Candles

I don't know why, but I found the section in Jane Austen's England about candles strangely fascinating.  Around the turn of the 19th century, there was no electricity, and gas lighting was still a fancy new technology. Aside from the home's hearth, the primary source of light at night came from candles. Depending on your status in life, there were plenty of candle options, too.

The most expensive and highest-quality candles were made of beeswax. The flax or cotton wicks were either wrapped with sheets of beeswax or melted into a solid candle. Because they worked well in chandeliers and produced very little smoke, these candles were favoured in public buildings like theatres and churches.

Whale oil candles filled a similar niche as beeswax candles. They could be made in moulds and also burned cleanly.

Unfortunately, these pleasant candles were expensive, so the everyday folks had to turn to tallow candles. The wick of these candles would be repeatedly dipped in hot animal fat, then cooled to solidify. These candles would give off a flickering light and a bad smell. They also needed thicker wicks that would produce smoke. This wick would need to be regularly trimmed with scissors called "snuffers" while burning to avoid the charred wick getting too long. Mutton tallow was the choice animal fat, but beef and pork fat were also used.

All of those candles were taxed, however. The poor would need to make their own rushlights. Rushes would be picked, peeled, dried, and drawn through used cooking grease. Rushlights didn't last very long, but were cheap and gave a reasonably clean source of light.

Oil lamps were popular in coastal areas with access to cheap whale oil. Essentially, lamps were shallow containers filled with oil and held a suspended wick. Cheaper lamps produced more smoke and stink than candles, but some of the later lamps with glass chimneys did a better job of preventing that.

Sources:
"Jane Austen's England" - Roy and Lesley Adkins

The Safavids – Pre-Iran Iran

For those that don't realize, Persia and Iran are interchangeable words for the same place and have been for centuries. It's a interesting thing to think about. The Iran of today is a descendant of many great civilizations and empires, predating even Islam.

This post is about a specific period in Iranian history: the Safavid dynasty. This was a dynasty that grew out of the destruction wrought by the Mongols across Asia and Arabia, and essentially made Iran the Shi'a heartland it still is today.

It has its beginnings as a community that collected around a Sufi Sheikh named Safi al-Din. From the outset, Safi al-Din's Sufi order was similar to others. It was a spiritual community of like-minded individuals that followed the charismatic leader's teachings. The group did not have any particular political aspirations. However, as time went on, a pattern of hereditary leadership developed. After Safi al-Din's passing, his son inherited, followed by the son's son, then the son's son's son, &c.

As time continued, this Safavid order began to militarize and more resemble an insular cult. As the group began to interact more with anti-government groups, the local princes decided to put a stop to things. In 1488, the current head of the Safavid order was killed, along with his eldest son.

However, the younger son, Ismail, survived and was whisked away into a life of hiding for roughly a decade. At the age of twelve, he left his life of hiding, mobilized his Safavid military force, and overtook the prince that had his father and brother assassinated. Three years later, he was strong enough to declare himself Shahanshah, "the king of kings". This was an ancient Persian title that was intentionally chosen to distinguish himself from the Arab caliphs and sultans to the west.

Another major shift was Ismail's declaration of the state religion as Twelver Shi'ism (a Shi'a branch that would take a while to explain, so maybe I'll save it for another post). He declared that he had direct communication with the Shi'a's Hidden Imam (seriously, it's a long story), and directed missionaries to spread the word across the Ottoman Empire to the west. He even began persecuting the Sunnis living within his domain for not following the correct path.

Needless to say, the Ottoman sultan of the time was less than pleased with this attempted power grab and began executing Shi'i living within his own borders. This led to a polarization of Islamic sects, with Sunnis fleeing west to Ottoman lands and Shi'is fleeing east toward Safavid lands. Ismail pushed to blend Shi'ism with Persian culture and intertwine the two.

Tempers finally broke years later when the Ottoman army marched on Iran. The two armies met at a place called Chaldiran. With the use of their powerful firearms, the Ottomans defeated the Safavid army and ostensibly won the battle. However, they could not hold the city they conquered during the onset of winter and fell back. The Safavids retook the city, destroyed the land between the two empires, and ensured that neither army could cross over. The old dividing line, to this day, marks the border between the two modern successor states: Turkey and Iran.

The Iranian border solidified, and Ismail's remaining reign was relatively peaceful. Succeeding leaders oversaw a glorious growth in arts, architecture, industry, and technology.

For better or worse, time marched on, and the usual pattern of dynastic succession began to set in. After several great rulers, the Safavid dynasty began to devolve, preferring the decadent lifestyle over actual governance. Meanwhile, the Shi'a scholars began to draw power away from the monarchy. They gradually felt that the ruler did not really speak for the Hidden Imam; these ayatollahs actually spoke with that authority. Unfortunately for the ruling class, the merchants and the peasants believed them.

