Moon Pebble Necklace

I’ve been collecting round white quartz or chalcedony pebbles for many years, and for a long time I had an ever-changing series of them them arranged on a round ”Dark Moon Turtle Shell” mandala in my studio, to represent the 13 moons of the year.  I have been (and still am) drawing the more interesting ones for the “Stones” half of my “Sticks and Stones” oracle.  But I have always wanted to make some of them into a necklace.  It took awhile to find the right beads to go with the stones, but the result was this Moon Pebble Choker.  Holes were carved with small diamond drills.  Pebbles were wrapped with 16-gauge copper wire (silver might seem like a more appropriate choice for a moon necklace, but it needs frequent polishing.  The copper will tarnish gracefully and be a better match for the rough, earthy beads).  The antique African forged iron beads are of two different types:  bicones and simple flat-sided heishi.  There are also two African bronze beads, my forged iron s-hooks (a little thicker than the ones I make for earrings) and 14-gauge copper wire hooks on a 4mm round natural leather cord.

Moon Pebble Necklace

Stones:  (Left to right in photo).  All are unpolished natural pebbles, but #5 has simple carving.  I collected all except #1 and #8.

1.  Beach pebble of hydrated Florida fossil coral agate.  One of several stones that I inherited from a friend. 

2.  Hydrated chalcedony nodule with a uniform network of surface cracks.  Oligocene White River Formation, Pine Bluffs, WY.  “Hydration rinds” are common on chalcedony and chert pebbles that have been exposed to groundwater or weathering at the earth’s surface for a long time.  The weathered part of the stone becomes white, porous, opaque, and relatively soft.  This can be a thin “skin” or rind on the outside of the stone (#3,4), or just one or two spots (#6), or the entire stone (#1,2,7).  Hydration rinds are common on petrified wood and even some flint artifacts.  In chalky or clay-rich rock, chert may acquire a hydration rind while still embedded in the rock, which is what happened to this pebble.  Basically it is “snakeskin agate” (see #8) that is completely hydrated.  

3.  Beach pebble of hydrated brown chert with a natural cuplike hollow, Nags Head, NC.

4.  Pebble of gray flint with white hydration rind, Cretaceous chalk, Salisbury Plain, England.

5.  Creek pebble of vein quartz from metamorphic rock, northern Virginia.  Carved with a crescent moon and two rings.

6.  Chalcedony ventifact (wind-polished pebble) with white hydration spot.  Prairie gravel near Cheyenne, WY.

7.  Lake Michigan shore pebble of hydrated chert from Ordovician limestone, Chicago, IL.

8.  Snakeskin agate with thin reticulated hydration rind, Oligocene, eastern Oregon (purchased at a rock shop).

9.  Chalcedony “button” from volcanic gravel near Tucson, AZ.

Lichen Oracle Card Design

Lichen Card Sample

I’d like to print the Lichen Oracle as cards that look something like this, and include the unfinished 16-card Sticks and Stones Oracle along with it.  The card border (shown here in shaded gray) would be warm metallic silver.  But I doubt there would be much interest in these except from a few oracle collectors and people who are interested in divination systems.  But I may consider printing a very limited edition (50 copies or so) once the Black Cat Deck is done.  Meanwhile, I’ll revise the Lichen Oracle website to show the oracle in the form of these cards instead of the current glyph table with separate descriptions.  That should make it more accessible and prettier.

Working with the Lichen Oracle

Lichen Oracle

I haven’t written about the  Lichen Oracle for awhile, but I’ve been quietly working with it.  The table of glyphs, numbered as a Moon Calendar, is shown above.  Visit the LICHEN ORACLE webpage to learn more about this project and even get a free online reading.

GLYPHS form the core of the oracle, and can be used like runes.  Each symbol can stand alone, independent of its place in the sequence or any other relationship between the glyphs, and can be read individually.  Many of the symbols are suitable for use as personal runes for decorative and/or magical uses.  Some glyphs can be joined together like rune charms, like this combination of #2 and #14 which I have adopted for personal use:

Personal Lichen Rune

 Although they can be simplified into completely angular symbols, like Norse runes, they lose some of their unique living energy when the curves are removed.  It’s important to remember that the glyphs were traced from living, organic shapes that reflect the way the lichen grew as the lirellae literally burst through the tree bark.  The glyphs are composed of only four basic design elements:  the straight or curved line, the v-split, the u-split, and the prong.  The many combinations of these simple lines reflect the microscopic divisions of the lichen fungus mycelium as it grew.

VERSES provide a unified, poetic way to describe and read the glyphs, though they are tied to a specific place and sequence.  The symbols themselves will suggest additional interpretations.  Verses for each glyph are given on the Lichen Oracle webpage, although I have long since simplified many of them.

