The White Stag is a symbol that appears in both ancient and contemporary culture. Many might know of the White Stag that is Harry Potter’s Patronus, a magical apparition that a wizard or witch can summon to ward off evil. The White Stag also appears in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia when Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy are lured by a White Stag back to the door through which they originally entered Narnia. A White Stag also appears in the extended version of the film The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, which includes a scene in which the Dwarves come across a White Stag in the Mirkwood Forest as they try to cross the river. In the original Tolkien book there are three white stags in the same scene.
But there is an ancient history behind the White Stag, which is a creature of magic that appears in folktales and legends around the world.
White Stag. Photo Credit: Karel Bock. Image used under license from Shutterstock.com.
In the landscape we now know as the Arctic Circle, the indigenous Sami people have traditionally been reindeer herders, and this interdependence between people and reindeer is reflected in their folklore. The white reindeer is considered the most magical reindeer of all the reindeer. It was believed that if a human were to catch a white reindeer it would bring them luck, riches and eternal happiness. One Sami folktale tells about how the Sun is pulled in a sleigh around the world by a strong bear early in the year, making the Sun bright and powerful. But as the year progresses, the Sun replaces his bear with a Stag and then a reindeer cow, which explains why the Sun weakens until it vanishes during the winter months.
This Sami folktale is very similar to one from Siberia which explains the same folktale in terms of the constellations in the sky. Wintertime is when you can see the Big Dipper which is thought to be a herd of heavenly reindeer who steal the sun away, and that is why there is no sun for half a year in the arctic. Then as the year progresses and the summer comes, you can see the constellation Ursa Major which is in the shape of a bear, who hunts and kills the reindeer, which then begins the part of the year that has sunlight. The chasing of the stag is a hunt for the return of the sun, and its capture brings back summer. This is how the mythical Bear and Stag come to be associated with the winter solstice in these Northern regions of the world.
White Stag linocut by Diem Dangers.
The Celts also considered the White Stag to be a symbol of power, magic, and transformation. With its crown of antlers, the White Stag was thought to be a mythical beast pursued by the Knights of the Round Table, who served the legendary Celtic King Arthur. In 5th to 6th century Welsh language, the word “art” meant “bear”, so it has been proposed that “art + ur” (Arthur) means “man of the bear” or “bear-man”. In Arthurian folklore, King Arthur on many occasion attempts to capture a White Stag but it always eludes him, perhaps symbolizing the ideals of Camelot that could never be attained. So once again, it is the Bear hunting the White Stag which becomes the archetype of the hunter and the hunted.
It is interesting how in all three of these folktales the bear and White Stag are understood in opposition, as hunter and prey or associated with different seasons of the year. Yet in the course of a hunt, the hunter eventually eats the prey becoming one entity, and the seasons - though quite different from each other - are both necessary to complete a year and are both part of the same landscape. Perhaps this archetype of the hunter and prey reveals how people in vastly different cultures are contending with the same universal paradox: how can we be separate and different yet be one? How do we contend simultaneously with both divergent and convergent elements in the same context?
In Asia and Eurasia, the White Stag is also a prominent character in folklore and mythology that includes hunters as well.
In Taiwan, the Thao indigenous people of Sun Moon Lake, in Nantou, have a tale about a White Stag that explains how they came to live at this particular lake. In the folktale, the Thao Chief is unable to catch any prey for many days, but towards the end of his hunt he spots a magnificent White Stag. Although he tries desperately to capture it, it always evades him, luring him to a lake where it disappears. Having never been to this lake before, he discovers it full of fish. So he decides to relocate his entire village to the lake and in the end the Thao people never go hungry again.
In China, there is a legend about the Emperor of Wu of the Han dynasty who suffered a disease involving skin sores. In the folktale he is told that if he bathes in the fresh spring water found in the Taihang Mountains, it would heal him. Though the Taihang Mountains are thousands of miles deep and wide, filled with treacherous caverns and thick forests, he rides a loyal White Stag in search of this healing elixir. Finally in the misty highlands of what is now known as Pingshan County, Hebei, he finds the renowned mountain spring and bathes for a few days until his skin is healed. Today, at that legendary site, there is a shrine commemorating the sacred White Stag that the Emperor Wu rode.
