'Then will I call for the Cup that mirroreth the world,
And stand before God's presence.
In that Cup I will behold the seven climes...'
- Shah Nameh of Firdausi
The emblem found in the cover image of Sacred Web 52 is that of 'the world-revealing Cup' held in the hand of the primordial King of the Golden Age according to Indo-Iranian traditions, Jamshid or Yama Xsaeta, 'Yama the Brilliant'. About the King’s head flames the fiery nimbus of Xvarenah, the sacral solar aureole or irradiation of 'glory' which illuminates the brow of the Shah.
The eventual loss of this solar-igneous glory by King Jamshid in the distant past on account of hubris and pride is a classic motif of the decline and loss of the primordial man's original virtue at the close of the paradaisical Golden Age.
The 'seven-ring'd Cup' of Jamshid, Jaam-e-Jam جام جم, was inherited thereafter by the consecrated Shahs of Persia. In the Cup, into whose depths the monarch gazes, he beholds the mysteries of the microcosm and macrocosm, the ultimate stainless ground of the Divine Intellect.
The Cup of Jamshid is itself a symbol of the heart-space, the kardinal Centre also signified as the Grail. It is the sacral vessel which contains and bestows the immortality-conferring elixir, the Haoma/Soma or Amrita. Thus to gaze into the Cup is to contemplate the transcendent ground of the Self.
In the following excerpt from Firdausi’s Shah Nameh (p.166, trans. R. Levy, Teheran 1967) we have a description of the Emperor of Greater Iran, Kai Khosrow as he approaches the Cup of Jamshid in ceremonial splendour:
'To the World-Creator he made his orisons and invoked the universal Helper's aid and begged for justice against the evil Ahriman. Thence he came in majesty to his palace, where, placing the royal diadem on his head, he took the Cup in his hand and within it surveyed the seven climes. He uncovered the workings and Signs of high heaven, its quiddity, its quality and its quantity. Over the whole firmament he ranged within the Cup, from the Sign of the Fishes to that of the Ram, beholding Saturn and Jupiter, Mars and the Lion, Sun and Moon, Venus and Mercury. All things yet to be, the wonder-working Emperor beheld in the Cup'.
This mystery of vision within the Cup is an essential prerogative of the regal office, a privilege peculiar to the King who alone is consecrated to this sacred faculty, one possessed by the primordial King of the Golden Age in Eran-Vej, the supreme Centre.
Even in later traditions recounting legendary specula such as the Mirror of King Alexander or that of Prester John, this prerogative is inherently associated with Kingship and the regal function, a Divine Right sanctified by the Will of Heaven.
Nigel Jackson is an artist and illustrator with a long‑standing interest in traditional symbolism, sacred aesthetics and the spiritual worldview of the High Middle Ages. He writes about aspects of symbolism, esoterism and Tradition. He is formally filiated within the orthodox religious life of Catholic Christianity. A frequent contributor to Sacred Web, his art is featured on the covers of the journal.