If you like, you can stop here, having accessed the heart of the oracle.  To explore the oracle more deeply, there are several other components to work with, any or all of which can be used.

 

 1.  Moon Calendar

Each glyph has been assigned to one day of the lunar month, as shown in the chart. When using the oracle this way, a glyph’s place in the sequence becomes part of the interpretation, since each symbol is now connected to all the others.  You can pull the current day’s card for additional insight in a reading.  If you know the moon’s phase on your birth date, you can use your personal “birth glyph” as a significator or touchstone.

 

 2.  Three Minor Moon Glyphs

When working with the moon calendar, each glyph can be assigned three minor “companion” glyphs, and all four glyphs mark the same number of days after a primary moon phase.  The chart at the top of this page is set up so that each vertical column represents one of these groups.  The “companion” glyphs can lend their interpretations to the primary glyphs.  These extra symbols decorate each glyph in the large chart on the Lichen Oracle webpage.

 

3.  The Two Halfmoon Paths

The oracle incorporates a pair of cycles that is specific to the eastern U.S. coastal plain.  The time from the First to the Third Quarter shows the development, zenith, and disappearance of the Path to the Moon, the track of light that appears on the ocean at moonrise and reaches its zenith at the Full Moon.  The time from the Third to the First Quarter is the Blackwater Spiral, the creek flowing through the swamp to the coastal marsh, with the nadir at the New Moon in one of the freshwater ponds hidden in the forest at the center of the island (these ponds aren’t just symbolic – they are actual places you can visit).  Each glyph has a place along one of these paths, as well as along the moon’s monthly journey, and this can be an additional “milemarker” to show the way in a reading.

 

4.  Glyph Clans

The glyphs can be arranged in groups based on similar appearance.  Each ”clan” carries its own “root” interpretation underlying that of the individual glyph.

Lichen Oracle Glyph Clans

  5.  Generative Sequences

Some (perhaps all) of the glyphs can be arranged in sequences in which one glyph can be seen to evolve into another.  Some of this can be seen in the glyph “clans”.  But a few glyphs offer more than one possible path.  This type of connection adds a transformative layer of meaning to each symbol.

Lichen Oracle Glyphs: Growth Sequences

 

 

 

Moon Turtle Mandalas

The circular turtle shell in the Black Cat Deck’s  Eight of Masks is a motif that I have used in several drawings, the most detailed of which is the scratchboard Tsunami Turtle.  The first time I used it, I painted the Dark Moon Tortoise Mandala in forest fire charcoal, charred bone, and silver metallic powders.  It’s been holding a collection of white chalcedony “moon pebbles”, though now I’m drilling some of the pebbles for other projects.  Here it is with an old pencil drawing, Coyote Imitates Uroboros.

Coyote Imitates Uroboros

The design was modified from a realistic drawing of a box turtle shell:

Box Turtle Outline

I’ve used box turtle shells for several drawings that are inspired by the infinite variety of yellow and brown designs on the shell.  The one below is a fanciful handprint design painted in realistic colors using handground iron oxide mineral pigments (goethite, limonite, hematite, and Fe-Mn oxide).  I have a collection of more than a dozen shells, all with very different patterns.  One is nearly black with only a small brown patch on each scute.  Another is mostly yellow.  Most are about half brown and half yellow, with concentric, radiating, or irregular glyph-like patterns. 

Box Turtle Hands

Download a large printable version of the Box Turtle Outline template  HERE to decorate with your own “cheloglyphs”!

The Turtle Shell as a Moon Calendar:  In most turtles, the carapace (the top half of the shell) has 13 scutes (thin brownish and/or yellowish plates that are made of keratin, the same material as hair) and the plastron usually has 12 (some species have 10).  The scutes cover and protect the bone underneath, and develop concentric ridges as the turtle grows.  The number of marginal scutes (the small rectangular plates around the edge of the shell) varies depending on the species but their are typically 12 to 14 on each side, sometimes with a tiny scute called the nuchal at the center front.

All these divisions make the turtle shell an interesting way to lay out stones or other natural objects, divination spreads, drawings, and similar projects that are based on the lunar calendar. 

This Moon Turtle design is a very stylized and fully reversible circular version that I adapted for use with many different media – paper, fabric, metal, etc. :

Small Circular Turtle Template

Download a large printable version for your own project  HERE.

(Downloadable images are for personal use only, not for resale .)

Stones Oracle: Eye Agate

It’s good to be working on the Moon Oracle again.  Finished the first of the eight Stones drawings.  These will depict various round white quartz and chalcedony pebbles in the geological environment where they are found (which is sometimes, though not necessarily, the environment where they form.)  This one is for the First Quarter Moon and was drawn from one of my photos.  There are several similar archaeological sites near my house, with grinding holes/bedrock mortars in granite outcrops along major washes.  When the Hohokam lived here, these places would have had mesquite bosques where people came to collect and grind the sweet pods for food.  The holes almost always have nearby petroglyphs depicting spirals or concentric rings, perhaps associated with water or the with the work of grinding.   

