicity, yet at the heart of traditions like cooking, medicine making, and spirituality. These objects are used still today for the same exact purposes as they were centuries ago.

A complete pestle and mortar can be seen on display on Historic Huguenot street. In proportion to the number of pestles found in the Hudson Valley, mortars are more scarce. This is due to the difficulty it took to hollow out the stone to create the mortar (Parker 60). Other’s speculate that the mortar was more easily used over again and again, therefore they were less likely to be discarded and harder for archaeologists to find. When they are found, pestles and mortars indicate that the culture that once used them was relent on plant foods, where a lack of such objects indicates a more hunting oriented culture. Not only does the pestle serve for crushing herbs for medicinal purposes, like the families of Lenawee and The Arrow, the pestle offered a way to eat plant foods, and smash grain that would have otherwise been inedible proving to be an essential tool in the lives of ancient peoples across the globe. In a world where common cooking objects are considered disposable, the Huguenot Street pestle reminds us that every day objects can still be reused and have value even after they are broken.

Works Cited:

Diamond, Joe. Personal Interview. 13 April 2015.

Lenik, Edward J. Picture Rocks: American Indian Rock Art in the Northeast Woodlands. Lebanon: University Press of       New England, 2002. Print

Grumet, Robert S. Manhattan to Minisink: American Indian Place Names in Greater New York and Vicinity. Norman:       University of Oklahoma Press, 2013. Print

Parker, Arthur C. The Archaeological History of New York. New York: The University of the State of New York, 1920. Print.

Pritchard, Evan T. Native New Yorkers: The Legacy of the Algonquin People of New York. San Francisco:                   Council Oak Books, LLC, 2002. Print.

My copy T.S. Eliot Collected Poems 1909-1935 was reprinted by Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc. in  New York, 1936. The original publication was by Faber in London of the same year. In this copy the title page has a stamp from Milton Academy library in blue ink. After some research, I found that Milton is a k-12 private school in Massachusetts that’s been around for over a hundred years. The book must have belonged to that library before it was either donated, or bought by the used bookstore I purchased it from. This collection contains all of Eliot’s work between the years 1909-1935. It is an old hard cover, but I’m unsure of its exact age. The pages are yellowed, the binding is worn, and unlike newer editions of Eliot’s collected poems, it lacks footnotes. However, someone has gone through and lightly marked up with pencil the more studied works, like The Waste Land, “The Hollowmen”, and “The Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock”. The annotations are in meticulously small and written a quite beautiful and delicate handwriting that leads me to believe that whoever wrote in this book was once a female student or professor at Milton Academy.

My first encounter with Eliot was through The Waste Land. I had the Norton critical edition, which provides all of Eliot’s original footnotes and then some. I can only imagine the time and effort that this person went through to understand all the obscure references and to translate passages that were in a different language. Her notes are extensive, but there are a lot of stanzas that are made clearer by the Norton edition.

Although I write in almost every book I own – underlining, circling words I don’t understand, and making comments – I would never dream of touching my pen to these pages. I have come to the minor epiphany that I don’t write in any books that I purchase used; there is something sacred about these annotations, and any marks made by me would be disfiguring the true heritage of the book. The most annotated poem in this collection “The Hollow Men” suggesting to me that whoever the book belonged to at Milton might have had to write a paper on it. I wonder how it made its way to my favorite book store?

I picked if off the shelf on a rainy cold day sometime in mid-November of last year in the Bruised Apple book store in Peekskill. The clerk who is usually there is an older gentleman with a kind smile and a receding hairline reminiscent of Prufrock. I once heard him read poetry at an open mic several years back. He had brought in his poem to the open mic reading in a paper bag and while he read dramatically dropped the pages to the ground as he flew through his verses. He started off saying, “No one wants to be a poet – it’s like being an aristocrat during the revolution.” I still don’t know if I agree with him, but I’ll never forget the surprise I felt in finding that the little old man behind the counter of my favorite bookstore had so much to say. It was a lot like finding this book. Forgive the cliché, but I had discovered something much more in its pages than the cover could ever reveal

.

The nature of the journal is its closeness in proximity to the writer. Unlike the keyboard, whose unnatural clunk is never there when you need it, or the napkin which does not offer enough space for prose, the journal gives you space and access to write at a moments notice. In its nature of closeness to me it spends its time in my bedroom in the upper left side of the house I share with two other girls. While not being used I place it on one of my bookshelves beneath my mirror next to all the wonders and worlds it wishes to emulate. Sometimes, after writing in bed, it rests beneath my side table, an antique cigar cabinet inherited from a great uncle. It will sit there for days on occasion when I have little time for casual personal writing.

