CYPRIOT KEY SYMBOL - THE ASHERAH TREE OF KNOWLEDGE
In spite of many serious attempts to decode the Cypriot spoken in 2000 B.C. Sir George Hill declares in his book “The History of Cyprus,” that the language the Cypriots wrote and spoke in the Late Bronze Age is still an unsolved mystery. Setting aside cuneiform which was used for official correspondence with Egypt. The earliest syllabic signs we have are dated approximately 2300 B.C. and described by Mr. Dikaios as “Early Bronze Age Cypriot Characters.”For what it is worth, it has recently been observed that whoever adapted the Semitic alphabet to vocalic as well as consonantal notation chose precisely the five vowels used in the early Cypriot syllabary.
Over the last 40 years I have worked passionately to find the meaning of the ancient Cypriot sign with the phonetic value in Greek of "Ku", the Assyrian "Ki, Caucasian "Gi" and Arabic Khe. This sign, shown above, on the stand, looks more a like stylized tree, a totem and on the coin, a Y superimposed on an X. The symbol was prominent on the coin was issued first by Euelthon approximately 550 B.C.
Starting with the written historic record, we learn that Sargon I, dated 2650 B.C. having crossed the western sea, (sea assumed to be the Mediterranean) the land he crossed over to was called Ki (Gi). This land across the western sea most scholars believe to be referring to Cyprus.
2000 years later, Euelthons as King of Cyprus, and his successors down to the time of Euagoras I, (both said to be powerful and the supreme rulers of the island, asserted their sovereignty over the whole of Cyprus by placing on their coins the above symbol, the sign we recognize to have the phonetic value Ki .
The plentiful coinage of this period shows the Cypriot “ΚΥ” Sign placed within a circle, which is made up of 28 dots. This circle enclosing the Ki sign is sitting on top of a cross, which is exactly the same symbol we recognize today for representing the feminine principle, copper and Aphrodite.
There is very little on this symbol and the quoted 'experts' refer to it simply as a stylized Tree. What we know is that the "KY" symbol when sounded out, was like the English word "Key" but what it opened was for me to discover.
My research leads me to believe that the Ki symbol eventually gave its name, full meaning and power to the English word KEY.
"ASHERA"
This original Cypriot stylized Tree is the focal point on each of the four panels of the Cypriot Bronze Age Stand from Curium, dated approximately 1300 B.C. This symbol, is said to have proclaimed Euelthon as a King and more, as a King of Kings, with sovereignty over all of the Cypriot Kingdoms.
This symbol, that looks like a "Key" looks like an X superimposed on a Y. The X is split on the vertical by the Y, resembling the Cyrillic back to back K. The sum of the projected arms are seven in number (3 the Y and 4 the X) making of it a Septenary that resembles a tree.
We know for a fact that three, four, and their sum, seven were sacred to Aphrodite as queen of the three worlds above and the four elements below, and that together they did represent all potential creative powers 7/1, the Septad.
To an expert on symbols with a trained eye, this ideogram should reveal aspects of physical and metaphysical reality, which escape other modes of study.
My search for a similar sign, in the lost language of symbolism, reveals the possibility that we could be observing a brilliant ideogram representing a symbol of excellence of the Cinyiriads, who set up in Cyprus an offshore industrial capacity from about 1450 B.C. during the period when the stalemate between the Egyptians, Hittites and Assyrians was the status quo. This could well be the ASHERA in Cypriot mode representing the eternal vertical relationship between the above and below, heaven and earth united, the "Tree of Knowledge and of Life".
The Tree of Life appears in an infinite variety of forms in the lost language of symbolism, of world religions as well as archaic and primitive mythologies. The Tree has been and still is, a universal symbol representing the balance between the inner and outer direction and goal of existence, the microcosmic and macrocosmic, the ontological processes.
The Cypriot "Ky" symbol, as seen above, styled like a tree, seems to represent or reveals the living presence of a transcendent power. Like a tree of knowledge or an Asherah pole, it must have stood for something very close to absolute reality. As a sacred tree it would have embodied the seasonal transformations and transmutations, the perpetual renewal of the cosmos. According to
Jung, in his analysis of a symbol, which is an exact image of the Cypriot “KY” sign, which is an X split by a Y vertically, makes the following observation.
"This Y symbol contains within it an instance of tri-unity appearing as unity, realized by the splitting of the Y sign in the center vertically, so that it becomes the two in one and three of direction; and the X an instance again of duality as a quaternary, by the splitting of the X sign, a four armed cross, not with four lines but with two independent but counterbalancing right angles, an X split vertically so that it can be said to be two components by virtue of their continuity but four from the point of view of their direction."
Now we know that the X shares in the entire symbolism of the cross, it is a symbol of inversion, a divide, a Chiasmus, in Greek a khiasmos, the crux decussate (pairs of opposites shoots each at right angles to pair below and or beside) or cross saltier (saltation symbol), it is in itself the perfect figure of completion and balance. The X stands as the 4, the quaternary, the earth, the fixed, the first solid figure which is produced in this special scheme/order of manifestation, the static as opposed to the circular or cylindrical dynamic. It is totality, the Earth and all associations with the number four, the elements, seasons, cardinal directions. The square the cube all perfect figures of completion fixed and balance on the horizontal plane.
