The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols and Sacred Objects Paperback – November 2, 1988

I've just started reading it and it's deep. I think this book is perfect for getting in tune with the divine Goddess. As well as learning the true pre-patriarchal meaning of certain symbols. If your curious about symbolism and have an open mind I say give it a read. The book came a day earlier than they said it would come which is great!

I didn't have too many dislikes, the pros outweighed the cons when getting this book. Now if you were expecting it to be like the woman's encyclopedia of myths and secrets deep you're not really going to get that but you are going to get direct meaninh of whatever subject your soul chooses to go on. I love how the author has it section out such as symbols of deity signs to the zodiac to nature to even supernatural phenomenon. To those that are into goddess worship or viewing different esoteric things you will surely love this book.

I love this book. There's so much I didn't know about women's history & symbolisms. Barbara Walker's work helped me understand the extent & the things some men will do for POWER. Barbara's work also helped me understand that there's no such thing as religions. What men call God & religion are mere mind-control institutions they fabricated with women's ancient history & ideologies which they then usurped & reversed to reflect their dominance over women & the world.Humans in this planet deserve to learn ALL histories, not just the history the Victor wants the people to know. I will be the first to recognize hat "WE HAVE BEEN DUPED". I never would've imagined that our ancient mothers & fathers venerated & worshipped the Earth Mother Goddess as the true LORD, GOD/ GODDESS, SAVIOR, etc. This explains why these institution are full of so many different types of criminals. These men are not who they say they are. The stories they tell us are not what they say they are either. They're just business men who will stop at nothing for CONTROL, MONEY & POWER.

This massive compilation of symbols that used to belong to women and the goddess is a book I keep on my desk, next to Birds of Michigan, and Wildflowers. This is a reference book writers and artists can use often in their work. Walker doesn't take up room with justification for interpretation - history is in the potsherd. Consider that the ubiquitous modern use of "god" and male sacred imagery claims preeminence in antiquity, although the masculine role in procreation wasn't known for thousands of years. Most symbols, and iconic depictions were feminine; representative of the power of nature that was observable, even before the written word. Like most of recorded history, the powers that took the power write the books and redrew the pictures. Walker changes that here. I would have liked to have discovered this book a few decades ago, but I'm glad it's here for me now.

One of my all-time favorite dictionaries. Nothing compares so far to this compendium of woman's history & symbolic lore. I can get lost in this book as one thing leads to another. I have learned a lot from it and it's my go-to in art making and tying things together (metaphorically, shall we say!).A note to the author/editors: One thing I would like to see changed is the back of the book with all of the terms- some of them have so many page numbers, I'd like to see their main article (if one exists for the word) emboldened so it's easier to find! Sometimes I go searching for the main article of something and have to turn to 20 other pages before I find it!

Private use

Barbara Walker's research so resonates with me that as soon as I saw that this book was published I jumped to buy it. I have shared information from this and her other books broadly. In fact, I bought copies of her first dictionary for my daughter and daughter-in-law to offer them more fuel for empowerment. I hope she keeps doing more and more research and writing more and more and I have an opportunity to buy her works.

The first edition cover is different then that of the picture on Amazon. The difference through me off at first as I thought the book I purchased was not as up to date as the one advertised that I thought I was purchasing. Keep this in mind as it could make some not give you the positive rating you may deserve which is why I gave a 4 instead of 5.