Inventions To Thank Pagans For

[BarkerChickens]

Quote:
A fellow geologist!!

Specifically, hydrogeology (incl. hydrogeochemistry) for me.

As for the topic:
Many of the holidays are from pagan beliefs. Already mentioned is that Xmas is near the winter Solstice (also known as yule) for a reason. As well as the idea of red/green colors for the holiday spirit, xmas trees, wreaths, mistletoe, etc. Other holidays include:
Halloween (actually Samhain..pronounced sow-en) incl. jack-o-lanterns, etc. and NO it is not about the devil (not a pagan concept) and creepy, scary hauntings.
Easter is Oestere including the bunny, eggs, etc.
May Day is an actual pagan holiday (also known as Beltane).
Groundhogs day is also a pagan holiday (known as Oimelc, Imbolc, Candlemas as well as Festival of Saint Brigid...all are the same, just different names for different cultures and Candlemas is celebrated by some catholics).
In some older traditions, St. Patty's Day has been associated with the spring equinox.

Why so many similarities? Because when the roman's became predominantly christian, it was easier to convert the european pagans to Christianity if there were similar holidays and festivities. Of course, the meanings of the holidays differed.

I have always found it interesting how two subject that seem so different have many similarities...some developed for cultural reasons.

 

[boaz]

Quote:
In my enthusiam to post, I dropped in between the wrong quote tags. It would be possible to alter another's post here, sorry!

 

[GrayDragon]

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This has been proven to be a falsehood on several occasions.

And the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocents over the course of the 'burning times' is well documented history. As are the biblical scriptures used to justify what was done. Yes, sad to say, they were 'biblical', in that the bible can be made to support them. As they say, the devil can quote scripture for his purpose.

Culturally, acts of cannibalism are to 'honor' the consumed by taking their strength into you. However, the vast majority of 'cannibalistic' cultures were nothing of the sort. The missionaries who claimed such were lying through their teeth to justify their own abhorrent acts or creatively misinterpreting cultural rites, rather in the manner someone unfamiliar with Catholicism could, after a brief and biased glimpse of a mass, accuse the Catholics of being cannibals who worshiped virgins.

Actual acts of cannibalism are few and far between.

Warfare

Earlier in the thread you lauded the Christian contributions to warfare by using them as examples of how Christians were more advanced than other cultures. Please clarify as to whether war is a positive or negative thing, as it seems you are only considering it to be a negative when done by 'pagans', but something to be admired and respected when done by Christians.

Depending on how I want to go, I can easily point out that it can be said that Christ himself was a pagan invention, as his similarities to earlier mythological figures (most notably Baldur and Mithras) are quite clear. Ones beliefs are sacred only to the believer, and have only the validity one chooses to apply. That's the nature of faith, and as strongly as you hold your faith, others hold theirs and in that, their faith is just as 'correct' as yours is. Mankind has traded ideas back and forth, and cultures have interacted with each other since the first man took a look at fire and decided it was nifty. Naturally, there are similarities, and by the very nature of mankind, there are differences, as each sees the idea through their own eyes. Two people can witness the exact same event, then go to different bars and tell different stories of the same thing. To you the sky is cerulean, to me it cyaneous, and both of us are correct.

mom'sfolly :

domestication of the Chicken!!!!!

Domestication of all animals, actually. Man included

A few things are interesting to note: If you are European in origin, you are descended from headhunters. The Celts collected the heads of their honored enemies and preserved them in cedar oil as trophies. This made it into the story of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and St. Denis.​

 

[dacjohns]

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Different calendars, how about saying about the time of the winter solstice?

I'm not sure I understand your post. The solstice itself is on the 21st or 22nd, but the increasing length of the day was first noticed on the 25th, so pagans celebrated that as the "rebirth of the sun."

We use a different calendar than they used in Roman times. December 25th is not the same day.

 

[Blackbird]

I'm beginning to forget what the purpose of this thread was...

 

[dragonlaurel]

Quote:
It referred to the heaths- the areas where heather was growing wild. Meaning most of the Countryside. When the Romans were trying to convert the Celts to Christianity, they focused on the city people first. They could get to more of them at one time. The other people - that lived out in the heaths, didn't convert nearly as quickly. So heathen became a word for someone that followed the old religion.

 

[BarkerChickens]

Other pagan inventions...
sundial (and eventually the clock)
LCD (Liquid Crystal Diodes) (The inventor was followed eastern religions including those that are considered pagan)
paper (ancient eqyptians)
black ink (ancient eqyptians)
calendar (ancient eqyptians and romans)
written language (celts)
soap (celts)
harp (celts)
aqueducts (ancient romans)
engineering/construction (planned, more difficult structures including reinforced concrete) (ancient romans)
medical/surgical tools (ancient romans and greeks)
Fast curing cement (ancient romans)
public toilets (ancient romans)

 

[dragonlaurel]

A few more things that I think we missed.
Rammed earth construction, government run lottery - ancient China
Astrology-Sumeria
Writing - Sumeria
baker's dozen
Wigs
bronze
jewelry making
fortune telling by many methods
battery and light bulb - ancient Egypt

 

[tdgill]

the wheel

 

[GrayDragon]

marriage