The Y on the other hand is the alternative to the X; the Y represents the generative principal, the “Yod” in Hebrew, the dynamic of the number 3. The "original" triad/ternary that is in this case divided into a duality and thus a unity; it stands for multiplicity; synthesis; the descending spirit into matter, the creative power; the all from above. It holds within it the total power of the number three and represents the tripartite nature of the world. The Y when representing the body was said by Pythagoras to be the ultimate emblem of human life, the foot being the innocence of the infant and the dividing arms the choice of the will on the way of good and evil in adult life. A figure of a man/woman standing on earth reaching to heaven, balancing the right and left-hand paths of virtue and vice, the dividing ways and crossroads, the triangle. The Y is said to represent Janus/Yana and all that it implies. In Alchemy, it represents the Rebus, the Androgyny as well as the salt, sulfur and mercury. Man as body, spirit and soul, within birth life and death, the 12&3, the beginning middle and end, the three phases of the moon, the three fold Goddesses, the Horae, the father mother son, the soul, the becoming of the becoming of the becoming, but most importantly to Gabriel/GBR the messenger, the governor, the distributor of life on earth, genesis.
It is a well known fact that as “Queen” of the three worlds and four elements the number Seven was sacred to Aphrodite. Kypris is and Aphrodite are both equivalent as monad,Triad and quintad and analogous to the "Septad" or the "Heptomad" (Seven in One) which is said to be the totality or the collective balance within all existence and without, of all the potential creative powers represented in the universe, thus the meeting point of heaven and earth (3+4) and a point of communication between them.
The Cypriot "KY" sign could represent the key or tree of knowledge, the spirit, the creative powers in cyclical eternal time, (the spirals, the process). It stands as does an axis mundi, a metaphysical world center, a cosmic symbol par excellence that defines the All powers united, homogenous, as symbol, the Ki(G) absolute reality as unity defined. I see it primarily as a Heptomad (6+1), a Pentad (3in1+4), a Monad, a Diad, a Triad, Tetrad, Pentad, Hexad all points converging one as did the tetrachy of the pythagoreans.
As for the Kybarion or the Curion Stand which obviously was designed with an idea in mind, a perfect cube surmounted by a cylindrical or a POLOS/TIARA/CROWN, the idea of squaring the circle comes to mind.
*In cuneiform for the phoneme KI(G), was conceived to represent the essence of life, it became the sign that also represented "earth". In Akkadian orthography, it functioned as a determiner for toponyms and has the syllabic values gi, ge, qi, and qe which translates as "hearth." In Sumerian mythology Ki is an earth goddess. Ki was the chief consort of An, the sky god. In some legends Ki and An were brother and sister as well as personifications of heaven and earth. The name first appears in Sumerian creation texts of Ki, tell us that in union with An, Ki gave birth to the Anunnaki, the most prominent of these deities being Enlil, god of the air. The legend continues and informs us that heaven and earth were once inseparable until Enlil was born; then Enlil cleaved heaven and earth in two. An carried away heaven. Ki, in company with Enlil, took the earth.
*Kaph[K](also spelled Kaph or Kaf) is the eleventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Kaf כ, Arabic alphabet Kāf ﻙ, Persian alphabet ک. Its value is IPA: [k]. Kaph is thought to have been derived from a pictogram of a hand (in both modern Arabic and Modern Hebrew, kaph means palm). Where your fate is charted. This letter from Phoenicia gave rise to the Greek Kappa (Κ), Latin K, and the equivalent in the Cyrillic alphabet (К).
Gaf or Gāf represents the sound of "g". There are three forms of the letter kāf, with additional diacritics each used in different places: گ, based on kāf with an additional line. It is rarely used in Arabic itself, but may be used to represent a voiced velar stop when writing other languages. It used a lot in Persian and Kurdish.
Aššur (Akkadian) (Ashur/Assyria, Assyrian / Aššur; Assyrian Neo-Aramaic / Ātûr), is a remnant city of the last Ashurite Kingdom. The remains of the city are situated on the western bank of the river Tigris, north of the confluence with the tributary Little Zab river, in modern-day Iraq, more precisely in the Al-Shirqat District (a small panhandle of the Salah al-Din Governorate).
The city was occupied from the mid-3rd millennium BC (Circa 2600–2500 BC) to the 14th Century AD, when Tamurlane conducted a massacre of its population.
Archaeology reveals the site of the city was occupied by the middle of the third millennium BC. This was still the Sumerian period, before the Assyrian kingdom emerged in the 23rd to 21st century BC.
The oldest remains of the city were discovered in the foundations of the Ishtar temple, as well as at the Old Palace. In the following Old Akkadian period, the city was ruled by kings from Akkad. During the “Sumerian Renaissance”, the city was ruled by a Sumerian governor.
Aššur is also the name of the chief deity of the city. He was considered the highest god in the Assyrian pantheon and the protector of the Assyrian state. In the Mesopotamian mythology he was the equivalent of Babylonian Marduk.
Aššur is the name of the city, of the land ruled by the city, and of its tutelary deity. At a late date it appears in Assyrian literature in the forms An-sar, An-sar (ki), which form was presumably read Assur. The name of the deity is written A-šur or Aš-sùr, and in Neo-assyrian often shortened to Aš.
In the Creation tablet, the heavens personified collectively were indicated by this term An-sar, “host of heaven,” in contradistinction to the earth, Ki-sar, “host of earth.”
In the Babylonian creation myth Enuma Elish, Anshar (also spelled Anshur), which means “sky pivot” or “sky axle”, is a sky god. He is the husband of his sister Kishar. They might both represent heaven (an) and earth (ki). Both are the second generation of gods; their parents being the serpents Lahmu and Lahamu and grandparents Tiamat and Abzu. They, in turn, are the parents of Anu, another sky god.
In view of this fact, it seems highly probable that the late writing An-sar for Assur was a more or less conscious attempt on the part of the Assyrian scribes to identify the peculiarly Assyrian deity Asur with the Creation deity An-sar.
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