Saturn: The Return of The King

The stirring of the old gods in the collective unconscious Part I

© 2024 John R. Clarke.

photo John R. Clarke@Substack

Ouspensky¹ said it best, ‘there exist moments in life, separated by long intervals of time, but linked together by their inner content and by a certain singular sensation peculiar to them. Several such moments always recur to my mind together, and I feel then that it is these that have determined the chief trend of my life.’

This sensation, a feeling of a deeper pattern of meaning, is something most of us can relate to. Childhood is lit by the numinous in the same way a dark lake is lit by a bonfire on the shore, and memories are formed that never go away, but are pulled along with us under the surface.

On occasion through life something will activate that numinous chain and whilst we cannot quantify it in our conscious mind, we know we are being touched by meaning².

I have felt this in my own life, a resonance with a symbol across the decades. By sharing this personal moment from my own childhood, I hope to show that Saturn isn't merely an abstract concept but a living archetype that can surface in both personal experiences and the collective unconscious.

When I was eleven years old, I had a strange waking dream in my bedroom in the middle of the night. Perhaps I was asleep, and I dreamt that I was awake. It seems very likely. But that winter night, I awoke to find a black light hovering over the end of my bed.

A black light. Intuitively I knew what I was seeing was impossible. It was of an incredibly dense black, yet it still radiated rays of dark light. It was humming or vibrating quietly. I wasn’t a brave child in the least, but I wasn’t afraid of what I was seeing. It was like a glowing black orb or miniature black sun.

There was a truth in it that was just beyond my grasp, and above all, a feeling of a deep and profound magic.

Of course, that word sounds ridiculous to my own adult ear. Now, if exposed to the same experience for the first time, I would doubtless replace the word magic with power. The thing would be the same, but my processing of it would be different. In this I think there is an example of how it is we who change over time. The magic is still there, it is us who fade. Yet through the barriers that inevitably rise between ourselves and the numinous, the magic and meaning can still be glimpsed, if much more rarely.

I don’t remember falling asleep again, but I must have, because I woke the next morning unsettled by what I knew must have been a dream. I was worried enough to consult my grandmother about it, and she told me it was nothing to worry about and to ignore it. She said everyone had weird dreams. I accepted this reassurance somewhat dubiously but what did I know? I accepted that these things were just another baffling element of a world I didn’t understand.

photo John R. Clarke@Substack

I didn’t forget about it for a while but eventually I did. Little did I know that this numinous childhood experience had not gone, but just slipped beneath the surface of life.

It was many years before I came across the idea of a black light again, in Jungian alchemy, but when I did, I felt the same sense of magic and meaning I had felt in that long forgotten moment of childhood.

I came to understand that this black light was not merely a dream or a figment of imagination, but a manifestation of a deeper archetype—the ancient god Saturn. This time I was able to understand and process the symbol in a different way, a much more formal way.

As the embodiment of the unseen, the hidden, and the transformative, Saturn has once again begun to stir in the collective unconscious, echoing a call for us to confront the mystery and discover the profound meaning it holds.

I have often pondered the connection between that dream and how it resurfaced so many years later. Often I have indulged myself wondering -how linear is time exactly? The numinous exists outside of space time³, so it could equally have been a resonance from my own future echoing back to my past.

In recent years, I have seen this archetype begin to constellate in the collective unconscious. I am now experiencing the symbol in another way yet again, this time observing it in the macrocosm as interest in this symbol gathers traction.

Whether we see Saturn as a symbol, a god, or a cosmic enigma, there is no doubt that Saturn is the most fascinating of all.

In this chapter we will be tracing Saturn from his ancient roots through to the Roman Saturnalia and his influence on Christmas. We will consider his mythical position as the original sun. We will sally through the gardens of alchemy and Jungian psychoanalysis, gathering darkly petaled Saturnalian blooms. We will saunter through the connections to the Black Madonna, and ponder the black cube, the hexagram, and what it means for the collective consciousness- that we are entering a collective nigredo or time of change.