Now, monarchies don't like it when others question their authority. The Safavid rulers imported European military consultants to ensure that its armies were strong enough to keep the rabble in check.

This did little to slow the Safavid collapse during the late 18th century. Succession struggles allowed factions and provinces to break away, while Sunni neighbours were able to break in. Eventually, the Safavid dynasty completely dissolved. A new dynasty, the Qajars, filled the vacuum, but they were little more than puppets of the European powers. The Shi'a scholars continued to hold their religious authority, and felt nothing but disgust for this state of foreign control.

Sources:
“Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes” - Tamim Ansary

Sufism - The Mystical Side of Islam

[image source]

Sufism is the more mystical branch of Islam. It grew out of many Muslims' desires to have a more personal experience with God. They would look at the religious laws coming into existence and felt there must be more to Islamic spirituality than blindly obeying. To accomplish this, believers would collapse into themselves and not only fulfill God's laws, but also completely dedicate themselves.

These early Sufis would find all sorts of ways to express their love of God. Some would pray constantly. Some, known as dervishes, would voluntarily relinquish all of their wealth. Some would wear clothing made of rough-spun wool, also known as suf in Arabic. Making the etymological connection will be left as an exercise for the reader.

Generally, Sufis were pretty laid back, so to speak. They weren't trying to form a new religion, sect, branch, or fork. They just really loved God and wanted to do everything they could to get closer to Him.

Some Sufis, apparently, were better at getting close to God than others. These charismatic leaders would occasionally attract groups of followers, form little communities of their own, and earn the honorific "Sheikh", or "elder". These groups would start to form their own traditions, beliefs, and understandings, but would generally move on when they lose their leader. In rare cases, however, a Sufi group can grow into a powerful dynasty. Actually, I think I'll save that last bit for another post.

Believe it or not, one of the earliest Sufi stars was a woman. Rabia al-Basri was born in Basra during the early 700's. As a child, her parents died and she was sold to a rich household as a slave. One night, her master heard her praying and was so awestruck by her passion that he agreed to free her and arrange a marriage for her. However, she declined and declared that she was already in love. She was in love with God. From then on, she became an ascetic and a mystical poet. Many Muslims gravitated toward her message of love for God and hoped some of her spirituality would transfer to them.

Needless to say, traditional Muslim scholars did not appreciate these shenanigans. They began to drop the hammer when some Sufi Sheikhs began declaring themselves God. Executions and torture were put into effect, but did little to stop the growing popularity of Sufi mysticism.

Mind, not all Sufi Sheikhs were overtly heretical. Most were relatively tame. For example, a Baghdad Sufi named al-Junayd would go to work every day, but would then return home and devote himself to God. He would perform four-hundred units of Muslim prayer, read the Qu'ran constantly, and generally try to win the struggle with his own desires.

Sufism remained a big deal for centuries. The people's interest in establishing a more personal connection with God never really abated. Overtime, Sufism's more relaxed, pick-and-choose spirituality helped spread Islam to further nomadic people.

Sources:
“Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes” - Tamim Ansary

Ye Olde C-Sections

As it turns out, the caesarean section isn't as modern as I thought it was. For some reason, I assumed it was a 20^th century invention. In England, as it turns out, this surgery was a thing since at least the 1770's. It's likely Europeans had been carving out babies since even earlier. Though, back then, this operation was always a last resort sort of thing.

Childbirth in the 18^th century was much riskier than today's ultra sterile birthing facilities. Generally, the whole thing involved only the mother and some female family and friends. Occasionally, a paid midwife would be brought in. These midwives had no formal qualifications, just a lot of experience birthing babies.

Formally-trained male midwives were a relative rarity. However, they knew what they were doing. They had the research knowledge, experience, and fancy forceps to get things done right.

Either way, there were no anaesthetics or antibiotics. Mothers-to-be just had to grin (or grimace) and bear it. This was further exacerbated when birthing complications necessitated a caesarean.

William Cooper, in 1774, was the first doctor to perform a caesarean in England where the baby lived. However, the mother did not survive. It should be noted that surgical pain and a lack of anaesthetics usually results in dead bodies.

In 1793, James Barlow performed the first c-section where the mother survived. In this case, however, the baby did not survive.

It wasn't until around 1819 that the first recorded successful c-section, for both parties, was performed in the British Empire. In this case, it was performed in South Africa by an educated female midwife posing as a man.

Childbirth remained difficult and deadly for decades. Before 1800, about 1.5% of women died in childbirth. Compare that to about 0.0082% in 2010. (Note: the book that gives the former figure does not clarify if it was 1.5% of childbirths resulted in death or 1.5% of all womanly deaths were from childbirth)

Sources:
"Jane Austen's England" - Roy and Lesley Adkins
"Maternal mortality: how many women die in childbirth in your country?" - Simon Rogers
"Cesarean Section - A Brief History" - Jane Eliot Sewell, Ph.D.

