In Minoean Crete the double-edged axe was the symbolic tool of the mother goddess. Once considered to be the lightening flash of Zeus’s eyes, a thunderbolt fallen to the ground it came to mean many things. It was said to betoken the presence of a soul because it was shaped like a moth or butterfly which was the Greek symbol for the soul. It was called Labyrs and related to the labyrinth – the underground dwelling of the goddess. In order to pass through the labyrinth it was necessary to find a way to enter and then to make a full 360 degree turn, to turn completely around on oneself, and then to go back out the way one came in. The temple sweeper ‘Labys’ is credited with the maxim ‘Know Thyself’. I made his brush too from a heron wing.
(information from The Moon and the Virgin: Reflections on the Archetypal Feminine. New York: Harper and Row, 1980.ISBN 0-06-090793-2. Hard cover ISBN 0-06-011703-6. Also printed in the UK in 1980 and 1991 by The Women’s Press.)