Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. Its name is derived from the Greek word Σείριος, meaning lit. 'glowing' or 'scorching'. The star is designated α Canis Majoris, Latinized to Alpha Canis Majoris, and abbreviated α CMa or Alpha CMa. With a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, Sirius is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. Sirius is a binary star consisting of a main-sequence star of spectral type A0 or A1, termed Sirius A, and a faint white dwarf companion of spectral type DA2, termed Sirius B. The distance between the two varies between 8.2 and 31.5 astronomical units as they orbit every 50 years.
The Dogon are an ethnic group indigenous to the central plateau region of Mali, in West Africa, south of the Niger bend, near the city of Bandiagara, and in Burkina Faso. The population numbers between 400,000 and 800,000. They speak the Dogon languages, which are considered to constitute an independent branch of the Niger–Congo language family, meaning that they are not closely related to any other languages.
Ancient astronauts refers to a pseudoscientific set of beliefs that hold that intelligent extraterrestrial beings visited Earth and made contact with humans in antiquity and prehistoric times. Proponents of the theory suggest that this contact influenced the development of modern cultures, technologies, religions, and human biology. A common position is that deities from most religions are extraterrestrial in origin, and that advanced technologies brought to Earth by ancient astronauts were interpreted as evidence of divine status by early humans.
The cosmic egg, world egg or mundane egg is a mythological motif found in the cosmogonies of many cultures and civilizations, including in Proto-Indo-European mythology. Typically, there is an egg which, upon "hatching", either gives rise to the universe itself or gives rise to a primordial being who, in turn, creates the universe. The egg is sometimes lain on the primordial waters of the Earth. Typically, the upper half of the egg, or its outer shell, becomes the heaven (firmament) and the lower half, or the inner yolk, becomes the Earth. The motif likely stems from simple elements of an egg, including its ability to offer nourishment and give rise to new life, as is reflected by the Latin proverb omne vivum ex ovo.
Marcel Griaule was a French author and anthropologist known for his studies of the Dogon people of West Africa, and for pioneering ethnographic field studies in France. He worked together with Germaine Dieterlen and Jean Rouch on African subjects. His publications number over 170 books and articles for scholarly journals.
Salvage ethnography is the recording of the practices and folklore of cultures threatened with extinction, including as a result of modernization and assimilation. It is generally associated with the American anthropologist Franz Boas; he and his students aimed to record vanishing Native American cultures. Since the 1960s, anthropologists have used the term as part of a critique of 19th-century ethnography and early modern anthropology.
Germaine Dieterlen was a French anthropologist. She was a student of Marcel Mauss, worked with noted French anthropologists Marcel Griaule (1898-1956) and Jean Rouch, wrote on a large range of ethnographic topics and made pioneering contributions to the study of myths, initiations, techniques, graphic systems, objects, classifications, ritual and social structure.
The Sirius Mystery is a book written by Robert K. G. Temple supporting the pseudoscientific ancient astronauts hypothesis that intelligent extraterrestrial beings visited the Earth and made contact with humans in antiquity and prehistoric times. The book was first published by St. Martin's Press in 1976. Its second, 1998, edition is called The Sirius Mystery: New Scientific Evidence of Alien Contact 5,000 Years Ago.
Ian William Ridpath is an English science writer and broadcaster best known as a popularizer of astronomy and a biographer of constellation history. As a UFO sceptic, he investigated and explained the Rendlesham Forest Incident of December 1980.
Religion in Mali is predominantly Islam with an estimated 95 percent of the population being Muslim, with the remaining 2 percent of Malians adhering to traditional African religions such as the Dogon religion, or Christianity. Atheism and agnosticism are believed to be rare among Malians, most of whom practice their religion daily, although some are Deist.
Dogon country is a region of eastern Mali and northwestern Burkina Faso populated mainly by the Dogon people, a diverse ethnic group in West Africa with diverse languages. Like the term Serer country occupied by the Serer ethnic group, Dogon country is vast, and lies southwest of the Niger River belt. The region is composed of three zones: the plateau, the escarpment and the Seno-Gondo plain.
