Agonium of May 2015

The wondrous mysteries of the Provence. Today, the 21st, is the Agonium of May sacred to Vediovis. Richard and I went to Aix for vitamins, etc., had lunch in a new place for us suggested by Pierre and Catherine, and then had cappuccini in Jouques halfway to back home. But this time, finally, we stopped to see the Chapelle de Saint Pothin. We have passed the signpost for years but had never checked it out previously.

It was a long stone and rocky roadway through woods, not well marked, and we began to think we were not going to find the chapel. But we did! And there was a plaque next to the building explaining who St. Pothin is – with a shorter English digest also included. Originally he was un dieu païen worshipped throughout the region and especially in Varages, the village to which the chapel belongs. His name was Foutinus, and he was represented by a phallus and thought to increase virility for men and fertility for women. Eventually he was ‘replaced’ by Saint-Photin (Latin Photinus) who, the plaque explained, was the first bishop of Lyons. Photin was martyred in 177 along with Sainte Blandine. Presumably in April 1865, to obscure any similarity of the name with Foutinus, the saint’s name was transmogrified from Photin to Pothin. (http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC1Z6ZE_la-chapelle-de-st-pothin?guid=8555df3e-0e72-42c0-8651-3cb1eca0f529)

So here it was, a pagan shrine, there all along, and today we discovered it! One finds such shrines and sacred places throughout the Midi, and through such strange but wonderful retentions – throughout so much of Europe including the British Isles, one can witness the continuity of paganism and how the old deities are still present. Telluric enchantment is there for those of us who wish to find it.