"Before the world was mechanised an industrialised, the metaphor that explained self, society and the cosmos was the image of the organism.

This is not surprising since most people were connected with the earth in their daily lives, being peasants and living a subsistence existence. The earth was seen as female. And with two faces: one, the passive, nurturing mother; the other, wild and uncontrollable.

Thus the earth, giver and supporter of life, was symbolised by woman, as was the image of nature as disorder, with her storms, droughts, and other natural disasters.

These images served as cultural restraints. The earth was seen to be alive, sensitive; it was considered unethical to do violence towards her. Who could conceive of killing a mother, or of digging into her body for gold, or mutilating her?

So Miners carried out rituals; gave offerings to the gods of the soil and the subterranean world, sexual abstinence and fasting were conducted and observed before violating what was considered to be the sacred earth..."

... Judith Plant

In almost all cultures across the world trees found a place of central importance, since they knew trees were the only ones who could make the food they ate, filter the air they breathed.

The Dogons in Africa used to take permission of the tree spirit in a ceremony before cutting it down. And once they cut it, they would leave it cut for 24 hours, until the spirit found a new home. They would then proceed to use the natural shapes and textures of the wood to make exquisite masks, doors or anything else they needed to make.

They thought the natural texture, shape and sometimes even the "imperfections", e.g, cracks, marks etc in the wood added to the spirit of the artifact, and hence they would use it as is, so there is minimal waste of the wood, which the tree so generously gave them.

Native Americans believe that every natural object has its spirit, or to speak more properly, its shade. The shade of the cottonwood, the greatest tree in the valley of the Upper Missouri, is supposed to possess an intelligence which, if properly approached, may help the Indians in certain undertakings. Formerly the Indians considered it wrong to fell one of these giants, and when large logs were needed they made use only of trees which had fallen of themselves. Till lately some of the more credulous old men declared that many of the misfortunes of their people were caused by this modern disregard for the rights of the living cottonwood.

The Iroquois believed that each species of tree, shrub, plant, and herb had its own spirit, and to these spirits it was their custom to return thanks.

The Wanika of Eastern Africa fancy that every tree, and especially every coco-nut tree, has its spirit; “the destruction of a cocoa-nut tree is regarded as equivalent to matricide, because that tree gives them life and nourishment, as a mother does her child.”

Siamese monks, believing that there are souls everywhere, and that to destroy anything whatever is forcibly to dispossess a soul,will not break a branch of a tree, “as they will not break the arm of an innocent person.”

Amongst the Celts the oak-worship of the Druids is familiar to every one, and their old word for sanctuary seems to be identical in origin and meaning with the Latin nemus, a grove or woodland glade, which still survives in the name of Nemi.

Sacred groves were common among the ancient Germans, and tree-worship is hardly extinct amongst their descendants at the present day. How serious that worship was in former times may be gathered from the ferocious penalty appointed by the old German laws for such as dared to peel the bark of a standing tree. The culprit’s navel was to be cut out and nailed to the part of the tree which he had peeled, and he was to be driven round and round the tree till all his guts were wound about its trunk. The intention of the punishment clearly was to replace the dead bark by a living substitute taken from the culprit; it was a life for a life, the life of a man for the life of a tree. Tree Worship