This then, is Saturn.

photo John R. Clarke@Substack

The Imprisoned King and His Many Faces

You already know Saturn more than you might think. You have met his archetype through many of the tales you were told in your own childhood. You looked forward to his day, Saturday, every week when you were at school and now at work it still represents a release from toil for many across the world. If you celebrate Christmas, you are following in the steps worn into time over thousands of years of countless people who worshipped Saturn in the winter. As observed by Manley P. Hall, ‘Saturn, the old man who lives at the North Pole and comes down the chimney at the winter solstice, is known to the little folk as Santa Claus.’⁴ In England Christmas was banned for this reason from 1647 until the Restoration in 1660 at which time the people were allowed to celebrate Christmas (and Easter) again⁵.

You might be surprised to learn that these pagan tendrils extended forward into the Victorian Age, when Charles Dickens incorporated the pagan traditions of contacting the dead into his wonderful novella ‘A Christmas Carol’.

Yet that which now haunts Christmas was once the ruler of the house, worshipped as not only a god but as a sun. A great sun king who presided over the Golden Age, a time when the first race of humans, the Golden Race, lived in peace, free from sorrow or toil, and enjoyed a life of ease and abundance. These people were akin to gods, blessed with a harmonious existence, and they died peacefully, their spirits living on as benevolent guardians of the world.

In the Golden Age of Saturn, the world was a place of perfect harmony and abundance, untouched by the trials and tribulations that would come to define later ages. This was an era where men lived in peace, free from disease, toil, and the struggles that would later beset humanity. Under Saturn's benevolent rule, the very fabric of existence was woven from the incorruptible essence of gold—a symbol of the unified and pure state that characterized this primordial time.

In this age, the earth itself was a generous provider, yielding its bounty without the need for cultivation. Fields were not tilled, for the soil brought forth an abundance of food naturally, and the need for labour was non-existent. The concept of ownership, so deeply ingrained in the ages that followed, was foreign to the people of the Golden Age. Saturn forbade the land to be divided, sold, or claimed as private property; instead, all shared equally in the earth’s gifts. This communal way of life reflected the equality that reigned under Saturn’s watchful eye.

Animals, too, were different in this golden era. They possessed the power of speech and lived in harmony with mankind. There was no need for laws or commandments to enforce good behaviour; kindness and righteousness were inherent in all beings, as natural as the air they breathed. The law of Saturn was the law of karma—a cosmic order that ensured that every action, whether good or ill, was met with a fitting response. This was not a punitive system but a reflection of the divine balance that governed all life under Saturn’s reign.⁶

The Golden Age was a time when the material and the spiritual were not yet divided. Gold, in its symbolic and literal form, permeated existence, representing not just wealth, but a state of spiritual and material perfection. Everything in this age was of a unified, incorruptible nature, reflecting the divine order that Saturn maintained. It was an age where the boundaries between gods and men, and even between man and nature, were blurred, as all life flowed in harmony with the cosmos.

But it was not to last.

In Greek mythology, Saturn finds his counterpart in Cronus, the youngest of the Titans. Cronus, much like Saturn, was a god of time and agriculture, wielding the sickle with which he famously castrated his father, Uranus, to seize power.

After Cronus was overthrown by his son Zeus, the world entered a period of decline. Under Zeus’s rule, the Silver Race was created- a less noble and more flawed generation of humanity. Unlike the Golden Race, the people of the Silver Age were unable to honour the gods properly and lived for a long time as children, remaining foolish and immature even as adults. Their failure to respect the divine order led to their ultimate downfall, as they brought about their own destruction.

Following the demise of the Silver Race, Zeus created the Bronze Race—a warlike and aggressive people fashioned from ash trees. The Bronze Race was strong and powerful, living by the sword and thriving on conflict. Their lives were characterized by violence and destruction, and they ultimately destroyed themselves through endless warfare.