I’ll admit that I am a bit of a mess when it comes to my room. There is not usually one place that any given object is subject to stay. Currently there is a hand held vacuum next to my journal on top of my dogs’ kennel among an array of other objects that have landed in the vicinity for the moment. Becoming aware of this mess, I quickly move the journal back to the book shelf and the vacuum to the hall closet. My older border collie, Ruby, places a paw on my keyboard and drops a half chewed rope toy in my lap. They are as much a part of the habitus of my journal as any other object.  Their hair gets caught in the pages and surprises me when I’m opening its leather cover in the backs of coffee shops.

Once filled the journal will stay permanently on the shelf where the others of its kind rest. Besides these recollections are my most prized possession (besides the dogs of course), my books. They are the ones I cared to buy, gifts, and found. Each one is an old friend, or a friend I’ve yet to meet. I haven’t read all the books I own, but if I have them it’s for a reason. I remember how I came about each one and what compelled me to its pages. Some have histories that span to a time before I was born. My copies of T.S Eliot’s Collected Poems and The Shorter Poems of Robert Browning were both printed in the 1930’s. But there is no rhyme or reason to the way these books are displayed. I’ve tried to keep them orderly, but the best I’ve been able to achieve is to try and keep works by the same author in the same section. The condition of some of the soft covers reflects their use. The first book in Stephen King’s Dark Tower Series, The Gunslinger, has been chewed thoroughly and is missing both the front and back cover. I have thirty-one Stephen King books, the entirely of the G.R.R Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire Series, most of The Wheel of Time Series (there are fourteen), and of course Harry Potter.  I have four book shelves and one pile. Although I would sooner give away a book than I would my journal, they are nonetheless, very close to me. Like the journals I have, they tell a story of age and transformation through my tastes and what I’ve retained. As you can tell I went through a big fantasy phase, but I’ve never stopped loving the horror and psychological suspense that a Stephen King book offers, On Writing has recently been given away as a birthday gift to my cousin who I know will make the most of it.

My favorite gift to give is a book; this is often most people’s least favorite to receive. In the same way that I can recall where and when I received a book, I know where, and to who they’re going to be with next. Last week I gave away my copy of Phillip Pullman’s The Golden Compass at a baby shower where children’s books were asked to be brought in lieu of cards. It was one of my favorite books as a pre-teen and I remember the day I got it very clearly. I was reading underneath my desk one day during social studies class, like I always did, and my teacher approached me afterwards. I had a hard time connecting with teachers when I was younger, but this one in particular seemed to understand me. Instead of reprimanding, or calling my mother, he came up to me and handed me a copy of this particular novel and said, “If you like that, you’re going to love this.” It was a defining moment. Never before did an adult take an interest in my tastes or connect with me on my own level, and it was through a book. I was touched, and he was right, I did love it. When I think about why I want to be a teacher I think about this moment.

A moment must be captured swiftly lest it be taken away with the waking of the dog, or the sudden rush of an autumn
storm that changes the landscape and blows away all your materials. Intention, deft and dexterity must be observed when lifting paint from the pallet. In art you must choose what to keep and what to leave out. Writing is this way too, like the painter whose every move will be documented on the canvas, the poet must be careful about the words they choose and how they will arrange them. These choices will be cretinously examined by critics and peers alike. Disaster or Infamy hang in the balance.  The private journal leaves more room for error and mulling over the most absurd notions. You can draw funny faces of your friends in here or phallic images and none will be the wiser of your still juvenile tendencies.

My leather bound journal has pages made of linen, inspiring both the written word and the art of drawing. Arielle, my little sister, is an art major here at SUNY New Paltz. She gave me this journal for this past birthday. In my mind I want to say something short and profound about the relationship I have with her. It is strange how when we need to say something important the words are hard to come by. Maybe I chose not to write about this object originally because in my writing I’ve been trying to get away from the personal. I wanted to step back and leave myself out of my objects. Bringing myself into them and into my writing makes me vulnerable, a feeling that I’ve been trying to get away from my whole life and one of the reasons I began writing in the first place. I try not to take words for granted, try and put them in their proper place at the right time. They are not objects themselves, or are they? They are brought into being and then erased, re-written. Aloud, they exist in air for a nano-second and disappear. I sweat over them, rubbing my hands beneath the table, chewing on a nail, wanting to speak but never wanting to say the wrong thing. Misunderstanding and failure are too close at hand for me to voice an opinion. It is only through many years of practice have I learned to overcome this.

