Chronos Apollonios' "Home On Olympus"
The brief passage gives further details about the pterocarpans cabenegrin I and cabenegrin II, how they are isolated from the "cabeca de negra" tree root and are used for treatment against toxic venoms of various creatures.
The academic chemical journal, Tetrahedron Letters, Vol 23, No. 38, pp. 3855-3858 (1982) is entitled "Structures of Cabenegrins A-I and A-II, Potent Anti-Snake Venoms", by Masahi Nakagawa and Koji Nakaishi.
Tetrahedron Letters Vol 23, No. 38, pp. 3859-3862 (1982) is entitled "Synthesis of... Cabengrins A-I and A-II, authored by Masaji Ishiguro, Toshio Tatsuoka and Nobuo Nakatsuka, and immediately proceeds to again mention the tested anti-venom properties of these compounds against the poisons from many snakes.
What I should like to suggest at this point is an experimental assumption that the properties of anti-venom and far memory promotor may serendipitously coincide, hopefully often, leaving them perhaps generically interchangable. A number of theories might in fact be able to easily account for this if it proves to. A theories that involves the chemistry of phosphorus in the body and in the relevant situations of both venomous bites, and the process of memory, would be but one example. My intent here, though, is to look at some of the peripheral circumstantial indicators.
We would need to somehow link the themes of past lives with serpents, as we would expect the ancients may have, and indeed they may have utilized this labelling in places I have not yet bothered to dream (it may be, in fact, an assumption they connected to the morphology and ethnobotany of the Ophrys orchids for example, where fanciful Egyptian-styled serpents seem to protrude from the brows of tiny humanoids; the chemistry of a number of these agents might render them appropriate substitutes for these perennially scarcer orchids).
Of course, the very mention of Egypt brings up Cleopatra. Not ironically, Cleopatra seems to have reincarnated as so many people that even open minded and politically incorrect author of the Doonesbury cartoon, Garry Trudeau opted to immortalize that perception with scalding satire in his notorious cartoon strip one Sunday.
But if so many people indeed have had past life regressions performed, and come out thinking they were Cleopatra in a past life, does this or should it, automatically discredit these people, past life regressions, or the thought of reincarnation?
The most appropriate answer to all three questions may well be "no".
One of the most important things to bear in mind may be that the process of past life regression (whether hypnotically induced or initiated by other occult means) and the results of that process is that they are substantially theorized as communication between the unconcious or superconcious minds, and the concious one. Just as when often happens using Tarot cards, when one is trying to ask a given question but the mind has already become aware of something of greater urgency, the process will be overridden and the reading will pertain to the more pressing matter and read as if that were the question asked even when it has not been.
Regarding the question that actually was asked, the results in such a situation are horrendously erroneous, perhaps even virtually worthless. But in the context of what they concern, they may be flawless. Even when they seem to be meaningless, they can be talking, prolifically and profoundly.
Accordingly, we are advised to take regression memories seriously, even if they seem to be patently ridiculous. They may well be telling us something of considerable importance nonetheless. Put in the proper context or read in the proper language, they may have great meaning.
As to whether or not therefore such agents truly generate real, accurate past life experiences, it may easily prove that they, just like the Tarot cards and other divinatory apparatus, will do so, only when the "false" messages or experiences cease because the matters they pertain to have been recognized, noted, or dealt with.
I personally have difficulty accepting the veracity of the past life experience caused by "cabeza de negro" that was reported in the tabloid. This, however, for me at least, does absolutely nothing to tarnish the value of this information and the great potential that the elements of such an occurance can rapidly be directed to inducing genuine occult effects.
Note the less than ironic way in which this discover of this perhaps priceless agent experienced a past life as a Spanish Conquistador. Such a exercise in encountering and taming his own greed may have been this own issue that his subconcious required of him; it is a very likely candidate for the urgent matter at hand of a false experience. The resolution of this issue having been accomplished, anything which would follow may be in fact genuine far memory rather than this occult sort of "false memory syndrome".
Such agents, incidentally, could easily prove valuable in the complications of false memory syndrome that are currently being encountered.
A page on this is site devoted to a Shamanic interpretation of UFO experiences in a manner styled after that introduced by antropological scholar Lowell Bean (Sun Bear) and associates in the work "Dreaming With The Wheel" and extending it to an idealized but reasonably assumed ability of the mind and body to diagnose their own medical problems and communicate them to the concious mind through symbols. That approach is also highly likely to be applicable in the case of the mysterious numbers of persons who have experienced past life memories of an incarnation as Cleopatra.
