Celtic Pentagram - Celtic Gallery of Medallions

Celtic Pentagram

The Celtic Pentagram is here shown with the interlacing, serpentine designs that characterize Celtic art.

A pentagram or pentacle is a five-pointed star. Pentagrams were used symbolically in ancient Greece and Babylonia to seal off and keep away evil influences, including, it was believed, spoilage, which is why they were painted over doors and on food vessels. The Pentagram has magical associations, and many people who practice pagan faiths wear them. It’s original meaning was “health” or well-being, and it’s five points often associated with the five elements, or the five “points” of the human body. If you cut an apple through it’s core, it reveals a pentacle or pentagram. The apple was not only sacred to the Celts (it was believed the dead went to the blessed Apple Isles) and to their ancient Goddess, but was also associated with health (an apple a day keeps the doctor away).

Pentagram image from Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa's "Libri Tres de Occulta Philosophia" illustrating the golden symmetry of the human body. The signs on the perimeter are astrological.

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