As we shall meet with Melusina several times more in the course of our interpretation, we must examine more closely the nature of this fabulous creature, and in particular the role she plays in Paracelsus:
A WATER-NYMPH WITH THE
TAIL OF A FISH OR SNAKE
As we know, Melusina belongs to the realm of the Aquaster, and is a water-nymph with the tail of a fish or snake. In the original old French legend she appears as “mère Lusine,” the ancestress of the counts of Lusignan. When her husband once surprised her in her fish-tail, which she had to wear only on Saturdays, her secret was out and she was forced to disappear again into the watery realm. She reappeared only from time to time, as a presage of disaster
CW13 ¶ 179CATEGORY OF NYMPHS AND SIRENS
IN THE WATERY REALM
Melusina comes into the same category as the nymphs and sirens who dwell in the “Nymphidida,” the watery realm. In the treatise “De sanguine,” the nymph is specified as a Schröttli, `nightmare.' Melusines, on the other hand, dwell in the blood. Paracelsus tells us in “De pygmaeis” that Melusina was originally a nymph who was seduced by Beelzebub into practising witchcraft. She was descended from the whale in whose belly the prophet Jonah beheld great mysteries. This derivation is very important: the birthplace of Melusina is the womb of the mysteries, obviously what we today would call the unconscious
CW13 ¶ 180MELUSINES HAVE NO GENITALS,
HENCE PARADISAL BEINGS
Melusines have no genitals, a fact that characterizes them as paradisal beings, since Adam and Eve in paradise had no genitals either. Moreover paradise was then beneath the water “and still is.” When the devil glided into the tree of paradise the tree was “saddened,” and Eve was seduced by the “infernal basilisk.” Adam and Eve “fell for” the serpent and became “monstrous,” that is, as a result of their slip-up with the snake they acquired genitals. But the Melusines remained in the paradisal state as water creatures and went on living in the human blood. Since blood is a primitive symbol for the soul, Melusina can be interpreted as a spirit, or at any rate as some kind of psychic phenomenon
CW13 ¶ 180MELUSINA AS A VISION
APPEARING IN THE MIND
Gerard Dorn confirms this in his commentary on De vita longa, where he says that Melusina is a “vision appearing in the mind.” For anyone familiar with the subliminal processes of psychic transformation, Melusina is clearly an anima figure. She appears as a variant of the mercurial serpent, which was sometimes represented in the form of a snake-woman by way of expressing the monstrous, double nature of Mercurius. The redemption of this monstrosity was depicted as the assumption and coronation of the Virgin Mary
CW13 ¶ 180MELUSINA'S LONGING FOR A SOUL
AND FOR REDEMPTION
It is not my intention to enter more closely into the relations between the Paracelsan Melusines and the mercurial serpent. I only wish to point out the alchemical prototypes that may have had an influence on Paracelsus, and to suggest that the longing of Melusina for a soul and for redemption has a parallel in that kingly substance which is hidden in the sea and cries out for deliverance. Of this filius regius Michael Maier says: “He lives and calls from the depths: Who shall deliver me from the waters and lead me to dry land? Even though this cry be heard of many, yet none takes it upon himself, moved by pity, to seek the king. For who, they say, will plunge into the waters? Who will imperil his life by taking away the peril of another? Only a few believe his lament, and think rather that they hear the crashing and roaring of Scylla and Charybdis. Therefore they remain sitting indolently at home, and give no thought to the kingly treasure, nor to their own salvation” ( Symbola aureae mensae, p. 380 )
CW13 ¶ 181MELUSINA AS A WATER-NIXIE
Melusina, being a water-nixie, is closely connected with Morgana, the “sea-born,” whose classical counterpart is Aphrodite, the “foam-born.” Union with the feminine personification of the unconscious is, as we have seen, a well-nigh eschatological experience, a reflection of which is to be found in the Apocalyptic Marriage of the Lamb, the Christian form of the hierosgamos
CW13 ¶ 225