Kings & Queens
May. 28th, 2006 09:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
qosMore archetypal ponderings, based on my readings of Moore & Gillette's King, Magician, Warrior, Lover:
During lunch on Friday, I was reading their discussion of the King archetype: giver of order, blessing, fertility, and nurturing. My father embodies that energy more than any other male I've ever known, and as I write this, it occurs to me that perhaps what I have always thought of as a search for an Alpha partner is actually a search for an authentic King.
Reading M&G, and aware of the degree to which aspects of myself have been characterized as 'masculine,' I seek the King energy in myself, compare their discussion to Bruce Tallman’s discussion of the Sovereign (based heavily on M&G’s model), ponder what difference –- if any -– there is between the King and Queen archetypes. Are they simply gendered labels for a more fundamental Sovereign energy? Or are the King and Queen truly different at some level?
The biggest difference that I have been able to come up with is that there are no myths about Queen Sacrifice. It is the King who is called to lay down his life as a sacrifice for people and land. In many cases it is the Queen, as the embodiment of the Triple Goddess of Sovereignty, who wields the knife. When the King is dead, she will continue in her Crone aspect to test the young Hero who aspires to Kingship, turn Maiden to wed the successful challenger, and rule as Mother-Queen during the years of his reign, only to slay him in turn when his vitality fails –- and begin the cycle again.
During lunch on Friday, I was reading their discussion of the King archetype: giver of order, blessing, fertility, and nurturing. My father embodies that energy more than any other male I've ever known, and as I write this, it occurs to me that perhaps what I have always thought of as a search for an Alpha partner is actually a search for an authentic King.
Reading M&G, and aware of the degree to which aspects of myself have been characterized as 'masculine,' I seek the King energy in myself, compare their discussion to Bruce Tallman’s discussion of the Sovereign (based heavily on M&G’s model), ponder what difference –- if any -– there is between the King and Queen archetypes. Are they simply gendered labels for a more fundamental Sovereign energy? Or are the King and Queen truly different at some level?
The biggest difference that I have been able to come up with is that there are no myths about Queen Sacrifice. It is the King who is called to lay down his life as a sacrifice for people and land. In many cases it is the Queen, as the embodiment of the Triple Goddess of Sovereignty, who wields the knife. When the King is dead, she will continue in her Crone aspect to test the young Hero who aspires to Kingship, turn Maiden to wed the successful challenger, and rule as Mother-Queen during the years of his reign, only to slay him in turn when his vitality fails –- and begin the cycle again.