In some accounts, a separate Heroic Race followed the Bronze Age. This race included the great heroes of Greek mythology, such as those who fought in the Trojan War. Though still mortal, the Heroic Race was marked by extraordinary feats of strength and bravery, earning them a place in the legends of ancient Greece.

Finally, the world entered the age of the Iron Race, which Hesiod identified as the race of humanity in his present time. The Iron Race is characterized by toil, misery, and hardship. Though they still possess the potential for good, the people of the Iron Age live in a world far removed from the harmony and ease of the Golden Age.

It is the Iron Age in which modern man lives. There is a lot of significance to this metal, and you will meet it again and again in alchemy, physics, depth psychology, and religion. Transmutation, the changing of one thing to another, is at the very heart of these disciplines and in all of them, it is iron that dictates whether the result is fission or fusion.

In the ancient world, Saturn was revered as a complex and multifaceted deity, embodying themes of time, kingship, and the inexorable cycles of creation and destruction. Known by various names and worshipped under different guises, Saturn's legacy stretches across cultures, weaving a rich tapestry of mythological and symbolic meanings.

photo John R.Clarke@Substack

In Roman mythology, Saturn was the god of agriculture, wealth, and time—a stern, elder figure who once ruled during the Golden Age, a period of peace and prosperity where the earth yielded its bounty without toil, and humans lived in harmony with the gods. This era, untouched by the hardships of later times, ended when Saturn was overthrown by his son, Jupiter, in a cosmic coup that symbolizes the inevitable passage of time and the cyclical nature of power.⁷

But the echoes of Saturn’s reign, and the decline from the Golden Age to the Iron Age, reverberate far beyond the borders of Rome and Greece. In the ancient Near East, Saturn’s characteristics can be seen in the god El, the chief deity of the Canaanite pantheon. El was the father of gods and men, a figure of supreme authority and wisdom who presided over the divine council. Much like Saturn, El was a patriarchal figure associated with creation, kingship, and the passage of time. El’s legacy would influence the development of other deities in the region, as his attributes were passed down through generations of gods⁸.

In Phoenician and Punic cultures, Saturn was worshipped as Baal Hammon, the chief deity of Carthage. Baal Hammon, like Saturn, was a god of fertility, agriculture, and time. Often depicted as a bearded, older man, Baal Hammon's connection to Saturn becomes evident in the way he was revered as a powerful, yet distant, ruler who oversaw the cycles of life and death. The Romans, recognizing the similarities between Baal Hammon and their own Saturn, often equated the two, further entwining their mythological identities.⁹

Even in Mesopotamia, the god Ninurta shares affinities with Saturn. Though primarily a god of agriculture, war, and hunting, Ninurta’s role as a divine warrior and protector of civilization echoes Saturn’s dual nature as both a nurturer and a harsh, unyielding force of time and fate.

The archetype of the dethroned, ailing, or exiled king, so central to Saturn's mythos, has echoed through the ages, resurfacing in various guises across the realms of alchemy, art, and literature. This emblem of the once-mighty ruler laid low by time, fate, or treachery has captured the imaginations of creators across centuries, weaving a rich tapestry of symbolic resonance.

In the works of Shakespeare, we find this Saturnian figure embodied in the characters of Prospero, the exiled sorcerer-king of "The Tempest," and King Lear, the aging monarch undone by his own folly and the machinations of his duplicitous daughters. Prospero's staff, a symbol of his magical power and authority, mirrors the sickle of Saturn, while Lear's descent into madness and despair echoes the fallen god's own diminishment.

Centuries later, J.R.R. Tolkien would draw upon this same archetypal well in crafting the character of Théoden, King of Rohan, in "The Lord of the Rings." Théoden, like Saturn, finds himself weakened and diminished, his kingdom crumbling under the sway of the treacherous wizard Saruman. It is only through the intervention of Gandalf, wielding his own staff of power, that Théoden is restored to his rightful vitality and kingship.

