Mythopoetics of Stone

Abstract

The mythopoetics of stone, rocks and mountains is archaic, universal and ambivalent. The mythopoetical meaning of stones depends on a person's way of life and on his/her relations with the environment. Stones are enemies to the tiller, and soil provides him with food. Stone is lifeless and also dangerous to life-stone is both a weapon and means of punishment. A stray person is stoned to death; he is turned into a stone statue or locked up in a stone cell. At the same time stone has assumed preserving role of life-a fortress on a rock is a safe shelter, hearthstones keep warm, millstones grind grains. Stones, rocks and mountains mark the sanctification of place, they are the core of it and at the same time a boundary between profane and sacred, everyday and eternal world. As such, they are setting up the cosmic order, its well the phenomenal order in our lifeworld. Among the natural materials stone is lasting, strong and durable, but also rigid, static and constant as well. As such, it is a means of bringing the time flow to a standstill, halting a moment and spacing the time. Stone is the bearer of cultural memory, the supporter of both body and place memory, the means of recollection, reminiscence and memorialization. Mortal body finds immortalization in stone, and will lead its eternal life as a peace of sculpture; stone buildings are the reflections of history; gravestones, monuments and stone mounds prevent life from sinking into oblivion. A recurrent subject in arts and myth is that of bringing a stone figure back to life. Stones support the belief in incarnation and re-incarnation. In art and religion has stone made it possible to turn imperceptible into perceptible, invisible into visible. Stone immortalizes mental values, be it from mythical, religious, political, social, artistic or other forms of cultural consciousness.