The Mythology of Trees

The idea of Trees being sacred have been explored in just about every mythology of the entire World. Each mythology highlights a specific tree and deifies it within the context of serving the mythologies' main characters or acting as a common conduit for the movement of energy between and around realms. Perhaps it is being this vessel of energy that attracts people to it, feeling comfort, shelter and a higher connection to other spaces on this Earth and beyond. There are many trees that find themselves as front and center of old, charismatic stories of yore, here are just a few and their backstory.

1. Yggrasil - The World Tree of Old Norse

Perhaps one of the more popular trees is Yggrasil or Askr Yggrasil, the World tree that finds itself at the center of the cosmos connecting all realms in Norse Mythology. This would be a very familiar concept for those God of War or Marvel Avengers fans, both of which retold stories of the Norse Realm and their inhabitants. The World Tree here connects the realms of Angels(Valkyries) and Gods (Aesir and Vanir) to the Mortal realm of Midgard and the hellish worlds of Niflheim and Helheim with Nidhogg gnawing away at the roots. This is an Ash Tree and subscribes to the Ptolemaic flat world concept with each world existing on flat planes until the Tree trembles and dies, which is the sign of Ragnarok or the end of the World.

2. The Great Oak - Celtic Mythology

Oak mother's celtic name is Duir, this name came from the Celtic word for Druid, which is a master of memory, knowing, intuition, healing and magic. The Oak has always been considered the king of all trees amongst the 7 Noble Trees to the Irish. Sometimes called the Ogham Trees it was used to act as the table for the Knights of the Round Table in Arthurian Mythology. Mary Howitt in reverance to the tree and its role in Celtic history made this poem :

"Sing for the oak tree

The Monarch of the wood;

Sing for the oak tree

That groweth broad and good;

That groweth green and branching

Within the forest shade;

That groweth now, and yet shall grow

When we are lowly laid."

3. The Baobab Tree- Tree of Life

Stemming from the Arabic word "bu-hibab" meaning fruit with many seeds, there are few things more magical than the Tree of Life as it is designed as a magical one stop shop for all creatures in need of help. The first popular feature of the tree was in the Lion King as the home of the film's mystic Rafiki. Aptly portrayed as a magical tree, every part of the baobab can be put to use for clothes, medicine and also stores water in its massive craters and gnarled bark. The fruit it bears is also plentiful and marks as a sign for animals when the rains are near on the edge of the African Savannahs. There are three stories lending to the Boababs existence, one saying that the shamanic thunder god Thora did not like the tree growing in his garden so tossed it out of Paradise landing on the Earth on its head, growing there ever since. The other says that when the tree was planted by God, it kept walking, so God uprooted it and replanted it upside down so it wont wander any more. The final one is that the hyena was given the task to plant the Boabab by God and was so disgusted by the tree it simply shoved it into the ground upside down.

4. The Kalpavriksha - Vedantic Mythology

The story of this tree starts with the churning of the Indian ocean , the story of Samudra Manthan told in the Bhagavad Purana where the Devas and Asuras got together to churn the ocean using the snake of Rudra, Vasuki in order to yield the nectar of immortality. Instead, a deadly poison erupted from the ocean which Shiva drank in order to save the world from destruction. Eventually several other boons emerged with the release of eighteen items, one of which was Kaplavriksha, the wish giving Kalpa tree.

5. The Cosmic Tree

last but not least is my upcoming fiction series which is separated into the Guardian Series(x 7), Celestial Series(x 5) and Immortal Series(x 3). Each of the stories take place across our physical universe and is connected also by a tree. The Cosmic Tree, one of the three gifts of the Cosmic Dreamer anchors the entire series across thirty planets within our Visible Universe. With Thirty Superclusters of which one is the Virgo Supercluster where our Milky Way Galaxy resides as one of 17 different galaxies , it becomes challenging to set a scope to the series. But, just by looking at the series of random dots it was easy to place the series across the Solar Insterstellar neighbourhood, which , already looks like a tree of sorts .

The first Guardian Series take place between Earth (Books 1-4) and Sirius(Books 5-7), both of which are connected through the Bermuda branch. Just one more cover to go, and 200 more pages for the manuscript of Book 2 : The Lost Temple of Thoth to be finished.