Stone, the first form of life

Stone, rock and mountain have had, since antiquity, a great representative power, symbolising the entire cosmos.

They were present in all sacred places together with another very important primordial symbol, the tree.

They took various forms, both as “cairns” and as solitary standing stones, in that case symbolising the axis mundi…

They always represented a “centre”, a fixed point from which to set out on a journey, which has remained in all myths and rites as the search for paradise, for the treasure, for the Self…

The “foundation stone” is the rock on which the universe is founded, the very force of life. Heavy stones placed over a well or a spring symbolise the difficulties that must be overcome before finding “knowledge”.

Among many cultures stone was the aniconic (non-figurative) representation of the deity, if not the deity itself. For example, betyls, or thunderstones, were the place where the deity permanently dwelt, and were considered prophetic stones, speaking stones.

Among nomadic or hunting tribes, stones are still today the bones of Mother Earth. The latter, among peoples considered backward and barbarian by us “civilised and civilising” ones, is perceived as an immense living body, worthy of the greatest respect…

In the Greco-Roman world, the black stone was the symbol of the mountain goddess, Cybele. She was also represented by a conical stone.

Hermes was the god of stones, and was identified with a cairn. Even today in some northern countries, such as Norway, piles of stones are built and considered auspicious.

In the Islamic world, in Mecca, a cubic black stone is venerated; at least once in their life every believer is expected to pay it homage; it is considered the centre of the world, the meeting point between God and man.

In Christianity, stone is a symbol of firmness, salvation, indestructibility: Peter represents the Church itself, and one speaks of the foundation stone…

In the Jewish world, the cornerstone of the Temple was the centre of the Earth and the support of the world.

In India, the cromlech, among standing stones, symbolises the fertile womb of the feminine and of the earth, just as the menhir takes on a phallic meaning…

In China, stone bells are apotropaic and symbols of fertility.

Among the Sumerians, one of the oldest peoples on Earth, stones were the main representation of the divine and of supernatural power.

In alchemical language, the stone represents perfection, the spiritual, mental and moral integrity of the individual, the liberated, unified Self…

Stone as message

In the Holy Scriptures, it is on two tablets of stone that God engraved the Commandments. And on stone slabs the names of the dead are engraved, as a perpetual memory… But over this sacred value of stone as a direct bearer of messages lies an even greater one: that of stone itself as message, without anything being written on it. In this sense it fully takes on the meaning of McLuhan’s statement, “the medium is the message”: a powerful message is written in the stone itself, beyond whatever form it may have. This is possible because stone is a fundamental archetypal symbol. The richness of meanings of stone comes from the fact that they have gradually been layered over centuries and millennia, so that it has come to have a potentially infinite narrative programme.

Stone as vehicle

Stone is the place of myth. It manages to transmit, evoke, suggest. House of God, itself a deity, navel of the world, centre of the motionless wheel, cosmic egg, lotus of the universe: there is no limit to the variety of its meanings in different cultures and times…

To be continued…

See also the performances Stone Document – Experiment-action and Stone Document – Basilicata.