Across these varied depictions, common threads emerge: the motifs of madness, betrayal and the spectre of poisoned wine, a symbol of the treachery and corruption that so often lurk at the heart of the fallen king's story. This undercurrent runs as thick and dark as blood through the mythic and literary veins of the Saturn archetype, a reminder of the inevitable cycles of rise and fall, and the forces, both within and without, that can topple even the mightiest of rulers.

Yet when this mythical figure is summoned forth from the unconscious mind and given life in all these different characters, he often does not come alone. Often, in his shadow, is to be found a daughter. We see her again and again, often in familiar fairy tales as the Disney princess and in the bible as a cast down royal forced to be a slave. If you haven’t already, you can read more about this here:

We see the King and daughter duo in such well known tales as The Little Mermaid, Cinderella, and of course, Snow White.

Let us now follow the fallen King into the mysterious and thicketed forest of alchemy.

photo John R. Clarke@Substack

The King in Alchemy

Alchemy is noted for its deliberate obfuscation of information. There were two reasons for this, both of them good ones. The first was that the knowledge was considered to be so sacred that it was forbidden to speak of it to unworthy or people who could use it to harm. Also, the more it was spoken of in unworthy company, was known to dilute the power of the magic. In this we can see how language and reality were considered to be a symbiotic relationship. This echoes the idea found in Native American culture that one can speak things into existence. In the West we call it ‘tempting fate.’

The second reason, and a compelling one to those who wished to live, is that for many years, to openly practise alchemy was to be considered heretical and there was the very real chance of being put to death.

Alchemy, once practiced openly in medieval Europe and beyond, began to face significant suppression as religious and political authorities sought to control its influence. In the 14th to 17th centuries, alchemy became increasingly associated with dangerous heresy, fraud, and witchcraft. This led to its persecution and, at times, legal prohibition.

In 1404, King Henry IV of England passed the "Act Against Multipliers," specifically targeting alchemists attempting to transmute base metals into gold and silver. Authorities feared that such practices could destabilize the economy by undermining the value of currency. This law made it illegal to "multiply" precious metals through alchemical processes, reflecting the growing distrust of alchemists secretive work.

Religious authorities also condemned alchemy. During the Inquisition, alchemy was sometimes seen as occultism, linked to sorcery and witchcraft. The Catholic Church viewed alchemical practices that delved into hidden knowledge, particularly those involving the manipulation of natural elements, with suspicion. In some regions, alchemists were tried and punished under the same laws used to prosecute witches. The esoteric nature of alchemical texts and their secretive, symbolic language often led to accusations of heresy. Practitioners of alchemy could be imprisoned or executed, especially if their work was perceived as challenging the authority of the Church.

It is not surprising in the least that the Church oppressed alchemy, since the goal of alchemy is that of transmutation, the same goal as the church and nuclear physics. You can read more about this: here

Challenging the authority of the Church did not end well for alchemist and philosopher Giordano Bruno, who was executed by being burned to death in 1600. His beliefs included the study of opposites as an unshakeable and profound truth, and he claimed that the Holy Spirit was in fact the anima mundi, or soul of the world.

And he wouldn’t stop claiming it.

It is said that upon receiving his death sentence, Giordano Bruno replied ‘Perhaps you pronounce this sentence against me with greater fear than I receive it.’

Saturn, associated with cycles and renewals, is also present in the alchemical opus as a symbol of the opposites.

As the king in alchemy, Saturn receives many titles and epithets. His tale of betrayal, of being fallen, echoes throughout:

‘And although the king of the philosophers seems dead, yet he lives and cries out to us from the deep: He who shall deliver me from the waters and bring me back to dry land, him will I bless with riches everlasting. But although that cry is heard by many, yet none near a hand to be moved with compassion for the king and to seek him. For who, they say, shall plunge into the sea? Who will relieve another’s danger at the cost of his own? They stay idle at home and have no care for the king’s treasure nor for his safety’. ¹⁰

We can see how the tale of the Little Mermaid takes on another, deeper dimension as the king’s curse traps him beneath the sea.

