Birth Bricks Old and Older

Birth Bricks Old and Older

When I was learning about how rural and basti women gave birth 20-25 years ago, what was almost routinely mentioned was ‘….and I squatted on the bricks—and then the bachcha was born.’ I was not then surprised that a University of Pennsylvania team of archeologists excavating a site in Egypt found ‘birth bricks’, probably, they surmised, used by women of the nobility as they birthed.

The first image above is of a basti woman simulating the position she would take for the birth during a MATRIKA workshop.

The second, below, is the detailing on the birth brick excavated by archeologists. You can vaguely see the birthing Egyptian woman on the right and the midwife in the lower left hand corner, ready to catch the baby.

Of course, for me, it’s quite affirming to see the same custom/position having been used across geographical and chronological boundaries.

The practical aspect of a birthing mother squatting is recognized, the pelvic bones, muscles, ligaments are at their widest. Gravity is working FOR rather than against the woman’s pushing efforts. In the  ‘lithotomy’ position (legs up in the air)  the woman is actually forced to push UP against gravity.

Being slightly elevated on the ‘birth bricks’ would give the midwife ample room for her hands to catch the newborn. Also women often would be surrounded by helpers on both sides, offering physical support, affectionate touch and encouragement.

Can't you just imagine if we started bringing bricks into the labour room?!

Downward Pointing Triangle 3 Havan Kund

Few are aware of how the havan, which comes from the Vedic Sacrificial ritual, parallels sexual intercourse.  Just as the coupling of the male and female in sexual intercourse can bring into being a new human life, so making offerings into the fire with intention and incantation, can transform reality, bringing the desired objective into being.

In this image we see a downward-pointing triangle—we can tell the directional aspect from the stone at the point of the triangle—which has been used for a havan. Although most havans have been constructed in a square shape, this image shows one in triangular shape.

The sacred texts have many references to this symbolic equation of sex, fertility (that is the manifestation of the desired outcome of the ritual) and the role of the female element as holding the transformation process (just like the womb holds the unborn fetus). A few quotes from the series Sacred Books of the East—particularly from the Satapatha-Brahmana which deals with ritual procedures and details.

(Vol. 12 Part I) As seed is poured into the womb, so here. If, on the other hand, he were to make the offering before the vashat, it would be lost, as would be the seed poured not into the womb.

From the sacrifice offspring is assuredly produced; and that offspring produced…is from the union; and the offspring produced from union is produced after the completion of the sacrifice.

The altar is assuredly female and the veda is male. For the union the veda was made, accordingly when he touches the alter with it during the sacrifice, a union productive of the offspring is thereby effected.

Vol. 41, Part 3

And again, why he does so at new moon—when he performs the initiation, he verily pours out his own self, as seed, into the fire-pan, the womb.

Downward Pointing Triangle 4 Rajasthani wall painting

This contemporary Rajasthani wall painting continues the theme of the downward pointing triangle-yoni symbolism...the emanation, at the bottom even echoes my first posting of the Harappa seal.

Downward Pointing Triangle 2 Kobars

Kobars are marriage frescoes traditionally painted in the bridal chamber of some tribal peoples in the Bihar area. There are many kinds of kobars---representing the desired fertility of the couple, an invocation for many children to be born of this union.

However the focus of this image is not schematic as many kobars are, nor is it of the yoni or the belly or the breasts of the woman. Rather the downward pointing triangles (one with the third eye as her face) and the other depicted by the shape of her head, speak of female fertility.

Interestingly the energy, or chakra, on the top of her head, connects the bride with the ethereal world of spirits, perhaps ancestors…and of course the leafy thrusting of vegetal life omnipresent referent to fertile growth and life force.