Like tracking the mythology tag, but better

guaranteed free of: greek statuary art of vaguely mythical creatures that one symposium quote (you know the one)   be warned, mythology tackles themes traditionally not told to anyone small enough to be considered a child, and so will we     please ask questions and submit us posts   common tags: slavic norse greek egyptian chinese abrahamic celtic hinduism mexica general talk

[kentuckwitch]

“Most of the people who do this are Christian. But their approach to Christianity is very animist.”

[botanyshitposts]

“They believed that their ability to use plants and prayers to heal the sick was a gift from the Divine.“ 

this is a really cool ethnobotany thing like…..amazing

[historical-nonfiction]

A belief in witches and witchcraft were common in Europe through the early 1700s. Witch bottles–small containers filled with personal items, sealed, and buried–are one way this belief appears in the archaeological record. Where there are witch bottles, there were people who believed in witches. The buried bottle was supposed to absorb a spell, tormenting the witch who cast the spell, and preventing the spell from harming whoever buried the bottle. When witch bottles are found today they are almost always broken or empty. But in Greenwich, England, in 2004, workers found a rare, unopened example, a stoneware bellarmine jar. They heard rattling and splashing inside, so something was definitely inside.

[benito-cereno]

The Alphabet of Christmas, by Benito Cereno and Chuck Knigge, day 25 part 1: Y is for Yule Lads, who’re swiping your treats

The jólasveinarnir or Yule Lads are the thirteen gift-bringers of Iceland. Their mother is Grýla, a child-eating ogress from the lava fields of Dimmuborgir; their father is Leppalúði, Grýla’s third husband, whom married after she killed and ate the first two. Grýla spends the year listening for naughty children; at Christmas, she emerges and turns them into stew.

The Yule Lads are her thirteen sons, who emerge from the lava fields one at a time in the days leading up to Christmas until they are all present on the day itself, before leaving, again one by one, gone by Epiphany. They are Mxyzptlk-level pranksters and annoyances. Their names hint at what they do:

Stekkjastaur, or Sheep-Cote Clod, comes on December 12, leaves on Christmas. He drinks all the milk from your sheep’s teats until there is none left. His legs don’t bend at the knee, so just give him a good shove if you see him.

Giljagaur, or Gully Gawk, comes on December 13, leaves December 26. He hides in a gully until the milk maid isn’t looking, then sneaks in and skims all the cream from the milk.

Stúfur, or Stubby, comes on December 14, leaves on December 27. He uses his weird little fingers to scrape all the tasty burned bits out of the bottom of your pans.

Þvörusleikir, or Spoon-Licker, comes on December 15, leaves on December 28. He licks all your wooden spoons. This is all he eats, so he is rail thin.

Pottaskefill, or Pot-Scraper, comes on December 16, leaves on December 29. He scrapes out the goodies from the mixing bowls.

Askasleikir, or Bowl-Licker, comes on December 17, leaves on December 30. He licks the scraps out of a special lidded bowl called the askur.

Hurðaskellir, or Door-Slammer, comes on December 18, leaves on December 31. He slams your doors right as you’re about to drift off to sleep.

Skyrgámur, or Skyr-Gobbler, comes on December 19, leaves on January 1. He eats up all your skyr, which is a pretty delicious Icelandic yogurt.

Bjúgnakrækir, or Sausage-Swiper, comes on December 20, leaves on January 2. He swipes sausages left to smoke in the rafters.

Gluggagægir, or Window-Peeper, comes on December 21, leaves on January 3. He peers through your windows until you’re not paying attention and then sneaks in and steals your toys.

Gáttaþefur, or Doorway-Sniffer, comes on December 22, leaves on January 4. He sniffs out all your laufabrauð, which is a special fried bread shaped like a leaf.

Ketkrókur, or Meat-Hook, comes on December 23, leaves on January 5. Sticks his hook down your chimney to swipe the roast lamb you’re making for St Thorlák’s Day.

Kertasníkir, or Candle-Stealer, comes on December 24, leaves on January 6. He steals and eats your candles.

Although they were mere pranksters at first, these days they bring gifts to children who leave their shoes out on the window sill. Bad children get a potato. They also visit the National Museum in Reykjavik each year and typically change into Santa-like suits for Christmas.

The Yule Lads have appeared recently in comics such as Sleigher: The Heavy Metal Santa Claus and Klaus and the Witch of Winter.

Y is also for:

The Yule Cat, Grýla’s pet who scours the land looking to devour children who did not get new clothes for Christmas

The Yule Goat, first a foe, then a friend, now mostly a decoration and victim of arson

Previous letters here. 

[benito-cereno]

The Alphabet of Christmas, by Benito Cereno and Chuck Knigge, day 5: E is Esteru, the woodsman for fairies

L’Esteru is the gift-bringer from Cantabria in northern Spain. He is a woodcutter whose name might be derived from the word “estereo,” which means a cubic meter of wood, indicating how much he can carry on his back. He carves this wood into toys that he delivers to children on the back of his donkey, El Burru.

