The Black Madonna is Alchemy
During my pilgrimage to Southern Italy and Sicily we visited many Black Madonnas on black beaches. During the festival of Madonna Nera delle Neve, we watched the sun set behind the volcanic mountain of Vesuvius. As I looked down at my feet I noticed that I am standing in black sand.
Black Madonna sculpted from volcanic lava
At the sanctuary of the Black Madonna of Tindaris I bought a sculpture and a rosary carved from the volcanic lava.
Our Lady of Tindari
The Black Madonnas of Positano and Tropea are both in the shadow of Mount Etna.
Into the Inferno is a documentary (available to watch on the channel Netflix) by Werner Herzog. I highly recommend that you watch this film. This incredible and heart-stopping documentary explores active volcanoes from around the world. Herzog's quest (according to the promotional material) is to gain an image of our origins and nature as a species. He finds that the volcano is mysterious, violent and rapturously beautiful and instructs 'that there is no single one (volcano) that is not connected to a belief system.
The volcanologist and co-director Clive Oppenheimer explains that the volcano is the creator of the biosphere within which all of life exists on this planet.
Deep down in the darkness, in the womb of the Earth, her fire is alive and without volcanic eruptions no life will continue to exist.
In the making of this documentary they visit tribes in Indonesia, Iceland, North Kore and Ethiopia who are living in the shadow of each of these volcanic mountains. Each of these tribes believe in the divinity of the volcano as an ancestor, as Spirit, as Creatrix and as Destroyer and as the Source of life.
Members of the tribes that live on the edge of the volcanoes go to great lengths to collect obsidian. They also risk their lives to climb to the rim of the volcano in order to receive guidance from the spirit of the volcano.
Obsidian skull
Obsidian was and is still used to make knives, arrowheads, spear points, scrapers, and many other weapons and tools. Once these discoveries were made, obsidian quickly became the raw material of preference for producing almost any sharp object
Inside the great Gothic Cathedrals of Europe, and especially France, are statues of the Black Madonna made out of black obsidian. Many were painted white over the black rock but eventually the paint flecked away revealing the original black stone.
Black Obsidian is very likely the prima materia of the alchemists. It is from this important substance that gold and other transmutations could be performed. Out of this dark and black aspect comes the albedo, the stage of the King and the Queen, the duality. The unity of the One has now become the duality of the opposites.
According to the alchemist Fulcanelli there is a Black Madonna in the crypt, or the basement, of every Cathedral in France. He says that she is the Veiled One who must stay hidden through this age. And I believe that the time has come for her to take her rightful place in our consciousness.
blessings
Hettienne
Thank you Hettienne for this clear explanation of our Black Madonna & Prima Materia from which she is made in France. I did not know the volcanic connection to the Black Madonna & obsidian from volcanoes - indeed her body is Earth & fire itself.
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