Staff
Staff signifies guidance, authority, magic, pilgrimage, solar fertility, and the world axis, serving shepherds, rulers, clerics, judges, heralds, and religious teachers.
Our paraphrase of what the sources say it carries.
At a glance
- Type
- Symbol
- Borne by
- 2 figures
- Traditions
- Colombian folklore (1)Roman mythology (1)
Figures that bear it
A model judged each figure against its own description, one term at a time. Is: the figure is, or is partly, this thing. Bears: it carries the thing or is marked by it. What a figure does is filed under motifs and powers. Open "why" for the sentence the judgement rests on.
- Bochica bears Colombian folklore
why
A hostile figure causes the waters to rise over the plain where the people live; Bochica appears, strikes the rock at the edge of the plain with a staff, and opens the great falls through which the water drains, saving the survivors.
- Jupiter bears Roman mythology
why
The iconographic and symbolic register the compendia preserve is remarkably consistent: a seated, venerable figure with staff and spear, standing for organization, decision, expansion, and intellectual will — the energetic and the courageous — with the air for his element, tin for his metal, Thursday for his day, the east for his quarter, and maturity for his age.