It's tale. told by an idiot. full of sound and fury.

[deathandmysticism]

Brothers of Mercy, Italy, ca. 1900

[deathandmysticism]

An American text-book of obstetrics, 1897

[deathandmysticism]

Curiosités médico-artistiques, 1907

[deathandmysticism]

Cesare Ripa, Iconologia, 1603

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

Seals relaxing in what the text refers to as a “Seal’s Dormitory” from Edmond Selous’s The bird watcher in the Shetlands (1905).

Full text here.

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

A diagram of two Asian monitor lizard engaged in combat (though to the untrained eye it may look like they’re hugging it out) from Revue suisse de zoologie t.69 (1962).

Full text available here.

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

Gerenuks demonstrating their ability to be long (left) and tall (right) from Richard Lydekker’s The game animals of Africa (1908).

Full text here.

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

Costume designs by Walter Schnackenberg. Top: Knight Bluebeard (Ritter Blaubart) (character from the opera of the same name). Middle: a Salamander. Bottom: “The Blue Flame.” Full text here.

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

A lion and unicorn playing chess from James McNeill Whistler's The portfolio : an artistic periodical (1880). From the text: "[...] in the scene on a papyrus in the British Museum of the lion and unicorn playing at chess, though [the lion] is obviously an emblem of royalty, the caricaturist has not aimed at representing majesty. This, however, is of the Roman period, and has probably but little of the Egyptian character."

Full text here.

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

Nordic musical instruments: hummel, key harp, langeleik, and kantele; from Nordiska museet Bilder af utställda föremål. Full text here.

[smithsonianlibrariesarchives]

"Lioness and cubs" from Richard Lydekker's A handbook to the carnivora (1896).

Full text here.

[vertigo1871]

Carlo Adolfo Schlatter (1873-1958), Gli spettri e Il fantasma, dalla serie "I Misteri", 1917

[vertigo1871]

Giovanni Guerrini, Il Centauro, 1912 c.

[enchantedbook]

Illustration for Edgar Allan Poe’s The Island of the Fay by Alberto Martini, (1905–1908)

[enchantedbook]

"Offering" by Ulla Thynell

[drakontomalloi]

Titian - The Death of Actaeon, detail. N.d., between 1559 and 1575

[drakontomalloi]

“Here then is the pattern in my carpet, the sense of the eternal mysteries, the eternal beauty hidden beneath the crust of common and commonplace things; hidden and yet burning and glowing continually if you care to look with purged eyes.”

— Arthur Machen, The London Adventure  (via drakontomalloi)