‘The tomb in which our King is buried is called Saturn’¹¹.

A parable in De Sulphure describes an alchemist who, seeking the power of sulphur, wanders into the grove of Venus. He hears Saturn’s voice introducing himself as the governor of the prison. At that time most alchemists would have been familiar with the secret nature of Saturn as the ‘supreme tester¹²’.

In the alchemical tradition, the figure of the King holds a profound significance, embodying both the fallen and the exalted aspects of the human soul. Like many figures in alchemical thought, the King is a paradox—he must first experience death and dissolution before he can rise anew, transformed into the perfected, divine being. This process mirrors the very heart of alchemy, the quest for the philosopher’s stone, which represents both material and spiritual transmutation.

The King, often depicted in alchemical texts as a regal figure, begins his journey as a wounded or dying monarch, symbolizing the corruption of the material and spiritual self. His fall reflects the nigredo stage of alchemy, the phase of blackening, where all must decay and return to the base matter. The death of the King is not merely a narrative event but a critical alchemical process—the breaking down of the ego, the false self, or the “prima materia” (the first matter) that must be purified before enlightenment can be attained.

In the Splendor Solis, a well-known alchemical manuscript from the 16th century, we find vivid illustrations of the King’s death and eventual resurrection. The King is shown submerged in water, signifying his dissolution in the nigredo, the baptism of the soul that strips away its impurities. This image echoes the symbolic drowning and cleansing of the King, preparing him for the later stages of transformation. He must die to the world in order to be reborn into the divine light.

As the alchemical process progresses, the King undergoes a transmutation in the albedo stage, or the whitening. This stage represents purification and enlightenment, where the soul or substance is cleansed and made ready for the final phase. The King, now rejuvenated, is depicted in royal splendor, sometimes accompanied by the Queen, symbolizing the conjunction of opposites—the sacred marriage between the masculine and feminine, spirit and matter, consciousness and the unconscious. It is here that the alchemical marriage takes place, uniting the polarities of existence to produce the philosopher’s stone.

In alchemy, the King is not just an abstract symbol but a living archetype. He represents the royal self—the part of the individual that must be crowned with wisdom and illumination. His crown, often depicted in alchemical imagery, is the ultimate reward for those who undertake the Great Work. But before he can wear this crown, the King must pass through fire and darkness. He must endure death, decay, and dissolution, symbolized in the figure of Saturn, the planet that rules over time and the harvest of souls.

Saturn, in his dark, devouring aspect, mirrors the King’s necessary destruction. Just as Saturn devours his own children in myth, the King is consumed by the alchemical fire, reduced to ashes before he can rise. This is the role of the Sol Niger, the black sun that governs the nigredo phase. The King’s journey through death is reflected in the black sun, both symbols of the inescapable darkness that precedes enlightenment.

Finally, the King emerges into the rubedo, the stage of reddening, where the philosopher’s stone is achieved. He is no longer the fallen monarch but the Red King, representing the culmination of the alchemical process. He is the embodiment of regeneration, not just of matter, but of spirit. In this stage, the King has attained immortality, a symbol of the eternal union of body and soul, heaven and earth. His rebirth signals the completion of the Great Work, the transmutation of the self into its divine form.

The King’s death and resurrection are central to the alchemical journey. Just as lead must be transmuted into gold, the King must die in order to live again in his perfected form. His journey is our journey, a mirror of the soul’s descent into darkness and its eventual ascent into light.

Already we can discern how previously oblique remarks by alchemists can deepen in meaning once we begin to recognise the symbols. Take this answer the question on the nature of the philosopher’s stone-‘Why, it is the child of Saturn, need you know more?’ This sly, double-edged comment so characteristic of alchemists speaks to the veiled nature of the Great Work and its secrets. At its heart, the King’s transformation and the Sol Niger are inseparable from Saturn’s influence, the dark lord of time, death, and rebirth. In alchemical thought, Saturn represents the crucible through which all must pass—the father of both dissolution and regeneration.

