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Gold bracelet in form of serpent, found in Pompeii, worn on the upper arm

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Belá Krieger, design drawing for art nouveau jewelry, 1899. Paris. Via Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest. 

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The Only Jealousy of Emer

"... Cú Chulaind slept with Fand, then, and he stayed with her for a month. When he bade her farewell, she said to him ‘Where will we meet?’ They decided upon Ibor Cind Tráchta. This was told to Emer, and she prepared knives with which to kill Fand. Fifty women accompanied Emer to the place of the meeting. Cú Chulaind and Lóeg were playing fidchell and did not notice the advancing women, but Fand noticed, and she said to Lóeg ‘Look over at what I am seeing.’ ‘What is it?’ asked Lóeg, and he looked.

Fand then said ‘Lóeg, look behind you. Listening to you is a troop of clever, capable women, glittering sharp knives in their right hands and gold on their breasts. When warriors go to their battle chariots, a fair form will be seen: Emer daughter of Forgall in a new guise.’

‘Have no fear,’ replied Cú Chulaind, ‘for she will not come at all. Step up into my powerful chariot, with its sunny seat, and I will protect you from every woman in the four quarters of Ériu, for though the daughter of Forgall may boast to her companions about her mighty deeds, she is not likely to challenge me.’ He said to Emer, then, ‘I avoid you, woman, as every man avoids the one he loves. I will not strike your hard spear, held with trembling hand; neither do you threaten me with your thin, feeble knife and weak, restrained anger, for the strength of women is insufficient to demand my full power.’

‘Why, then, Cú Chulaind, have you dishonoured me before the women of the province and the women of Ériu and all people of rank?’ asked Emer. ‘It is under your protection I have come, under the great power of your guarantee; and though the pride of mighty conflicts makes you boastful, perhaps your attempt to leave me will fail, lad, however much you try.’

‘Emer, why will you not permit me to meet this woman?’ replied Cú Chulaind. ‘She is pure and modest, fair and clever and worthy of a king. A handsome sight she is on the waves of the great-tided sea, with her shapeliness and beauty and noble family, her embroidery and handiwork, her good sense and prudence and steadfastness, her abundance of horses and herds of cattle. Whatever you may promise, there is nothing under heaven her husband could desire that she would not do. Neither will you find a handsome, combat-scarred, battle-victorious champion to equal me.’

‘Perhaps this woman you have chosen is no better than I,’ answered Emer. ‘But what’s red is beautiful, what’s new is bright, what’s tall is fair, what’s familiar is stale. The unknown is honoured, the known is neglected -- until all is known. Lad, we lived together in harmony once, and we could do so again if only I still pleased you.’

Cú Chulaind grew melancholy at this, and he said ‘By my word, you do please me, and you will as long as you live.’ ‘Leave me, then,’ said Fand. ‘Better to leave me,’ sajd Emer. ‘No, I should be left,’ said Fand, ‘for it is I who was threatened just now.’ And she began to cry and grieve, for being abandoned was shameful to her; she went to her house, and the great love she bore Cú Chulaind troubled her, and she recited this poem:

I will continue my journey though I prefer my great adventure here; whoever might come, great his fame, I would prefer to remain with Cú Chulaind.

I would prefer to remain here -- that I grant willingly -- than to go, it may surprise you to learn, to the sun-house of Áed Abrat.

Emer, the man is yours, and may you enjoy him, good woman. What my hand cannot obtain I must still desire.

Many a man has sought me, both openly and in secret; yet I never went to meet them, for I was upright.

Wretched she who gives her love if he takes no notice of her; better to put such thoughts aside unless she is loved as she loves.

Fifty women came here, Emer of the yellow hair, to fall upon Fand -- a bad idea -- and kill her in her misery.

But I have three fifties of women, beautiful and unmarried, at home with me in my fort -- they would not desert me.

When Manandán learned that Fand was in danger from the women of Ulaid and that she was being forsaken by Cú Chulaind, he came west after her and stood before her, and no one but Fand could see him. When she perceived him, Fand felt deep regret and sadness, and she recited this poem:

See the warlike son of Ler on the plains of Éogan Indber: Manandán, lord of the world -- once I held him dear.

Then, I would have wepr, but my proud spirit does not love now -- love is a vain thing that goes about heedlessly and foolishly. When Manandán and I lived in the sun-house at Dún Indber, we bough thought it likely we would never separate.

When fair Manandán married me, I was a proper wife: he never won from me the odd game of fidchell.

When fair Manandán married me, I was a proper wife: a bracelet of gold he gave me, the price of making me blush.

Outside on the heath I had fifty beautiful women; I gave him fifty men in addition to the fifty women.

Across the ocean I see (and he who does not is a fool) the horseman of the foaming sea, he who does not follow the long ships.

Your going past us now none but the Síde might perceive; your keen sight magnifies the tiniest host, though it be far distant.

That keen sight might be useful to me, for the senses of women are foolish: the one whom I loved so completely has put me in danger here.

Farewell to you, dear Cú! I leave you with head held high. I wish that I were not going -- every rule is good until broken.

Time for me to set out, now -- there is someone who finds that difficult. My distress is great, O Lóeg, O son of Ríangabur.

I will go with my own husband, now, for he will not deny me. Lest you say I left in secret, look now, if you wish. ...”

From “The Wasting Sickness of Cú Chulaind, or the Only Jealousy of Emer”, the oldest version of which can be found in the Book of the Dun Cow, which was made in the 12th Century. A portion of the text has been dated through linguistic pointers to the 9th Century and another to the 11th, indicating that at least two sources had been known to the scribes.