He is connected by some stories to the anjanas, a race of fairies in Cantabrian lore who also deliver gifts at Christmastime. They are known to bring gifts to children in need on Epiphany Eve, and they bring exceptionally large bundles of gifts every four years.

Perhaps more impressively, however, the anjanas also protect children by slaying a fierce race of Cantabrian cyclopes known as the Ojáncanos. These savage giants have a single weakness: one white hair among their shaggy red beards. If an anjana can fly deftly enough to grab this hair and yank it out, the giant will fall immediately dead.

Netflix has a somewhat average movie about Esteru that they call In the Land of Magic, but which is known almost everywhere else in English as Mule-Tide Christmas. The dub refers to Esteru as Santa, which is an obviously localization. But if kids can get over the fact that Santa is dressed like a Cantabrian woodsman for some reason, or that he has a donkey with a really grating voice instead of reindeer, I think they’ll probably still flip their shit the first time “Santa” turns into an owl.

E is also for:

Elves. They’re elves.

Previous letters here.

[rihardgansey]

slavic mythology ⇢  weather demons.

[theoldstone]

The Gwanggaeto Stele

Part 3 of 4 – The Inscriptions

The stele is covered in approximately 1800 ancient Chinese characters, each are about the size of a hand. The inscriptions cover 3 main topics: the founding of the Goguryeo Kingdom, the military conquests and battles of King Gwanggaeto, and a personal record of the custodians who took care of the King’s grave.

The foundation myth of the Goguryeo Kingdom was largely in tact, and the legend reads as follows:

Of old, when our first Ancestor King Ch'umo laid the foundations of our state, he came forth from Northern Buyeo as the son of the Celestial Emperor. His mother, the daughter of the Earl of the River, gave birth to him by cracking an egg and bringing her child forth from it. Endowed with heavenly virtue, King Ch'umo [accepted his mother’s command and] made an imperial tour to the south. His route went by the way of Puyo’s Great Omni River. Gazing over the ford, the king said, “I am Ch'umo, son of August Heaven and the daughter of the Earl of the River. Weave together the bulrushes for me so that the turtles will float to the surface.” And no sooner had he spoken than [the God of the River] wove the bullrushes so that the turtles floated to the surface, whereupon he crossed over the river. Upon the mountain-fort west of Cholbon in Piryu Valley established his capital, wherein his family would long enjoy the hereditary position. Accordingly, he [ritually] summoned the Yellow Dragon to come down and “meet the king.” The King was on the hill east of Cholbon, and the Yellow Dragon took him on its back and ascended to Heaven. He left a testamentary command to his heir apparent, King Yuryu, that he should conduct his government in accordance with the Way. Great King Churyu succeeded to rule and the throne was handed on, [eventually] to the seventeenth in succession, [who], having ascended the throne at twice-nine, was named King Yongnak.

[treasures-and-beauty]

Kartika. Crescent knife used in Vajrayana Buddhist ceremonies. Symbolizes severance of all material/ worldly bonds, said to destroy ignorance, cutting of conventional wisdom by the ultimate insight into emptiness, leads to enlightenment. Implement in the Tibetan Buddhist practice of Chöd, or ‘cutting through demons’. In Buddhist teachings, this tool is held in the right hand of Yamantaka, the conqueror of death. Used with kapala, symbolizing impermanence.                

[dwergas-deactivated20180817]

yes

[messoamerica]

Aztec sculpture of water deity Chalchiuhtlicue, Mexico AD 1400 - 1500

The finely carved figure belongs to a sizable group of kneeling females that display costume elements identifying them as water deities called Chalchiuhtlicue (“she of the jade skirt”) in Nahuatl, the language spoken by the Aztecs. In Aztec religion, the water goddess was the wife of the rain god Tlaloc, an ancient deity that had long been worshipped throughout Mesoamerica. Chalchiuhtlicue symbolized the purity and preciousness of spring, river, and lake water that was used to irrigate the fields. As a fertility goddess, she portrays the Aztec ideal of fertile young womanhood. Most typical of the water goddess costume is the distinctive headdress consisting of multiple thick bands, probably cotton, wound about the head and bordered above and below by rows of balls and two large tassels attached to the sides of the head. In back, the bands are twisted and tied in a prominent knot, the tasseled ends falling over her straight hair. Her clothing is that of a noble woman with a skirt and triangular shoulder cape bordered by a tasseled fringe. The water goddess was closely related to the Aztec corn goddess, Chicomecoatl, who is often also shown wearing this headdress, while holding ears of corn in her hands.

[saintmaneater]

THIS WEBSITE IS SAYING RA CRIES BEES CAN ANYONE CONFIRM

[studentandfox]

Wiki says:

“In Egyptian mythology, bees grew from the tears of the sun god Ra when they landed on the desert sand.”

Don’t let Ra cry around sand.

[saintmaneater]

oh my god

[reina-morada]

[saintmaneater]

[amadina-fasciata]

@thatlittleegyptologist confirmation????? 

[thatlittleegyptologist]

Are you ready for this?