The Wheel of the Year

Fun fact: During my last semester of college, I was the token atheist (not an official title) of my school's Pagan organization. Then, as now, I was interested in studying religions, and Paganism was something I knew next to nothing about. So, I joined the group to learn a thing or two. It was  pretty cool.

One of the big things was the Wheel of the Year. In a nutshell, it's a series of eight, evenly spaced seasonal festivals. Half of them correspond to the equinoxes and solstices, while the other half fall in between.

While the dates, activities, and even existence of these festivals varies between various Pagan denominations*, I'm going to try and stick with the modern Wiccan tradition, if only because it's the only book I have about the subject at the moment.

The Wheel of the Year is meant to be a metaphor for the lives of the god and the goddess. Describing these entities would take more than a single paragraph. While I may write a proper article about the topic, for now it's enough to know that a lot of Wiccans see the world as maintained by a pair, god and goddess, whose form and name change throughout the year in relation to nature.

Yule (Winter Solstice)

December 22

This one should be familiar to most people. A lot of Christmas imagery originates from this holiday: white-red-green colours, mistletoe, "yule" logs, &c. During the solstice, the light of day is at its shortest. However, this also marks the turning point where the length of sunlight begins to increase.

Because of the coming of more sunlight, Yule is seen as the rebirth of the god from the goddess. However, the god is not yet strong enough to fight off the night, resulting in a continued season of cold, long nights, and death.

Imbolc

February 2 (pronounced "em-bolc")

At this point, the goddess has recovered from giving birth to the god. Both are gaining strength and the days are getting longer. On a more practical level, it is a celebration of light and fire encouraging spiritual and physical cleansing.

Ostara (Spring Equinox)

March 21

It's finally Spring! Sticking with the god-goddess metaphor, this is the point when the god is something of a preteen. The goddess takes on the role of virgin again, resulting in themes of fertility, with related symbols like rabbits and eggs.

Many of the modern Easter traditions come from this festival, particularly the Easter bunny and coloured eggs.

Beltane

April 30

The god is now of age and joins with the goddess (if you know what I mean). The maypole, a common pastime during this celebration, is symbolic of this union (wink wink). The happiness of this union spreads to the Earth and all people that walk upon it. This festival is meant to be fun and not at all somber.

Litha

June 22 (Summer Solstice)

The god and goddess are enjoying their marriage. However, the god is maturing and understanding that his upcoming sacrifice is necessary. This realization puts a damper on the mood, and the days begin to grow shorter.

This festival was particularly popular with the Celts. Stonehenge and other stone circles were raised and aligned with the day's summer sun.

Anime image is tangentially related

Lughnasadh

August 1 (pronunciation is inconsistent)

It is this festival when the god sacrifices himself for the harvest, as represented by the harvest of various grains. He doesn't go out without a fight, though. He leaps from grain to grain until the very last sheaf is cut.

Mabon (Autumn Equinox)

September 21

Mabon is a festival for giving thanks to the god and goddess for a bountiful harvest. The god is dead, granted, but he is just in the underworld awaiting his rebirth.

This is the first Pagan festival I, personally, got to celebrate. There wasn't any ritual or anything; it was fairly laid back. It felt very similar to the traditional American Thanksgiving with lots of food and friends.

Samhain

October 31 (pronounced "saoh-win")

This is Halloween, guys. The goddess is an old crone, the god is deep in the underworld, and the new(?) god is growing in the womb. The barriers between the worlds of the living and the dead are at their weakest, allowing communication between the two. As such, it is a festival ready made for giving thanks to passed ancestors.

If Mabon was my first festival, Samhain was my first ritual. Several of us gathered at the group leader's home after sunset. A circle was cast and everyone stood in the cardinal direction associated with their element (I was an earth element but cannot honestly remember what direction I was facing). We each took turns honouring deceased family and friends, calling them to join us for the occasion. Afterward, the circle was dispelled and that was that. The rest of the evening was spent chit-chatting as folks trickled home.

Regrettably, this was also my last festival. I graduated before the next one.

My time with the Pagan group was very fun and fascinating. I certainly learned a lot. The group was very respectful and open. They all clearly believed in their spirituality (not all were Wiccan, mind) but did nothing to force their beliefs on me. I am grateful to have been a part of it.

Sources:
Personal experience
"The Book of Wicca" – Lucy Summers
Aquarian Tabernacle Church

* It should be noted that "Paganism" isn't a single religion. Rather, it's an umbrella term for, well, any non-Abrahamic religion. While some of the larger religions have broken free from the term, not all have been so lucky: Wicca, Norse, Celtic, Greco-Roman, and many others all fall under the category of Pagan.