Translation by Jeffrey Gantz. Penguin Classics’ Early Irish Myths and Sagas.

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The 'Lady of Cao' was a Moche ancestress or High Priestess. She had been placed under the floor of the temple of Cao Viejo (in El Brujo), in a rectangular chamber especially built for the reason. Scholars propose that this is not her first burial, and that her descendants must have placed her there to bolster the prestige of the site, or of their lineage. Whichever way it was, in life the Lady had a prominent role in the community as a ruler or religious officiant.

A great part of the body is covered in iconographically significant tattoos -- chthonian themes all -- the Spider, which weaves the Stair to the Underworld; the watery snake, and the crab, a fruit of the sea. Moche iconographical studies reveal the Lady Moon as the sole discernably female deity -- she governs the Sea, and the liminal spaces of Death and Birth, and is as a sorceress and healer, but is also represented as a disturber of the regular, "natural" order. Like many other gods, she takes blood sacrifice in pyramidal temples.

One of the myths that can be reconstructed, in rather a rudimentary measure, is the 'Rebellion of the Objects', where the Lady Moon proclaims herself Queen of Gods and men, and brings the weapons and weaving tools to life, that they attack their human masters. The bat, the crab, the shrimp, and a sort of supernatural feline appear to be her subjects, at least in this episode, and are represented sacrificing men for their lifesblood or their flesh. Other monsters she sends against the rival gods -- on one occasion, the Radiant God is taken to the Underworld, from which he eventually ascends on a stair of spidersilk. He restores order to the world by vanquishing the goddess in his golden chariot, driven by birds or birdmen.

The Lady of Cao's mummy bundle greatly exceeded the size of the person discovered within, exceptionally well preserved. Several layers of cloth and metal ornaments had been wrapped around the body. The face had been covered with a round gold plate, signifying 

The Lady of Cao is inferred to have died of childbirth complications between the ages of twenty and twenty five from the visible stretching of the skin of the abdomen and breasts.

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The mythology of a people is far more than a collection of pretty or terrifying fables to be retold in carefully bowdlerised form to our schoolchildren. It is the comment of the men of one particular age or civilisation on the mysteries of human existence and the human mind, their model for social behaviour, and their attempt to define in stories of gods and demons their perception of inner realities.

H. R. Ellis Davidson, Gods and Myths of Northern Europe (via tiamhaidh)

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'For details on completing form b7124 (autocannibalism), please read guidelines on form X987ii (victimless crime). Please note that chit k6578 (parricide) requires a signature from next-of-kin. Please use red ink only…'

Eliza Sherwood sometimes works in Hell’s bureaucracy department.  (via extoria)

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Calcite with Hematite inclusions - Leiping, Guiyang Co., Chenzhou Prefecture, Hunan Province, China

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190 “selfie scan”

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The god Horus stands on a boat, and spears a tiny hippopotamus -a manifestation of the god Seth. Relief at the Egyptian temple of Horus at Edfu, early 1st century BC.

Why is Seth depicted so small in this artwork?

A sequence of inscriptions and reliefs are shown at the temple of Horus at Edfu, which tell of the struggle between the forces of chaos (represented by the god Seth), and the forces of order (represented by the god Horus). 

Compared to the overpowering, commanding figure of Horus, this evil manifestation of Seth is shown on a minuscule scale. While this may seem strange from an artistic point of view, for the Egyptians, it was essential that evil was shown as bound to fail, and good, triumphant. Depicting evil powers was thought to be dangerous, and, as Pinch notes: ”reducing the power of the enemy by reducing his scale was a magical technique as well as an artistic convention.”

Recommended further reading: Geraldine Pinch’s Magic in Ancient Egypt (University of Texas Press, 1995). Photo taken by David Berkowitz.

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Large (Wikimedia)

Perhaps the symbolism in John William Waterhouse's 1874 Sleep and his Half-Brother Death is a little heavy-handed.

Even if one brother weren’t brightly illuminated, the other in ominous shadow, the poppies clutched in the hand of the nearest (and, honestly, the two poses) would suffice to indicate which brother Waterhouse meant to be which.

The two instruments on the table (probably meant to be two halves of an ancient Greek reed instrument called an aulos) reinforce the idea of brothers, alike but not, quite. And the fire in the background—which could as easily be smouldering as snuffed—speak to the duality the rest of the work suggests.

But I think Waterhouse ought to be forgiven. After all, the result is visually lovely—and he had reason enough for painting it.

Not only was it one of his earliest paintings shown, but by the time he painted it his two younger brothers had succumbed to tuberculosis.

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500 DELICIOUS FRIENDS!

We’re positively overcome. Five hundred followers! Here, a gift: 

A Tumblr of darkdrop coffee, for you.

(Click and sign in to claim your gift. Reblog to your heart’s content, there’s plenty for all of you - but please, don’t post this outside Tumblr. They won’t understand.)

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(via A Pigment Library That Launched American Art Conservation)

When the Harvard Art Museums reopen this Sunday after a six-year expansion project, historic pigments foundational to the field of art conservation in the United States will be on public view. A new display will showcase the Forbes Pigment Collection as part of the Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies.

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The Flower Garden, 1893

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There are accepted revolutions, revolutions which are called revolutions; there are refused revolutions, which are called riots.

Les Miserables Volume 5, Book 1, Chapter 20  (via shakespeareandpunk)

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King Alexandros I of Greece (1917–1920) died from blood poisoning after being bitten by his pet monkey