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Ancestors, the - Art - Blood, Red ochre, Bhimbekta and the Red Lady of Paviland
Identifier
021698
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
Blood as symbol
The use of blood and the corresponding extensive use of red ochre is a feature of these early peoples. Blood and red ochre are symbolically ‘spirit’ or spirit input. Thus any drawings in red ochre indicate a spiritual being or a person imbued with spirit and thus either seen in spiritual experiences or one having an experience. Many shamans shown on cave paintings are ‘flying’, whether this is a figurative Out of body experience or actual levitation we may never know.
Burial also used red ochre to indicate – gone to the spirit - The male skeleton found in Pavisland Cave on the Gower peninsula, known as the Red Lady of Pavisland, for example, had been reddened with ochre
Red Lady of Pavisland