Pentagram (Pendant in antiqued silver)

Very detailed, robust pentagram pendant, 38 x 47 mm, 925 old silver finish, with black depths, in-sided design

Geometry of the pentagram
The pentagram is drawn in a closed, five times at an angle of 36 ° is equal to long kinked line fünfspitzige star with a pentagon in the middle. Other common names of this symbol are five star, pentagram, Trudenfuß, Drudenkreuz, Alpfuß, Alpkreuz, Nornenstapfe, witches and Star Maarfuß. In Mage circles it is sometimes referred to as Pentangulum, pentacle, signum sanitatis or signum Pythagoricum, and in heraldry is called Pentalpha (five times the Greek letter alpha).

What is the origin of the pentagram?
The origin of this famous character and symbol is lost in antiquity, but it is found in almost all early cultures of the world. Maybe keeping the fossilized, fünfstrahlig symmetrical calcareous skeletons of certain echinoderms (sea urchins, starfish) that were found in the soil, for magical, because their structure is unusual. It has fossil sea urchins used already in the Bronze Age as magic grave goods. Oldest pentagrams shown, which were found during excavations, dating to 2000 BC. The Sumerians already saw the sky god An, later Anu as a star icon. In later Babylon was this character of the goddess Ishtar, the equivalent of Aphrodite or Venus, assigned. The Sumerians invented writing and the first word for the highest god was depicted as a star.

Which meant the pentagram originally for people?
It was often depicted on ancient Greek coins and received a great importance also in the various Gnostic coins and religions whose sacred number was five, since they knew the five elements (light, air, fire and water wind). In the Jewish and especially Christian Gnostics of late antiquity, such as the Bogomils, the pentagram was a symbol of the five elements of the Greeks that made up the world for them. On old grave stones in Croatia, where many Bogomils are buried, quite often there is a pentagram as a relief. Even before the Ottoman Empire took the crescent as a symbol of Islam, was the pentagram, then known as the Seal of Solomon, the distinctive emblem of the first Muslims.

Also used in ancient Greece Pythagoras the pentagram as a symbol of health (signum sanitatis). His followers wore it as a badge, so it is still known signum pythagoricum (lat .: mark the Pythagoreans). The Pythagoreans called it Pentalpha (formed by 5 alpha characters), it used as a sign of health in body and soul and put it thus like at the beginning of her letters.

On the "Abraxas" -Amuletten this five star stepped also common, as well as later in the magical literature of the West. In the Middle Ages it was used in incantations and should exercise his dominion over the elementals. It has even been worn by some crusaders as a sign. Gigantic Five stars are located in France. In the area of ​​Rennes-le-Château are two imaginary pentagrams with an axial length of each exactly four miles form the cornerstones Templar castles. The upright pentagram was the symbol of the people for the alchemists of the Middle Ages.

Pentagram was called the Pentagram, because you made use of him to ward off witches and Druden. Druden (also Druten or Truden) are the old German folk beliefs angry female night spirits, bring the nightmares, occasionally also good, fine spirits in the wake of the goddess Holda or Perchta. This belief is most widespread in Bavaria, Tyrol and Transylvania. Even today, used the superstition that character to keep spirits and wicked witches of cowsheds, doorsteps, weighing, stables, etc. beds. As demons spell forming mark the pentagram therefore often occurs in wood carved on old door beams, door thresholds and Almtüren.

Goethe's Dr. Faust conjures Mephisto by used a pentagram as wards and the banishment of the elementals. Often it was the badge of secret societies. The pentagram is found in old churches (eg the cathedral of Paderborn where a pentagram is firmly anchored in the rear window between the two center windows, or even on the west window of Westminster Abbey in London), on old grave stones in the rafters of old houses, carved in stone or rock walls, as jewelry or art object.

For a long time the pentagram as a symbol of protection, only the Christian church later times disparaged it as Satan star and does so to this day, although it was considered a sign of the five wounds of Christ in early Christian iconography. The reasons for this are probably remain forever hidden in the mists of time, but maybe they did this even pagan symbol that was deeply rooted in the minds of men banish.

The pentagram plays today in practically all areas of Western magical world role. Thus, it is e.g. in the Wiccan tradition the central symbol. It serves as a badge initiate and is often worn as an earring, pendant or brooch.

As a sign of magic, the elements and life and also as a protective sign was and is it magicians and witches, but also by the common people, used for a long time. The Eternal Religion sees the pentagram not a portrait, but the word of God the Creator in kaligraphischer view and considers that this was also the view of earlier cultures and religions, which used the pentagram. So Solomon, neither Jew, Christian was still Muslim, but the most high God, the Creator served.