With the pen it is different. Here, you can speak up, work through your thoughts before presenting them. The details of a life are mundane to those who stand outside its sphere. You must choose carefully what to write to make it true, or else it’s just another slip of paper being put away in a draw. What you leave out becomes more important than what you keep. I have been writing in journals since I was a little girl drawing in them, pressing flowers and writing poetry. In this private place however, you can write as much as you want about whatever you want. I knew I wanted to be a writer before I turned thirteen. My sister followed my lead; the books I would read would become hers, but more often she would use my paints and art supplies to make her own creations. We flourished in our shared little world of imagination.

I’ve been told not to talk vaguely of experience. Seek truth. No one will ever experience the exact same things that my sister and I did. There is a great Tolstoy quote: “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” In my family, our father was prone to lighting things on fire, not out of anger or for the love of the flame, but out of sheer drunkenness. The garbage can was a victim often, but mostly the couch felt the brunt of it. He ate, read and slept there every night and would fall asleep with a cigarette in his hand. Next to him were two kerosene heaters he used to heat the house. The heaters themselves, if left till the wick burned out, would fill the house with smoke. Arielle and I would wake up in the mornings and there would be soot on our faces. It looked like you were rolling around in dirt.  The windows were lightly coated with the stuff. If you wanted to look out through barren trees and see the frozen lake clearly you’d have to get a wet towel and clean off the glass.

I broke my little sister’s heart when I left that place behind, she was only fifteen and would spend another year there before moving in with an Aunt. Our relationship suffered for a while, but recently we’ve grown close again. Her gift was a reminder to me that no one else will ever get that close to understanding who I am than her. I didn’t think I could give an object that much importance and meaning until I set down to write this.

“Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyant,

Had a bad cold, nevertheless

Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,

With a wicked pack of cards.” – T.S Elliot’s The Waste Land

Where does the drive to know the truth begin, and where does it end? How do we find the words or images to make meaning out of our seemingly meaningless existence? Philosophers, poets, and artists (if not all the same being) have sought to bring to light these questions, but often their answers provide little solace for those on the receiving end. Who do we trust to make such meaning, a friend, a stranger, a wise man, a fortune teller? Despair in the modern world led T.S Elliot to write The Wasteland, and in his epic poem, he references the Tarot several times, using it to relate back to his own life and create a masterpiece. The deck whose cards he references is the Rider-Waite Deck (Leavitt, 14). His poem would be considered one of the greatest poems of the twentieth century, but with countless literary, philosophical, and spiritual references would only be completely understood by a small population. Still, without comprehension of every footnote, much like the tarot cards themselves, the poem can be appreciated and loved by many who read it.

Pamela Colman Smith

Most occult historians surmise that the beginnings of the Tarot are shrouded in mystery. Some say it originated in ancient Egypt and then traveled to the Levant and onward to Greece and Europe.  Others insist that it did not appear until Renaissance era Italy (Gray 6). There are many conflicting hypotheses of why exactly it was created in the first place,
making it a hard craft to study. During the mid-15th century the tarot pack would have been used for playing card games by nobles, and even specially painted to resemble the families that were given. Although Edward IV had outlawed the importation of decks into England, the tarot still made its way into the country with the help of traveling gypsies (Gray 8).

Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn

Cat People Tarot: Strength

In 1886 the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn was formed in England. Many celebrities were part of the order, including W.B Yeats (Raine 6). In 1910 Arthur Edward Waite enlisted the help of Pamela Colman, another member of the Golden Dawn and renowned artist of the time, to paint seventy-eight allegorical paintings using Waite’s descriptions of the Tarot pack (Gray 9). These images have served as the standard for Tarot packs in the English-speaking world and have influenced the creation of thousands of different unique decks since then, which include subjects from “Cat People Tarot” to “Zombie Tarot” and beyond.

Those who study the occult often make a business out of it. A haggard man on the street in Woodstock once offered to read my sister her cards for ten dollars (or “whatever you have to spare”). In my imagination, I concoct elaborate images of gypsies and magi who studied the tarot hundreds of years ago. I do not know of any others in my own life who practice the art themselves but have tried to reach out to those in the community to learn more to no avail. Until recently, there was a shop in town called “The Silent Muse” that advertised on their website psychic readings, antiques, and items of the occult. If one was to peek in the dirty windows of The Silent Muse, they would see an old Knight’s suit, glass displays containing different spiritual stones, and dusty tapestries hanging on the walls. Although the owner had a list of available hours on the door, they were never open. Recently the sign was taken down, and the inside of the store was cleaned out.

