I was leafing
through Fuller’s Earth, A History (prev, Robert Robertson, who founded The
Resource Use Institute in Pitlochry) and realized some fascinating similarities
with some of the themes I’ve been following.
Since fuller’s earth is a “found substance”, Man uses it with no need
for processing, from the raw properties, and it’s worth quoting in full.
(page 8 -- humans giving birth in caves long, long ago)
(The Roman discovery of lime for concrete might have been equally
accidental Hyborian Bridge 18)
Cleansing properties have to be pretty strong and pungent so you’re
really in a different universe to one of hygiene, where things are weak.
Cleansing breaks things down, often organic things carried in with sheep’s wool
before spinning. One way to look at it is there are two things which are
strong: one is the raw sheep’s wool, greasy and matted; the other is the
material used for cleansing. Two strong things make one pristine product.
None of the things are hygienic, which is usually just a way of masking
the effects of bad practice (such as chlorinating chickens.) As a general rule,
things which get really dirty are of the figure in action– whether animal or Man,
cowboys or Indians. These things then need the strength of cleansing.
(page 32) There meaning “laundry”, since
Another similarity I found in Robert’s book is that, in a world of
primitive action, the body-in-action has a sexual symbolism that is taken for
granted.
(page 230) Similarly, in Ireland, fulling of raw cloth or “frize”
The fact that the body in its physical labors is picturesque is
seemingly seen in all societies of free communal action. The sexual symbolism
is completely the norm. JM Synge, the Irish playwright, takes it to even more
fantasy levels.
Synge is my favorite modern playwright, and his dreamy, madcap
fantasies were his response to the rude rural peasantry he saw in Aran and
elsewhere on the west. It’s the free action of the body, under no order save
the primitive rhythms and proportionate grace of limb.
That anarchic order is what we, as free-dwelling humans, are, born of
sweat and dirt and cleansed by spring and fuller’s art. The body-in-action
tends to have a dynamic psyche since head and body are acting together, as
warrior or hunter..
Again, mud is a form of dirt, but is a cleansing agent. Stale urine is
a pollutant. In nature there is the idea of pungency, that things act
one-on-another. Is there then a great thread of life that is acted on roughly
and with force and that gives it supple grace? The dynamic, primitive world of
action that is very similar to Howard’s.
I did make mention before of the physical allure of psyche in ancient
times (Drama1) The physical or sexual allure of figures is taken
together with their strength of psyche. In Robert’s book, he mentions the “tension
of opposites” of Heraclitus. That two things – like night and day – are indispensable
parts of one thing. In Fulling, rough treatment gains softness of thread, as
Hippocrates, page 33
In our modern world, our heads exist in a type of hygienic weakness
(electromagnetism, lenses – prev.); in Howard and ancient and medieval states,
body and head are one indispensable thing.
So, physical
allure and psyche are much closer than in our own pornographically-saturated
era. What I tend to mean is, like the Scorch Fullers, women are unabashedly
sexual as it is associated with their physical activity (People of the Black
Circle Part 2, Savage Sword 17 1976)
Both the Devi
and the hill-woman wear loose-fitting baggy clothes fitted to saddle or the
grace of courtiers (And God Created)
So the dynamic of two things together – head and body, or rough and
smooth – have one pristine result. The psyche that is joined with the active
body.