Golden Hind
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
This article is about the British ship. For the mythological creature see Golden Hind (mythology).
The Golden Hind was a ship best known for its global circumnavigation between 1577 and 1580, captained by Sir Francis Drake. It was originally known as the Pelican and was renamed in mid-voyage 1577 by Drake as he prepared to enter the Straits of Magellan. He rechristened the ship the Golden Hind in a politic gesture, to compliment his patron, Sir Christopher Hatton, whose armorial crest was a golden hind (in heraldry a "hind" is a doe).
A modern replica of the same ship was launched in 1973 and has travelled more than 140,000 miles. Like the original, it circumnavigated the world. Since the 1990s it has been berthed at St Mary Overie's Dock, in Bankside, Southwark, London, close to Southwark Cathedral. There are organised visits from schools, where children can dress up as pirates, and get living history lessons about Elizabethan naval history. The Domesday Book mentions "the tideway where ships are moored" and this is probably what is now called "Mary Overie Dock". Southwark Cathedral used to be known as "The Cathedral church of St Saviour and St Mary Overie".
Deer (mythology)
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(Redirected from Golden Hind (mythology))
Deer have significant roles in the mythology of various peoples.
In paleolithic cave paintings the figure of a shaman wears antlers as the deer-spirit, notably the figure being called "The Sorcerer" in the Cave Trois Frères in southern France. The Celts had Cernunnos (possibly the horned figure on the Gundestrup cauldron) and Caerwiden, from which neo-pagans synthesized the figure of the Horned God. The stag was worshipped alongside the bull at Alaca Höyük and continued in the Hittite mythology as the protective deity whose name is recorded as dKAL. Other Hittite gods were often depicted standing on the backs of stags.
The Scythians had some reverence for the stag, which is one of the most common motifs in their artwork, especially at funeral sites. The swift animal was believed to speed the spirits of the dead on their way, which perhaps explains the curious antlered headdresses found on horses buried at Pazyryk.
In Greek mythology, the deer is particularly associated with Artemis in her role as virginal huntress. Callimachus, in his archly knowledgeable "Hymn III to Artemis," mentions the deer that drew the chariot of Artemis:
in golden armor and belt, you yoked a golden chariot, bridled deer in gold.
One of the Labors of Heracles was to capture the Cerynian Hind sacred to Artemis and deliver it briefly to his patron, then rededicate it to Artemis. Actaeon witnessed Artemis bathing in a pool and was transformed into a stag that his own hounds tore to pieces.
In Slavic mythology and folklore, Golden-horned deer is a large deer with golden antlers which often appear in fairytales. The legend of Saint Hubertus (or "Hubert") concerned an apparition of a stag with the crucifix between its horns, effecting the worldly and aristocratic Hubert's conversion to a saintly life.
Deer are considered messengers to the Gods in Shinto, and have become a symbol of the city of Nara.
It is sometimes thought that stories about spectral deer may be the based upon tales of the now extinct Irish Elk (Megaloceros giganteus).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Hind