West African mythology is the body of myths of the people of West Africa. It consists of tales of various deities, beings, legendary creatures, heroes and folktales from various ethnic groups. Some of these myths traveled across the Atlantic during the period of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade to become part of Caribbean, African-American and Brazilian mythology.
Philip Coppens was a Belgian author, radio host, and commentator whose writings, speeches and television appearances focused on areas of fringe science and alternative history.
Denise Paulme was a French Africanist and anthropologist. Her role in African literary studies, particularly in regards to the importance of Berber literature, was described as "pivotal".
Ogotemmeli was the Dogon elder and hogon who narrated the cosmogony, cosmology and symbols of the Dogon people to French anthropologist Marcel Griaule during the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s, that went on to be documented and adapted by contemporary scholars. A lot of what is known about the Dogon religion, cosmogony and symbolism came from Griaule's work, which in turn came from Ogotemmeli—who taught it to him.
The Lebe or Lewe is a Dogon religious, secret institution and primordial ancestor, who arose from a serpent. According to Dogon cosmogony, Lebe is the reincarnation of the first Dogon ancestor who, resurrected in the form of a snake, guided the Dogons from the Mandé to the cliff of Bandiagara where they are found today.
The Binou is a Dogon totemic, religious order and secret ceremonial practice which venerates the immortal ancestors. It can also mean a water serpent or protector of a family or clan in Dogon. It is one of the four tenets of Dogon religion—an African spirituality among the Dogon people of Mali. Although the Dogons' "Society of the Masks" is more well known, due in part to Dogon mask–dance culture which attracts huge tourism, it is only one aspect of Dogon religion, which apart from the worship of the Creator God Amma, a rather distant and abstract deity in the Dogon world-view, is above all made up of ancestor veneration. The Binou serves as one of the four aspects of Dogon religion's ancestor veneration. Other than the Binou and the worship of Amma, the other three aspects of the religion includes the veneration of Lebe, which pertains to an immortal ancestor (Lebe) who suffered a temporary death in Dogon primordial time but was resurrected by the Nommo; the veneration of souls; and lastly, the Society of the Masks, which relates to dead ancestors in general. These myths are in oral form—known to us in a secret language. They form the framework of Dogon's religious knowledge, and are the fixed Dogon's sources relating to the creation of the universe; the invention of fire, speech and culture.
Awa, also known as the Awa Society, the Society of Masks, is an African mask and initiatory society of the Dogon people of Mali which is made up of circumcised men, and whose role is both ritual and political within Dogon society. The Awa Society takes an important role in Dogon religious affairs, and regularly preside over funereally rites and the dama ceremony—a ritual ceremony that marks the end of bereavement in Dogon country. This Society is one of the important aspect of Dogon religious life—which is primarily based on the worship of the single omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent Creator God Amma and the veneration of the ancestors. Although it is only one aspect of Dogon's religious sects, it is perhaps more well known than the others partly due to Dogon mask–dance culture which attracts huge tourism, and their masks highly sought after, and in fact, one of the first to be sought after by art collectors in the west.
The Kanaga mask is a mask of the Dogon of Mali traditionally used by members of the Awa Society, especially during the ceremonies of the cult of the dead.
Amma is an African tribal deity – the supreme creator god in the Dogon religion. The Dogon story of the creation of the world relates that the sky god Amma mated with the earth goddess, and because Amma was prevented from joining the goddess's clitoris in the form of a giant termite mound, he produced only an imperfect offspring – a desert fox or jackal – and therefore eventually removed the termite mound. Leaving the earth, he instituted the religious ritual of female circumcision. After removing the termite mound, the god Amma with the earth goddess continued procreating and begat humans. Duality is central to Dogon religion, the heavenly forces also have a dual character: the supreme god Amma has androgynous characteristics. The birth of twins is celebrated among the Dogon with a special religious ritual, as twins refer to the original dual structure of creation and to the harmony between earthly and heavenly.