I am of course foregoing somewhat more conventional approaches to the psychology of these experiences, for if it were that their purpose were purely to express or communicate a need to, for example, compensate for being "at the bottom of the totem pole", whereas Cleopatra is thought of as being at the top of a sociological power structure, the experience would neither seem to appreciably alleviate such feelings, nor is likely to be communicating something to those who experience that they are not already conciously aware of, perhaps acutely.
Hence, we may be free to examine such possibilities as that, perhaps like the alien encounters, such often repeated archetypical experiences are a species of Shamanic vision that has an underlying structure of complex, interconnected symbolic information about probably the very class of experience in question. It may well be the most straightforward generic label applicable.
In such a manner, Cleopatra may well symbolize various ideas and materials. One botanical with which Cleopatra is perpetually associated is the lemon. Her use of lemon wedges applied to the skin as an antidote to wrinkling skin eventually caught the notice of modern science and seemingly engendered our current preoccupation with anti-wrinkle or anti-aging products that incorporate alpha-hydroxy acids.
Note that a botanical both botanically close and chemically close to the lemon, namely the orange, has already been cited by established authors as an agent that promotes far memory; there is indeed correlation.
Another thing that is notable about Cleopatra's legend is that she is regarded to have committed suicide by allowing an asp to bite her breast. While this may or may not be true, such an act is either excruciatingly deliberate, or a humourous contrivance like those so seemingly typical of ancient literature and clearly cut out for the same purpose of serving as a vehicle to popularize important medical and utilitarian knowledge.
The goal of the familiar act of placing a tournequet on such a wound may well constitute something of an ancient situation comedy. It could inspire us, however, to seriously consider the process of defending oneself against deadly bites, there are certainly various extremeties or various parts of the body that could be exceedingly difficult to treat in such a manner, and especially if one is expected to be administering first aid to themselves.
Such concerns appropriately belong to such Goddesses of wild places who accordingly seem to govern the knowledge of how such situations should be dealt with. Some interpretations of Aesculapias or the Caduceus hint at using the offending reptile itself as the most available tournequet if possible. It has not been that long since publications from Adventures Unlimited Press repeated a news article reporting that such a deed had in fact been done, and doctors claimed this is the sole thing that saved his life, using the skin of the snake that bit him to tie a tournequet.
But besides looking for confirmations that the Mother Goddess or Serpent Goddess, as the Cretans portrayed her, can be thought of as a Goddess of memory (indeed this may be as simple as noting that she is a lunar goddess), we also have some observations that may help make sense of the archetypical experience that may be by now loosely called the "Cleopatra Complex" or the "Cleopatra Syndrome". This is perhaps only the beginning of the echoes of valuable knowledge that lie encoded within, and indicated by, it.
Some agents which are cited by occult references are cited themselves or in combinations associated with triggering past life memory, although the effect may or may not be direct; some sources allude to concidental benefits such as promoting relaxation that is conducive to invoking far memory
although they indeed fit the morphological and chemical profile that seems to be a general one for actual memory stimulating members of this class of agents (see texts mentioned for further information):
Homeopathic (from Gurudas "Spiritual Properties of Herbs")
Lemon balm
Cayenne
Garlic
Henna
Magnolia
Sandalwood
Strawberry
Thyme
Witch hazel
Yerba mate
Aromatherapeutic: (from Scott Cunningham, "Magical Herbalism")
Lilac
From ""How to Uncover Your Past Lives" by Ted Andrews, pages 81-91:
Past Life Fragrances:
Eucalyptus
Frankincense
Hyacinth
Lavendar
Lilac
Myrrh
Orange
Sage
Sandalwood
Wisteria
Past Life Flower Essences:
Blackberry
Black-Eyed Susan
California Poppy
Chaparral
Forget-me-Not
Iris
Lotus
Mugwort
Saint John's Wort
Self-Heal (ie, Prunella vulgaris?)
Star Tulip
Thyme
(more to be found here in the near future)
“I always thought that anyone who told me I couldn’t live in the past was trying to get me
to forget something that, if I remembered, it would get them in serious trouble” Utah
Phillips & Ani DiFranco, “Bridges”, from “The Past Didn’t Go Anywhere”
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