In the late Neolithic Age (10,200 - 4500 BCE), Europe is a wild unsettled place. Great bears, aurochs and big cats roam the great north woods. Evil spirits whisper in one's ear on chill winter nights. Human beings are not apex predators. Humans are prey.
READ: Cult of the Fire God - Bronze Age Quest
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Yet, in the world of mortals, knowledge of agriculture grows. Early domestic animals appear about 10,000, when humans are domesticated by cats. Herding, trade and the logistics of keeping animals including chickens, sheep, horses, goats and cows expand during the Bronze Age.
READ: Cult of the Fire God - Bronze Age Quest
The first mention of deities of any kind appears from c. 4000 BCE, a reference to Inanna. On the Caspian Steppe, south of the Danube River in Europe and the Middle East, live the Proto-Indo-European speakers. It's a language group from which many others including English, German, French, Spanish, Hungarian and Romanian derive.
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Proto-Indo-Europeans occupy the Pontic–Caspian steppe across Eurasia, grasslands ranging from the Black Sea to the Caspian Sea. Eventually, the people would disperse to the lands around them and assume different cultural identities, all with one deep-rooted link in the primal subconscious.
Some clan or language groups settle into agriculture and slowly learn how to enrich the soil and when to plant the seed. As these land-based activities became cyclic, a pastoral God of roads, woods and herds comes into the world of mortals.
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His hair is wild, his beard unkempt. Péh₂usōn roams the meadows and woodlands, playing his pipes. His legs are those of a goat, clad in woolly fur with cloven hooves, and horns curl from his head.
He's a frightening apparition. Despite his fierce appearance, Péh₂usōn protects travelers on the roads, shepherds and flocks in the fields. Also a deity of wilderness, he influences success of the hunt.
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His maddened music may be heard from a distance. It's said he will teach anyone to play the reed pipes. Reed pipes are popular instruments, made of local reeds, stalks or stems. The pipe can be cut as a single reed with holes, or a combination of reeds in various sizes.
His pipes might be made from the rough horsetail reed, the oldest plant in the world. A fertility deity, he's virile, lustful and proud of it. He pursues all genders and most species.
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The song of his pipes can entrance young men and women to dance. They drink ambrosia, honey mead or later, wine, and lose all inhibitions as music whirls around them. In ancient times, his is a feast of wild abandon.
In about 5000 BCE, the Egyptian culture starts to take root in the Nile Valley. In 3000 BC, the first European civilization appears as Minoans settle the shores of Crete. The Minoans bring with them the Cult of the Bull, another domestic animal. Meanwhile, the Egyptians have established a worship of Apis, the sacrificial bull god.
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The more humans depend on the fertility and productivity of the earth and seas, the more elaborate the rituals, gods and temples become. As a rustic god of the fields and wilderness, Pan receives worship in the great outdoors, excepting a couple of temples. His tales, shrouded and mystery, are related and expanded by later scribes and storytellers.
READ: Cult of the Fire God - Bronze Age Quest
As time passes Pan develops a complex mythology. He has notable attempted liaisons with three beautiful nymphs who factor into nature lore. Syrinx, fleeing his advances, becomes a stand of water reeds. From these he makes his pipes, thereafter called syrinx.
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At one point he races around the hills and forests seeking the lovely nymph Echo, but can only hear her voice. Echo was in love with Narcissus, a vain young man. Stories differ, but she fades away until only her voice is left. This is the object of Pan's futile pursuit.
In another tale he pursues the mountain nymph Pitys, who becomes a pine tree to escape him. A more complex version has Pan and the north wind Boreas both lusting after her, and Boreas uproots trees to show her how powerful he is.
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She just laughs and chooses Pan. This upsets Boreas so he blows her off a cliff to her death. Feeling sorry for her, the Goddess Gaia changes Pitys into a pine tree. And Pan still doesn't score.
Pan is a confirmed bachelor who will never change his wild ways. Although unmarried he has several children. He's lord of the outdoors. If he's woken from a nap in the woods his roar is so terrible it causes panic.
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He's equated with Roman Faunus, an ancient God of forests, fields and flocks although there are some differences. Faunus becomes a horned god after the introduction of Pan. At times Pan keeps company with Bacchus, the Roman God of Wine and equivalent of the Greek Dionysus.
He takes part in the Roman Bacchanale, a heady time of drinking, feasting and horizontal fertility rituals. Pan is part of the general entourage of Bacchus.
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The celebration spreads to Greece and the Cult of Dionysus, and attempts at suppression by authorities have little effect. Women of all ages go off to drink and get wild in the hills. Inhibitions dissolve and passions run amok.
The dominant ideology is severely threatened by this unseemly behavior of women, and eventually closes it all down. Sometimes, in the natural wild places, one can still hear the pipes of Pan.
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