Kubla Khan

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.


Xanadu has become a metaphor for mysticism. It appears in works by Nabokov and Rushdie as an allusion to "Kubla Khan". "Kubla Khan" took it from the historical writings of Samuel Purchas who described the literal location of Xanadu. "In Xandu did Cublai Can build a stately Pallace, encompassing sixteen miles of plaine ground with a wall, wherein are fertile Meddowes, pleasant Springs, delightfull streames, and all sorts of beasts of chase and game, and in the middest thereof a sumpuous house of pleasure, which may be moved from place to place [sic].” It was this sentence that Coleridge claims to have last read before falling into an opium-induced comma. 


Alph can easily be read as the Greek letter alpha, which has been used to symbolized the beginning, and the first item in a series. Additionally, in Norse mythology we find King Alf. Alf was the suitor of Alfhild who was guarded by two dragons that decapitated unwary suitors and impaled their heads on poles. Alf defeated the dragons, but Alfhild, advised by her mother, fled from Alf dressed as a man, and became a warrior. Alf and his servant, Borgar, searched for and eventually found her in the company of a troop of female warriors. Alf defeated her in combat, knocking off her helmet, after which she became his wife. Elements of romance within this story include: women dressed as males, narrow escapes from death, the quest, the guarding of virginity, and a happy ending among other things.


The "sacred river" is most likely the river Okeanos, which in Greek myth was seen as the originator of all rivers and clouds. It was also considered to symbolize eternity because the celestial bodies rose and fell from its depths. There are nine rivers believed to have been born from Okeanos. One of them, the river Styx, was the boundary between the known world and Hades. The majority of the other rivers birthed by Okeanos were believed to bubble up from caverns within the depths of the sea. 


An alternative interpretation of the sacred river is the river Ganges, the holiest of India's rivers. Hindu tradition states that the 

Ganges, personified as mother and goddess, purified all she touched. The path of the Ganges is therefore a pilgrimage for the faithful. All along the way are the tirthas, the "fords" or "crossings," where Hindus come to bathe, symbolically renewing themselves in her saving waters; some spending their last days on her banks, there to die and "cross over" the river of birth and death to the ocean of life immortal. The m

other Ganges is the source of life-giving waters and wife and consort to the god Siva, destroyer of form and regenerator of life. In the myth of the Ganges, one finds a medium ground between the myth of the rivers Okeanos and Styx. The Ganges, for me, personifies the union of these two rivers whom I believe to be the two protagonists of this tale.

So twice five miles of fertile ground

With walls and towers were girdled round:

And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;

And here were forests ancient as the hills,

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!

A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing for her demon-lover!


Although it is difficult to pin this line on any one allusion, it is somewhat reminiscent of the story of Tobit taken from the Catholic Apocrypha. In this tale (another wonderful romance by the way and highly recommended) the hero, Tobit, hears of a woman who is haunted by a demon who keeps killing her husbands in the wedding chamber. He goes on a quest to find the girl, is given advice by an angel on how to kill the demon, succeeds, and beds the girl. 

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,

A mighty fountain momently was forced:

Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst

Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,

Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:

And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever

It flung up momently the sacred river.

Five miles meandering with a mazy motion

Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,

Then reached the caverns measureless to man,

And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far

Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The war referred to here is likely the war between Ethiopia (once Abyssinia) and Adal described further down.

The shadow of the dome of pleasure

Floated midway on the waves;

Where was heard the mingled measure

From the fountain and the caves.

It was a miracle of rare device,

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer

The Graeco-Roman dulcimer (sweet song) derives from the Latin dulcis (sweet) and the Greek melos (song)

In a vision once I saw:

It was an Abyssinian maid,


History of Abyssinia (Ethiopia):

About 960 BCE princess Yodit ("Gudit", a play on Yodit meaning evil), conspired to murder all the members of the royal family and establish herself as monarch. During the execution of the royals, an infant heir of the Axumite monarch was carted off by some faithful adherents, and conveyed to Shewa where his authority was acknowledged, while Yodit reigned for forty years over the rest of the kingdom, and transmitted the crown to her descendants. 

Between 1528 and 1540 armies of Muslims, entered Ethiopia from the low country to the south-east, and overran the kingdom, obliging the emperor to take refuge in the mountain fastnesses. In this extremity recourse was again had to the Portuguese. A force of 400 musketeers marched into the interior, and being joined by native troops were at first successful against the enemy; but they were subsequently defeated (1542)

And on her dulcimer she played,

Singing of Mount Abora.

Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight 'twould win me

That with music loud and long

I would build that dome in air,


This reflects the idea of a poem by Wallace Stevens, The Idea of Order at Key West which says:

She was the single artificer of the world

In which she sang. And when she sang, the sea,   

Whatever self it had, became the self

That was her song, for she was the maker. (lns 37-40)

In these lines we see the idea that myth is higher and more real than reality itself. It is the world of romance that gives form to that which was already in existence but not yet living. I am also reminded of the opening lines of Genesis in which God spoke the world into being. Yet the world had already been - it was void and formless yes, but it existed. However, it was not until the spoken word, the story, entered the picture that the world had any form or purpose. It is story that creates reality. 

That sunny dome! those caves of ice!

And all who heard should see them there,

And all should cry, Beware! Beware!

His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

Weave a circle round him thrice,

"Cast the circle thrice about, to keep the evil spirits out." –Wiccan Rede, part of how to caste a circle and begin your magik work

And close your eyes with holy dread,

For he on honey-dew hath fed

Greek myth: honey drips from the Manna–ash, with which the ash tree nymphs, nursed the infant god Zeus on the island of Crete. 

The branches of the original Ash tree are believed to extend into the heavens.  Likewise, its three roots extend into Urðarbrunnr in the heavens, the spring Hvergelmir, and the well Mímisbrunnr.

And drunk the milk of Paradise.