Dreams Across Continents and Centuries

The modern, western world has a distinct and developed view of dreams and their interpretations, the product of a long line of faith, research, and experience. Much of what we know about dreams and their connection to sleep we have gained from EEGs and laboratory studies; much of our psychological theories come from the work of Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, and others; our religions have also played a significant role in dreams and their interpretations. However, our view of the human’s ability to dream is only one facet in a vast array of theories that spans continents and centuries. Three such interpretations, taken from various geographies and eras, are those of the ancient Greeks, Australian Aborigine tribes, and the medieval English culture—specifically, the two opposing views expressed in The Nun’s Priest’s Tale, part of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. Each society had a unique relationship with dreams, though they are by no means the only such ideas. It is interesting to note, however, that the most similar views, those of the Greeks and English, are also closer in geography, while the most unique society, the Aborigines, had little contact with other civilizations until centuries after their way of life had been established.

It is necessary to first explain dreams as seen by the people of medieval England. Chaucer, through the dialogue between the cock named Chanticleer and his hen Pertelote, brilliantly summarized and gave examples of the two prevalent ideas of the time. The first, expressed by Chanticleer, was one that tied closely with the importance of Fate and Providence. By describing his own dream (in which he was attacked by a fox) and examples in which a person’s dream came true, he showed that many people of the day were superstitious in this respect and believed strongly in the power of their dreams, as well as the idea that dreams could tell the future. Dreams could also tell of events that God had willed to happen. Pertelote represented the opposite faction, which discounted dreams as being meaningless. Nightmares in particular were the result of an imbalance in the four humors of the body; these humors (choler, blood, phlegm, and melancholy) were body fluids which controlled personality and mood. While the predominance of one could create a specific temperament, the imbalance could be remedied by herbal medicines, which the hen proceeded to prescribe for the cock. Even in the middle ages, religion and science conflicted with each other.

Another interesting aspect of dreams in this time was their supposed relation to demons and evil spirits, due to the misinterpretation of the Bible by Saint Jerome in the fourth century. In it he mistakenly translated the forbidding of practicing “augury and witchcraft” as “. . . .observing dreams.” Dream interpretation was for pagans, and dreams could tempt men to do evil deeds. Incubi and succubi, male and female demons, respectively, who seduced people in their sleep, were widely feared and reviled. They were a way to explain, among other things, unwed pregnancies and erotic dreams, which at the time were considered sinful. Nuns and priests in particular, sworn to chastity, could absolve themselves by believing their dreams to be caused by demons. Thus dreams in the middle ages had widely differing interpretations and importance.

The civilization that had somewhat similar approaches to dreams, and was perhaps one source of medieval beliefs, was ancient Greece. Greek mythology and popular culture were ones in which dreams played a significant role. There was even a specific god assigned to guard dreams—Morpheus, the son of Hypnos, the god of sleep. Morpheus, whose name means “one who molds or shapes,” slept on a bed made of ebony, surrounded by a field of poppies. Perhaps even in ancient times humans identified the poppy flower as an opiate, having the power to induce dreaming. Famous legends of Greek mythology also dealt with dreams and their various powers, including the story of Ceyx and Alcyone, in which a wife learned in a dream that her husband had been lost at sea. Endymion, a shepherd with whom the goddess of the moon fell in love, was given immortality through sleep so that she could love him in his dreams forever. As with Chanticleer’s dream, some believed that dreams could deliver premonitions or knowledge which would otherwise be hidden in everyday life.

Dreams and medicine had an interesting connection as well, and the theory gathered many followers which eventually carried over into the Roman empire. The founder of this practice was Aesculapius, the son of Apollo, a skilled physician, and who eventually became a god. It is interesting to note that his sacred animal was the cock, as was Chaucer’s proponent of dreams. Among his teachings was the popular idea of dream incubation, a process which could either directly cure or lead to a cure for an ailing person. This person would travel to one of the many temples devoted to Aesculapius, and be received and prepared by its priests. That night they slept in the temple and had a dream relevant to solving their problem. Sometimes Aesculapius himself would appear as a human, dog, or snake, and touch the diseased person to heal them. In the morning they described it to one of the priests, who would help to interpret the dream and suggest the cure indicated in the dream. Dream incubation had many skeptics, but nevertheless it was very popular and an acceptable method of remedy. Dream interpretation was also a popular topic. One of the best books on the subject was written at this time by Artemidorus of Daldis, called Oneirocritica (The Interpretation of Dreams.) This book was not only a simple dictionary, but described methods of interpretation and how to apply dreams to predict the future.