It is in the nigredo, under the shadow of the Sol Niger, that this secret is revealed. The stone, the King, and the black sun all align under Saturn’s gaze, teaching us that creation comes through destruction, and that the rebirth of the King can only occur through the death and dissolution of what once was. This is why the stone exists outside of time—it carries within it the eternal echo of Saturn’s golden age.

The Sol Niger or Black Sun

The Sol Niger, or Black Sun, emerges from the darkest depths of alchemical philosophy, a symbol as foreboding as it is essential to the transformative process. It stands at the threshold of death and renewal, representing the nigredo, or blackening phase, in which everything must decay, dissolve, and confront the shadow before it can be transmuted into something purer, more refined. In this phase, the alchemist faces the deepest mystery of their work—the necessity of confronting darkness to reach the light.

The Sol Niger is not just a symbol of physical death, but the dissolution of the old self. It demands that we step into the void, the space where all that we know, all that we cling to, must disintegrate. Like Saturn, who devours his children in myth, the Black Sun is a devouring force. It consumes the ego, the impurities of the soul, and the material form, reducing all to its most basic elements. Only through this painful dissolution can transformation begin.

In alchemical texts, the Sol Niger is often depicted as an eclipsed sun or a blackened orb casting dark rays, a paradoxical image that conveys both absence and presence, a sun that both gives and withholds light. It marks the moment in the alchemical process where the prima materia, the base material, enters a state of chaos and confusion. It is here, in the darkness of the Sol Niger, that the true work begins. The alchemist, much like the mythic hero, must descend into this shadowy underworld, confront their own darkness, and allow the death of what once was.

This blackening stage is where all illusions must die. The Sol Niger exposes the false structures upon which the ego is built. It is the necessary destruction before renewal can occur, and it forces the alchemist to reckon with the shadow, those repressed, hidden aspects of the psyche that must be integrated if enlightenment is to be attained. The process is mirrored in the psychological alchemy of Carl Jung, who saw the nigredo as the confrontation with the shadow—the part of ourselves that we fear or deny. For Jung, as for the alchemists, the black sun was not a force to be feared, but a gateway to individuation, the path to wholeness.

The Black Sun’s ties to Saturn are unmistakable. Saturn, the ancient god of time and decay, governs this phase of alchemical death. He is the ruler of limits, endings, and boundaries, the slow-moving planet that brings everything to its inevitable close. In the nigredo, Saturn’s presence is felt as the weight of time and the harsh reality that all must perish. But within Saturn’s domain, there is also the seed of rebirth. For just as the Black Sun signals death, it also foreshadows the possibility of resurrection—the dawn that follows the darkest night.

The conjunction of opposites is central to alchemy¹³, and the Sol Niger embodies this principle. Darkness and light are not separate forces; they are intertwined, one giving rise to the other. The black sun carries within it the potential for new light, just as the alchemist’s confrontation with the shadow carries within it the possibility of spiritual transformation. In some alchemical images, rays of gold or white light are shown breaking through the blackness of the sun, symbolizing the first glimmers of the albedo, the whitening stage that follows the nigredo. This emergence of light represents the purification of the soul, the first step toward the final union of opposites in the rubedo, or reddening, phase.

In spiritual alchemy, the Sol Niger marks the moment of profound spiritual crisis—the dark night of the soul where all previous understanding crumbles. Yet, it is in this darkness that the greatest potential for transformation lies. The alchemist must pass through the nigredo, must witness the dissolving of the old world, to reach the next stage of the Great Work. In this way, the Black Sun is not an end but a beginning, a signal that something greater waits beyond the shadow.