I found the two pitted and “eyed” chalcedony pebbles on the bajada near my house.  The pits on the pebbles reflect the grinding holes, and the concentric chalcedony layers that are revealed in the broken pebble mirror the ancient weathered petroglyphs.

Stick Oracle – finished

I finished the last of the Stick drawings.  This one represents the Third Quarter Moon.  For some reason, this is the most stylized and least realistic of the series, though that wasn’t intentional.  Minor changes will be made in a couple of the drawings before printing, but for now you can see how they all look together on the Moon Oracle page:

http://www.mineralarts.com/artwork/MoonOracle.html

The 8 Sticks are only half of a 16-card oracle.  With the next moon, I’ll begin drawing the 8 Stones that will complete the project.

Stick Oracle: Madrone Gate

For the Waxing Gibbous Moon, the Stick Oracle shows a gate built of two heavy Arizona madrone branches placed in a pile of stones on a small island.  The young bark of madrones is smooth and dark red, so it is shown in black here.  Older bark is nearly white and is broken up into small square blocks.  The poles crossing the forked top are made of peeled branches.  Old stumps, repeatedly healed after fire damage, fade into the background.

Stick Oracle: First Quarter Moon

Just in time for the First Quarter Moon – the corresponding card in my Stick Oracle, showing two forked staves marking the confluence of two creeks.  Although carefully sketched before inking, these Stick cards (six so far, with two to go) have had a lot of reworking as each develops on the way to the completed drawing.  When they are done, I will make minor changes in all of them to improve the way they fit together.  All are powerful images for me, from long ago and far away – they seem to have always been with me.  Although several of them have motifs in common with the Wands in the Tarot, they are more complex than that (for example, they have water as well as wood and stone). 

Solstice Cards

My next oracle project is a set of 16 Sticks and Stones cards.  The Sticks will depict twigs, wands, and staves along the Oldest River, and represent moon phases as well as the eight “fire festivals” of the solar year.  Four of these drawings are completed.  The Stones will show various types of naturally round white moon-like chalcedony pebbles in their geologic environments.  These are just pencil sketches so far.  I hadn’t planned to post about this oracle before it was finished, but yesterday I completed the Winter Solstice/New Moon card.  Since this year’s Winter Solstice is close to the Full Moon, I’ve posted the Full Moon/Summer Solstice card as well, for comparison.

The Winter Solstice or New Moon card shows the the Oak Maze, Daedalea quercina, growing on a rotting stump.  Water or ice trickles down the labyrinthine pores of the fungus and seems about to split it in half.  D. quercina is a woody brown bracket fungus that grows on dead oak wood and often persists for many years.  The gills (platelike structures on the underside of the fungus, where the spores develop) are unusually thick and interconnected in this species, creating fascinating and beautiful maze-like patterns.  The drawing was made from a specimen that I collected in Virginia many years ago.

The Summer Solstice or Full Moon card shows a stick shelter made from stacked and interwoven cottonwood branches.  The fallen and living cottonwood trees behind it offer additional protection, and the water seems to be flowing out of or into the shelter.  The hut is reminiscent of ancient mammoth bone shelters that would have been covered with skins and earth.  I photographed this structure along a river, long after whoever built and used it had continued their journey downstream.

I realize that this pair of drawings is rather cryptic now, but there is no point in offering more interpretation until the other pictures are done.  Meanwhile you will have to make up your own stories about them.

Skystone Mineral Pigment

This is a new mineral pigment for my collection – a tiny piece of greenish-blue copper ore from a local abandoned mine.  It contains malachite, chrysocolla, and probably a bit of turquoise.  I already have several examples of all these pigments in my collection, but this piece was particularly bright and clean, so the paint is clear and (for copper ore) relatively intensely colored.  Sky and water, cool and warm, strong and delicate at the same time, like turquoise. Typical ore like the pieces in the photo is usually a mixture of several greenish or bluish copper minerals, often with dark impurities (cuprite, iron sulfides, and iron and manganese oxides) which make it unsuitable for pigment.  The small pieces are the best – they are the most pure, and usually contain the rarest and most intensely colored minerals.  Now I have the perfect pigment for my Copper Oracle, which is still in the pencil-sketch stage.

I printed the Lichen Oracle as a set of cards so I could learn how to work with it.  I’m finding it much more powerful this way, and the moon and three minor glyphs on each card allow for interesting patterns in a spread – it is an intriguing puzzle, yet the glyphs are good for meditation, and become even better as I grow more familiar with them.  The whole series flows, pauses, and moves very naturally.  Of course the published deck will look quite different – this practice set will help me decide what it should look like.