Similarly, in Persia, there is a legend about a White Stag which is thought to be Scythian in origin. The nomadic Scythians played an important role on the Silk Road, a vast trade network connecting Europe and Asia, and perhaps this explains the similarity in the White Stag folklore that may have spread by way of the Silk Road around the world. In the Scythian version, there is a Prince who tries desperately to kill a White Stag but it always eludes him. Finally it leads him to a small lake where it jumps in and disappears.
In these myths from Asia the White Stag is hunted but not eaten, instead it provides a pathway leading to something of value to the hunter: a source of healing or the location of food in desperate times, a pathway to transformation for the better. In both Eastern and Western mythologies the White Stag is seen when a threshold is being crossed (such as the change in season), or it appears at a time of great distress as a source of hope.
In many instances the White Stag is sought after or hunted but it almost always remains out of reach, and is seen near lakeshores or bodies of water which is often thought of as a symbol of the unconscious, something similarly out of reach. White Stags are themselves quite rare.Scientifically speaking, their pale coloration is due to a recessive gene a condition known as leucism, that reduces the pigment in their hair and skin giving them a ghostly appearance. Genuine White Stags occur so rarely in the wild in the past fifty years there have only been a handful of sightings. For this reason it is no wonder that White Stags are imbued with so much magic and mystery and why so many folktales and legends include White Stags, and why in so many of these stories they evade capture.
Going back to the symbolic realm, the hunt itself as a ritual that takes place immediately before the hunter kills and eats the prey, the time between life and death, right before two opposites become one. The hunter is lured by the White Stag towards the threshold of what is yet unknown and is clearly a symbol of transition or transformation. In these folktales, whether it is the new season it ushers in, or the newly healed body, or the location of a new home or existing home, the White Stag leads the hunter towards what completes him. The White Stag can also symbolize that which is unattainable, the thing that is always out of reach. In so doing, the hunter also becomes complete because he witnesses and realizes his own limitations, he becomes conscious of what he was not aware of before, and must readjust to accommodate a more truthful self-image. All of these are folkloric ways of using a White Stag to tell the story of becoming whole.
Although the hunter and prey archetype is as old as humanity, and deep within our bones, the pursuit of wholeness is easy to forget because we live in an age that is dominated by polarization and divergent thinking. It is an era of violence, separation and opposition, while forgetting altogether about the interconnectedness, the inter-being and unifying qualities that are just as prevalent, yet less visible, less vocalized or acknowledged.
The archetype of the White Stag was inspiration for this watercolor painting. It includes a bear and a White Stag and the mists of the Taihang Mountains. . . Whether it is King Arthur and his White Stag, or the celestial bear and White Stag from Finland or Siberia, or the White Stag at the edge of Sun Moon Lake in Nantou, it lives under the one white moon of the Solstice that can be seen by all both East and West… hopefully a reminder of our collective consciousness and how we are all one under the sun.
References:
“Facts about Deer” [www.livescience.com/51154-deer-facts]
“Legends of Sacred White Stag: Emperor Hanwudi v.s. Takemimikazuchi-no-Mikoto, Fujiwara ancestor descent upon Mt Mikasa”. [www.japanesemythology.wordpress.com/legends-of-sacred-white-stag-emperor-hanwudi-vs-takemimikazuchi-no-mikoto-fujiwara-ancestor-descent-upon-mt-mikasa]
Legg, David., “Stags and Deer” [www.druidry.org/resources/stags-and-deer]
“Reindeer Myths and Legends” [www.lapland.fi/visit/meet-reindeer-ailo/reindeer-myths-legends]
Rhys, Dani., “Stag Symbolism - Celtic Symbol of Power” [www.symbolsage.com/stag-symbolism-meaning]
“The White Stag” (January 18, 2018) [www.islandfolklore.com/the-white-stag] An online repository of Taiwan’s folktales, history, legends, myths and traditions.
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