The Sol Niger, like Saturn, teaches that there is no creation without destruction, no enlightenment without darkness. The alchemist’s journey through the shadow, through the black sun, is not to avoid death, but to embrace it as part of the cyclical nature of the cosmos. The Black Sun is both the symbol of the darkest phase and the harbinger of new light, a reminder that transformation always requires us to face the shadow before we can stand in the light.

photo John R. Clarke@Substack

Our journey to meet Saturn at the North Pole is a long and cold one, winding through the dense, dark woods of winter. We have already encountered Saturn in his fallen state, the King in decay, broken by time and awaiting transformation. But this is only one face of Saturn. Ahead, we will meet him in another guise—this time as the Pole Star, the original and best sun, the cosmic ruler from which all things descend.

Before we ascend to this vision of Saturn, it is crucial to understand the deeper spiritual laws that underlie this transformation. For in ancient belief, there was once a time when it was thought that all matter, all of creation, could be redeemed. This notion, rooted in early Christian theology, is known as apocatastasis, a belief particularly associated with the theologian Origen and his followers. It was the idea that the entire universe, even the most fallen aspects, could be restored to its original purity. The Council of Constantinople in 553, however, condemned Origen's teachings, shifting the cosmic goalposts of redemption. The possibility of universal salvation, once a guiding principle, was recast in narrower terms, and the grand vision of a universe where all matter could be redeemed faded from mainstream theology.

To understand Saturn in both his forms—the fallen King and the original sun—we must look beyond these cosmic roles and consider the larger metaphysical context in which they exist. The belief in universal redemption and the idea that all things could be restored mirrors the alchemical process itself, where base matter is transformed into gold, and the fallen King is resurrected. In the same way, Saturn as the Pole Star, as the primeval sun, is not just an alternative cosmological theory but an expression of these deeper, eternal laws—laws that suggest the universe, in its entirety, was once aligned with a greater order, and that it might one day return to that state.

As we move forward into the next section, where we will explore Saturn’s role as the original sun, it is vital to remember this ancient belief in the redeemability of all matter. It offers a deeper lens through which to view what might otherwise seem like a strange cosmological theory, showing that these myths, like alchemy itself, speak to the eternal cycles of fall and restoration, death and rebirth, that govern the cosmos and the soul alike.

In Part Two, we will delve deeper into the theory of Saturn as the original sun, tracing his celestial role and what it means for the collective unconscious. We will also examine the signs and symptoms that accompany the activation of the Saturnian archetype in individuals and societies alike. Finally, we will draw together the various threads of this archetypal narrative, including the black cube and Saturn hexagram, arriving at conclusions that reveal the profound transformation Saturn represents in both the personal and cosmic realms.

Stay tuned for Part Two as we continue to uncover the many faces of Saturn.

1. Ouspensky, P.D; A New Model of the Universe (1932). Ouspensky's exploration of cyclical time, hidden realities, and significant moments offers a philosophical backdrop that complements the symbolism of Saturn, associated with cycles and renewal.

2. Lack of meaning and spiritual ennui have been increasing rapidly in the last decades. This topic is discussed in relation to the rising levels of narcissism in Twenge, Jean, M. & Campbell, W. Keith, The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement’ (2009) Free Press

3. Schwartz-Salent, N. (1995) in Jung On Alchemy Routledge New York

4. Hall, Manly P. The Secret Teachings of All Ages: An Encyclopaedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy. The Philosophical Research Society, 1928.

5. Durston, Christopher. The Puritan and the Celebration of Christmas in Seventeenth-Century England. History Today, 1985.

6. Hesiod. (1991). Works and Days (R. Lattimore, Trans.). University of Michigan Press. (Original work published ca. 700 BCE)

7. Beard, Mary, John North, and Simon Price. Religions of Rome, Vol. 1: A History. Cambridge University Press, 1998.

8. Cross, Frank Moore. Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel. Harvard University Press, 1973.

9. Markoe, Glenn E. Phoenicians. University of California Press, 2000.

10. Jung, C.G (1963) Mysterium Coniunctionis Bollingen New York

11. ibid

12. ibid

13. Bruno, Giordano, De la causa, principio, et uno" ("On Cause, Principle, and Unity"), written in 1584.