Free gobekli tepe - genesis of the gods by andrew collins Page A

D’s eastern central pillar (Pillar 18) showing its belt buckle device and fox-pelt loincloth.

    Figure 12.2. Left, comet showing the bow shock around its leading edge and, right, Halley’s Comet in 1910. Both resemble elements of Pillar 18’s belt buckle.

    Figure 12.3. The Great Comet of 1861 showing its triple tail.
    The idea that the belt buckle glyph shows a comet is strengthened by its similarity to three-tailed comets seen in an ancient Chinese silk text. The Mawangdui cometary atlas (also known as the Book of Silk ), created ca. 300–200 BC and named after the Han Dynasty mound tomb in which it was discovered in the 1970s, lists, in all, twenty-nine different cometary forms and the disasters associated with them. In figure 12.4, we see that in more than one example there is a striking resemblance to the Göbekli Tepe belt buckle design, especially as the comets are drawn with their tails pointing upward. 3
    MARK OF THE COMET
    Yet even assuming that the belt buckle glyph does show a comet, could this not simply be a personal device without any connection to the function of Göbekli Tepe? This appears unlikely, as the pillar is festooned with ideograms of a probable celestial nature. The belt’s C and H glyphs would appear to have cosmological values, as does the carved eye held within a slim crescent worn around the “neck” of the T-shaped monolith. In addition to this, it does seem as if Enclosure D’s eastern central pillar has a greater function than its western neighbor, almost as if one twin is alive, while the other functions as a ghost or echo of the other.

    Figure 12.4. The Chinese Mawangdui atlas (or Book of Silk) from ca. 300– 200 BC, showing the entry for the various different types of comet, some resembling the belt buckle on Göbekli Tepe’s pillar.
    Regardless of these facts Pillar 18’s belt buckle is simply not enough to demonstrate that comets held some special importance at Göbekli Tepe. There is, however, another tantalizing link between the symbol of the comet and Enclosure D—this being the fox-pelt loincloths seen beneath the belt buckle on both monoliths. Universally the fox, and the fox tail in particular, has been seen as a metaphor for comets, due to the hairlike appearance of their long tails. Even in British heraldry the device known as the comet or blazing star is drawn to resemble the fox’s tail (see figure 12.5 on p. 124). It is for this reason that comets have occasionally been personified as having clear vulpine and—as we shall see—canine (doglike) and lupine (wolflike) qualities of a dark, foreboding nature.
    COMETARY CANINES
    Chinese myths and legends, for instance, speak of mountain demons called t’ ien-kou ( tengu in Japanese), “heavenly dogs.” Folk tradition asserts that these supernatural creatures derive their name from comets or meteors falling to earth, for it is said they resemble the tails of dogs or foxes. One account speaks of t’ien-kou as:

    Figure 12.5. Medieval heraldic device known as the comet or blazing star with its distinctive “fox tail.”
a huge dog with a tail of fire like a comet. Its home was in the heavens, but it sustained itself by descending to earth every night and seeking out human children to eat. If it could not catch any children it would attack a human adult and consume his liver. 4
    It is this dreaded fear of comets, seen in terms of malevolent supernatural creatures in canine form, that brings us to a fascinating account recorded by a Spanish Jesuit priest who journeyed through northern Mexico in 1607–1608. While staying in the town of Parras in the state of Coahuila, Andrés Pérez de Ribas (1576–1655) witnessed the priests of the local tribe, perhaps the Tlaxcalan Indians, conduct a powerful and somewhat macabre ceremony to ward off the baleful influence of a comet (almost certainly it was Halley’s Comet, which made an appearance in 1607). According to him:
The end of the comet (some of them said) was in the