Symbols - What does heaven look like
Old King Cole
Old King Cole is a nursery rhyme or old song purportedly about a former king in Britain. The rhyme goes …………….
Old King Cole was a merry old soul
And a merry old soul was he;
He called for his pipe, and he called for his bowl
And he called for his fiddlers three.
Every fiddler he had a fiddle,
And a very fine fiddle had he;
Oh there's none so rare, as can compare
With King Cole and his fiddlers three
But let us now look at the following ……………….
Alfred Watkins – The Old Straight Track
The New English Dictionary gives a rare obscure word ‘Cole’ as meaning a juggler. Also as of more frequent usage ‘cole prophet’, sometimes spelt ‘cold-prophet’ a wizard, sorcerer or diviner.
In Rowland’s ‘Mona Antiqua Restaura’ the word cole is mentioned in connection with tumuli and cairns and it is said that there are ‘grounds of probability that it really was some solemn appurtenance or religion, although now quite forgotten’.
It appears to have a Celtic origin, for in Pugh’s Welsh Dictionary will be found: Cole – an omen or belief; ..cole y beirdd, the alphabet of the bards; Colecerth; omen of danger, beacon, bonfire; Coelfain, the stones of omen
So Old King Cole was a wizard.
The indication from the rhyme is that Old King Cole derived his shamanic experience by smoking [pipe] something and ingesting something [bowl], with the possibility that fiddles and dancing induced experience cannot be ruled out. In effect, superficially, the combination of pipe smoking, ingestion of some plant brew and music played by the fiddle was enough to help Old King Cole on his spiritual journey.
But it may also help to know the symbolic meaning of pipe, cup or bowl and musical instrument. See the observation.
Observations
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