In 1971 The Rider-Waite Tarot deck copyright was purchased by U.S. Game systems Inc. The new world merges with the old, and those who can strike the balance are left in the dust. There is no concrete evidence to support the accuracy of fortune-telling. One thing is for sure, the images of the tarot will continue to delight, inspire and confuse for a long time to come. More than anything, the deck serves as a way of connecting with archetypes of the past rather than a method of predicting the future.

Works Cited:

Gray, Eden. A complete Guide to the Tarot. New York: Bantam Books, 1970. Print.

Leavitt, June. Esoteric Symbols: The Tarot in Yeats, Eliot, and Kafka. Lanham: University Press of America, Inc. 2007. Print.

Raine, Kathleen (1976) [1972]. Liam Miller, ed. “Yeats, the Tarot and the Golden Dawn”. New Yeats Papers II (second ed.). Dublin: Dolmen Press. p. 6.

My Rider Waite tarot pack travels from location to location within my house. I have had a few decks before this one, but so far it is my favorite. Although I have been interested in tarot since my younger years, it is not until recently that I’ve begun to study them more seriously. The tarot pack comes with a book entitled The Key to the Tarot which was written by A.E White at the time of its creation in 1910. I am still a novice, and like those whose cards I read, each image holds new mystery and discovery.

The Tarot cards are flat and rectangular in shape. Like traditional playing cards they are made from layering paper, creating a product called pasteboard that is then used to print the cards (madehow.com). On the back of each card is a cerulean blue and white design of roses and tulips. The cards themselves are 5” by 2.5”.  As you can tell, the size of a deck makes it very portable.  The accompanying book is the same length with a width of half an inch.  The cover of the book is deep blue with gold mimicking the design on the cards with an inner rectangle displaying the title and author. Also within this rectangle is the ouroboros, a snake eating its own tail, which is a symbol for eternity. The pages have experienced slight water damage, but are still legible.

The tarot consists of a 78-card deck. These cards are broken up into two groups: The Major Arcana and the Lesser Arcana. The Major Arcana is made up of 21 trump cards numbered with roman numerals. There is another card in this part of the deck that has no number, but is usually assigned the number zero; this is The Fool. The image of The Fool is represented by a fair young man precariously close to a cliff. Behind him, a dog scurries at his heels but it is unclear whether the dog means to harm the man or warn him of the imminent danger. In his left hand is a white rose and in his right he carries all his worldly belongings. The back drop is yellow with a white sun.

In the Lesser Arcana there are 56 suit cards. Suit cards, similar to a traditional playing deck, are part of 4 different groups consisting of fourteen cards each.  These are: Wands, Cups, Swords and Pentacles; each of these suits has their own King, Queen, Knight and Page. On the front of each card is a depiction of a particular scene which conveys the situation at hand and the emotions associated with it. Each suit has its own element and connotations.  For Instance, the suit of wands is typically associated with the element of fire and spirituality.

Let’s look at The Nine of Wands, which is represented by a man preparing a battlement. He looks distressed as he holds one staff in his hands and looks on at the other eight which he has positioned to block out enemies. Without The Key to The Tarot, one may conclude that this card signifies strength in the face of opposition on their own. However, not all cards are as straight forward as they seem and for this reason the book is essential for full understanding. Waite also provides instruction on how to position the cards in the traditional Celtic cross method at the back of the book.

The purpose of a tarot reading is the quest for divinatory truth by the “Querent”, who is the person the cards are being read for. In the time that this tarot was first devised very few people would have owned their own set. The history of the tarot extends before the creation of the printing press.  Before then, each image would have been painted on the front of the card by hand (Eden 3). The world has grown smaller since then. A doctrine that Waite says in theory has always existed (Waite 53) is now accessible to the masses for the low price of $20.49 on Amazon.com.

My interest in these cards is not a belief in any real ability for them to predict the future, but in the archetypes and symbols that each card represents, which I find both fascinating and elusive. I do believe most people whose cards I read create their own interpretation of the images. This speaks to the human psyche’s relationship with materials and symbols. Since the dawn of man we have sought to assign meaning to life and all of its treasures and disasters. The tarot cards create a tangible representation of that continuous search.

“Playing Cards.” Madehow. Advameg Inc., 2015. Web. 25 January. 2015.

Waite, A.E. The Key to The Tarot. London: Rider Books, 1910. Print.

Gray, Eden. A complete Guide to the Tarot. New York: Bantam Books, 1970. Print.