Make Out City

The Festival of Maia and Mercury

Maia was the goddess of memory, and the mother of Hermes/Mercuryâ?? the trickster god of the Greco-Roman pantheon, and the deity in charge of thieves, merchants, magicians, and travelers. Together they are celebrated on this day.

In ritual alone and in group, emphasize the union of memory and record-keeping with the work of businesses and magic-making.  Use writing â?? one of Hermes’s arts and a gift he made to his mother â?? as a ritual tool for making magic.  Shower blessings on businesses and on people’s workplaces, for prosperous years and safe working environments. 

The piggyback arrangement consisted of the seaplane Mercury on top of the Short C Class flying boat Maia. In a careful operation taking up to an hour the Mercury  was lifted by crane onto Maia. The seaplane’s floats needed to be positioned exactly right in order for the framework to connect the two aircraft together. Whilst the planes were connected the pilots could talk to each other by telephone. 

HOLIDAY:

Maia is the Oscan Earth-Goddess, and an ancient Roman Goddess of springtime, warmth, and increase. She causes the plants to grow through Her gentle heat, and the month of May is probably named for Her. Her name means “She Who is Great”, and is related to Oscan mais and Latin majus, both of which mean “more”. She is also called Maia Maiestas, “Maia the Majestic”, which is essentially a doubling of Her name to indicate Her power, as both “Maia” and “Maiestas” have their roots in latin magnus, “great or powerful”. She was honored by the Romans on the 1st and 15th of May, and at the Volcanalia of August 23rd, the holiday of Her sometimes husband, the Fire-God Vulcan.

She seems to have been paired with Vulcan because they were both considered Deities of heat: through the increasing warmth of Maia’s spring season flowers and plants sprouted and grew; while Vulcan’s stronger summer heat brought the fruits to ripeness. The flamen Volcanalis, the priest who officially oversaw the rites of Vulcan, sacrificed a pregnant sow to Maia on the first day of May. The offering of a pregnant sow was traditionally given to Earth-goddesses such as Tellus or Ceres and signified both the remarkable fecundity of the Earth (as there are usually between 6 and 12 piglings in a litter) as well as the darker side of the Earth Mother, as sows have been known to eat their young. Rites to Maia were also performed at the August Volcanalia, a festival to ward off the destructive fires that could be caused by the dry weather and burning sun of summertime.

In a later period, Maia was confused with a Greek Goddess of the same name. This Maia (whose name in Greek can take such various meanings as “midwife”, “female doctor”, “good mother”, “foster mother”, or “aunty”) was a nymph and the mother of Hermes, the trickster God of merchants, travellers, and liars; She was also said to have been the eldest and most beautiful of the seven sisters who formed the constellation of the Pleiades, whose heliacal rising (meaning when the constellation is just visible in the east before the sun rises) signalled the beginning of summer. Through this association the Roman Maia became the mother of Mercury, and Her festival on the Ides of May (the 15th) coincided with the festival commemorating the date of the dedication of His temple on the Aventine.

Ovid gives several possibilities as to how the month May got its name, and though he admits confusion, one of the possibilities he gives is that it is named after the personification of Majesty, whom he describes as seated in a place of high honor on Mt. Olympos, clothed in gold and purple. At face value it would seem he simply made this up; but as an alternate name (not just an epithet) of Maia is Maiesta, “Majesty”, he may have been closer than he thought. Though a Goddess of the merry flowering springtime may seem kinda fluffy-bunny, the roots of Her name point to a powerful and ancient great Goddess of the Earth, growth, fertility and heat. It is rumoured that Maia was the ancient and original name of the Bona Dea (“the Good Goddess”), whose name was so sacred it was forbidden to be spoken aloud; and through this connection Maia was associated with the Goddesses Fauna and Fatua. She was also associated with Ops, the Earth-Goddess who symbolizes the wealth of the Earth, and the eastern Great Mother Cybele.

Alternate names: Maiesta, Maja, Majestas, Majesty.

EXPERIMENT:

In the early days of long distance flight, the problem of carrying enough fuel to reach the destination safely was the biggest concern.  Many concepts were explored; adapting the fuel capacity of the aircraft, in-flight refuelling, building larger planes with bigger fuel tanks and assisted flight. This used the idea that an assisted take-off saved fuel for use in flight rather than getting an aircraft off the ground. One of the more eye-catching flight experiments carried out by Imperial Airways, using assisted flight, was the Mayo composite aircraft.  

The piggyback arrangement consisted of the seaplane Mercury on top of the Short C Class flying boat Maia. In a careful operation taking up to an hour the Mercury  was lifted by crane onto Maia. The seaplane’s floats needed to be positioned exactly right in order for the framework to connect the two aircraft together. Whilst the planes were connected the pilots could talk to each other by telephone. 


Maia/Mercury taxiing This must have been an arresting sight on Southampton Water, a flying boat with a seaplane secured on its roof taking off with all eight engines running!  Built by Shorts of Rochester, trials were done on the Medway and one resident recalls the sight. 

‘Us kids were taken to play football down on the field by the river… we saw Maia with the Mercury on top running up and down the river. It took her three or four attempts and she had to turn around but eventually she took off.’ 

 Flight preparations on Mercury

Once in the air, the release of the seaplane could be activated electronically by the Mercury. The first Atlantic trial from Southampton was on 21st July 1938: Mercury left Maiain the air over Foynes, Ireland and flew non-stop to Montreal in thirteen hours and twenty-nine, which was a record for an east to west crossing of the North Atlantic. After unloading there, it then flew on to New York in another five hours. By not having to use any fuel for take off, the seaplane could carry 1000lbs (453kg) for over 3,500 miles (5,632km) flying the first commercial flight over the N. Atlantic. The experiment set three new records, the third being the first east to west crossing from Britain to Montreal. But they weren’t continued, because another way of extending the range of aircraft looked more promising - inflight refuelling.

Tags: holy days, maia mercury experiment, maia mercury festival, may 15th, pagan holidays, paganism, this day, Tumblr Feeds

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