Several Greek philosophers pondered the purpose, meaning, and importance of dreams. Early philosophers (called the pre-Socratics because they lived before Socrates) discounted of the meanings of dreams, saying instead that the dreamer existed in his own world not influenced by the gods or anyone else, and events in dreams were only fragments of leftover reality. Socrates and his followers, however, believed dreams to be important for several reasons. Plato, his student, wrote the most about dreams, mostly because he believed dreams could be used as a philosophical method to achieve understanding of oneself and the world. His thoughts were that dreams came as “images” from the gods, and by interpreting one’s dreams one could learn their divine will and please them accordingly. He also asserted that the dream world was its own reality, and could not be seen or dismissed as a simple extension of waking life. Lastly, he believed that the liver was the “dream organ,” acting according to whether one had an excess or lack of pleasure in one’s life. This biological source of dreams was vaguely like the influence of the four humors in medieval medicine. Similar to Freud’s ideas to come centuries later, Plato said that in dreams the ideas of reason and morality are dominated by the darker aspects of personality such as anger and lust. Good men could have bad dreams, just as celibate monks and nuns could have wicked dreams because an incubus or succubus seduced them.

Far from Greece and England, in both geography and culture, are the hundreds of tribes collectively known as Aboriginal Australians. Each group has their own specific belief system, but all share many common ideas, and these ideas are all dramatically different from those of the Western world. In this society, dreams play the central role in almost every aspect of life. Aborigines believe that before the physical world existed, there was a spirit world which they call the Dreamtime; however, rather than being simply a completed past, the Dreamtime continues on as a parallel reality to the one experienced during one’s life. The spirits of the ancestors live in the Dreamtime, and they created the world of the Aborigines—the landscapes, the physical features, the people themselves, and their customs and ways of life. The tribes, which still exist today, follow the rules the ancestors instructed them to obey. It is in this way that their laws and traditions are perpetuated. The places in which they live are also held as sacred, because they represent and possess the energy of the spirits of their ancestors and things created in the Dreamtime; tribes refuse to live in each other’s spaces because they do not wish to live among spirits that are not familiar to them. This adhesion to rules is an example of the Aborigines’ need for pattern and order; they “discover” patterns through tradition, songs, and veneration for heroic deeds and special events in the past. By living in patterns they can achieve harmony with themselves, with nature, and with the Dreamtime.

Each individual has their own personal connection to the Dreamtime as well, called their Dreaming. Everyone strives to make their own Dreaming acceptable according to the laws created by the ancestors. Their concepts are beyond simple life and death. When a person is born into the physical world, their spirit temporarily leaves the Dreamtime. During sleep they can revisit this other world through their Dreaming, interacting with other members of the tribe, both living and dead. When they die, they leave this world and their spirit returns to the Dreamtime to be immortal once again. Dreams to the Aborigines are very important, not only for their personal benefit, but also as social interaction. The morning after having an important dream, a person promptly shares this dream with others in the tribe in order to gain further understanding of it. Sharing the dream allows people with different “gifts” to give their opinions to help the person find its meaning. As in Greek culture, dreams are a way of problem-solving and insights can be gained this way, particularly through observing certain rituals. For example, a person may dream about a dead relative who comes to heal them if they are in pain. They may dream about a far away relative in distress and hurry to help them because the dream indicated that they were ill or in trouble.

Dreams are also a source of higher knowledge and insight, which is another reason why they are shared among each other. Returning to the Dreamtime is the Aborigines’ way of connecting with their purpose and place in life, establishing a link with the patterns which they strive to understand. This is similar to both medieval and Greek ideas, in that dreams can give insights or understanding of either divine will or the meaning of life. Another belief is that the dreamer leaves the body while sleeping and can travel to anywhere they desire, without the limitations of time and space. Such is the Dreamtime, and in many ways it is more real to the Aborigines than the world in which they currently live. This vital, continuing link between reality and dreams is certainly unique, and unlike anything found in European groups such as the Greeks or medieval English. Rather than being an extension of reality or the result of forces within the body, dreams are themselves a reality which is larger and more enduring than either the body or the waking world. They are not the product of the unconscious, but the realm in which all states of consciousness can mesh into one entity.

The phenomenon of dreams is a vast and mysterious subject, and one that each civilization throughout human history has attempted to explain. Dream theories have also evolved throughout history—as with many other aspects of culture, groups which were closer to each other seem to share more ideas than those which developed independently. Some groups, such as those in medieval England, saw dreams as works of demons or chemical imbalances in the body. Others, like the ancient Greeks, considered dreams to be divine or healing messages. Groups which we have so wrongly labelled as primitive, such as the Australian Aborigine tribes, consider dreams to be more real than reality, a view which is no better or worse than any other, but certainly quite different. Even today, science, religion, and psychology are unable to agree on the nature and true meaning of dreams. Whether they begin within us or surround us, dreams remain one of the most complex enigmas of the human mind, body, and soul.

References

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