Gaea

Gæa



1. Ancient Earth-mother goddess; mother and spouse of Uranus; also mother of the Titans, the Furies and the Cyclopes. Under the variant spelling Gaia, a name for the biosphere; as in Lovelock's "Gaia Hypothesis." Has been proposed as a name for the planet Earth; known figuratively as "Our Lady Gæa." Also: Gea. Hence: Gæan, Gean.

1994 Ott Ayahuasca Analogues, 88. Planet Earth, Our Lady Gæa, is suffering mightily the consequences of our materialistic world-view, especially the Judæo-Christian tendency to see humankind as a special creation, apart from all other Gæan life-forms, and as enjoined, moreover, to subdue and dominate all other countries.

1995 Ott The Age of Entheogens, 40. We thus have a satisfying family of words, based on the name of the Greek earth-goddess Gæa for our planet; we as Gæn creatures; pangæan as an adjective to replace the shopworn and provincial "universal" for a worldwide phenomenon; Palæoæa and Neogæa to describe what we are now obliged to call the Old and New Worlds, with the adjectives palæogæan and neogæan.

Gaia—Variant of Gæa. This spelling should be avoided, as it is usually mispronounced in English as guy-ah [as opposed to the proper pronounciation, gay-uh]. Moreover, Gæa or jee-uh, gives us the sound of the common prefix, e.g. geology.

2. Gaea, in Greek mythology, the earth; daughter of Chaos, mother and wife of both Uranus (the sky) and Pontus (the sea). She was mother, by Uranus, of the Cyclopes, the Titans, and others, and, by Pontus, of five sea deities. She helped cause the overthrow of Uranus by the Titans and was worshiped as the primal goddess, the mother of all things.

Source:


  1. The Age of Entheogens & The Angel's Dictionary by Jonathan Ott
  2. The Concise Columbia Encyclopedia by Columbia University Press


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