The pattern of the year is a fundamental symbol, the cross. The symbol of the cross is another universal key to the language of cosmic symbolism, a key to understand the symbolic references of primitive ornament.

Symbolic ornament is universal. Until relatively recently in Hindu society, for a woman to be seen without her jewelry was considered "un-dressed", "un-fit", "dis-orderly" : granted, to forbid a woman the freedom to appear without jewellery for such cosmological reasons, is repugnant.  This is not simply an instance of patriarchial chauvinism. Personal adornment can be symbolic, as suggested by the word, cosmetics, the art of adornment, deriving from the Greek root word for "order", cosmos. The wearing of jewellery by women in traditional Hindu society, then,  had  a cosmic significance, quite literally.