From P.Derchain’s 1965 book “Le papyrus Salt 825 (BM 10051): rituel pour la conservation de la vie en Égypte” (Yes I had to read French for this):

Papyrus Salt 825 aka P.BM 10051

“The God Re wept and the tears from his eyes fell on the ground and turned into a Bee”

The bees from tears is basically a pun in Ancient Egyptian writing. Ra is also mythologised to have cried tears that turn into people, thus creating humanity. The Egyptians knew this so they did word puns:

(Pronounced beet)

(Pronounced reh-metch)

(Pronounced reh-mee-tch)

So ‘tears’ to them is a pun on the portmanteau of ‘bee’ and ‘people’ thus giving the joke that Ra cried bees.  

In conclusion:

(link goes to the British Museum’s page on one of the four pages of P.Salt 825 to have a picture of it. It’s not the exact page that talks about bees)

[emberkeelty]

#it’s the fucking sneeple meme#beeple (bee people)  -@carabas

[historical-nonfiction]

We fear the weather spirit of earth that we must fight against to wrest our food from land and sea. We fear Sila. We fear dearth and hunger in the cold snow huts. We fear Takanakapsaluk, the great woman down at the bottom of the sea, that rules over all the beasts of the sea. We fear the sickness that we meet with daily all around us; not death, but the suffering. We fear the evil spirits of life, those in the air, the sea, and the earth, that can help wicked shamans to harm their fellow man. We fear the souls of dead human beings and of the animals we have killed. Therefore it is that our fathers have inherited from their fathers all the old rules of life which are based on the experience and wisdom of generations. We do not know how, we cannot say why but we keep these rules in order that we may live untroubled. And so ignorant are we in spite of all our shamans, that we fear everything unfamiliar. We fear what we see about us, and we fear all the invisible things that are likewise about us, all that we have heard in our forefathers’ stories and myths. Therefore we have our customs, which are no the same as those of the white men, the white men who live in another land and have need of other ways.

Aua, from a discussion recorded by Knud Rasmussen.

Born around 1870 in today’s Greenland, the Igloolik shaman gave this summation of local Inuit religion to Danish explorer and anthropologist Rasmussen in 1921. Aua was converted to Christianity by missionaries around the time of Rasmussen’s visit; his description is often interpreted as Aua contrasting Igloolik religion with the Christian message of trust in God. Still, his account provides a perspective on Igloolik mythology at a time when it was being slowly subsumed by the introduction of Christianity.

In another narrative recorded by Rasmussen, Aua said he took his name from a type of “little spirit, a woman, that lives down by the seashore” and from whom Aua got his shamanic powers.

(via historical-nonfiction)

[inn-dagstjarna]

What did Old Norse sound like?

[godsinthemountains]

Okay so this dude with a doctorate?? Who specializes is Old Norse??? Just makes his instructional videos in the middle of the wilderness in the Midwest??????

[ultramarineblues]

@grettir-dun

[cervinesatyr-deactivated2021083]

This is great.

[nightbringer24]

… this is not a combination I ever imagined seeing… but now I want more cowboys speaking Old Norse.

[astronomifier]

oh yeah ive been subbed to this guy for a while hes great

[theladyragnell]

who is lady ragnell?

Called Dame Ragnelle in the source material (”The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle”), a fun fairy-tale-ish bit of Arthuriana and one I read in retold form as a kid and have loved ever since.

So King Arthur kills a deer while out hunting in a land with strong mystical connections, as one does when one is a legendary king. A knight appears, by the name of Sir Gromer, and objects to this life choice. He tells Arthur that in a year’s time, he has to return to the same spot with an answer to the following question:

What is it that women most want?

If Arthur doesn’t have an answer–the right one, mind you–Sir Gromer will cut his head off.

And Arthur, because he’s an honorable fellow and it never occurs to him to say “fuck that, peace out, I’m the king of the land and if you want my head you can come fetch me,” instead says “oh shit” and goes home, where he kind of broods about it.

Into this story walks Sir Gawain–he of The Green Knight fame, one of Arthur’s core knights in the legend (and Arthur’s nephew in many versions of the tales)–and he asks Arthur why he’s so sad.

Arthur tells him, and Gawain sensibly suggests traveling around asking various women what they desire most, which is at least slightly more useful than sitting around brooding, so they do it! The survey results, as one might imagine, are inconclusive when they compare notes, because even a millennium ago dudes didn’t seem to realize that women are distinct human beings with different desires and ambitions even when those dudes are a king and a knight who are legends for their nobility BUT WHATEVER.

Anyway, they’re fucked.

And when Arthur rides out into the woods to brood about this, into the story walks Dame Ragnelle, The Ugliest Lady Arthur Has Ever Seen. (In other versions of the tale, because there are non-Arthurian versions, she’s called The Loathly Lady.)

She tells him she has an answer to his riddle, but she’ll only give it to him if Sir Gawain consents to marry her.

Arthur is feeling pretty desperate, so he brings it up to Gawain, hating to ask it of him, but knowing Gawain is loyal and will do it. Gawain says yes, even when Arthur says “seriously, buddy, when I say The Ugliest I mean it,” so when he goes out to meet Sir Gromer and Ragnelle stops him on the way and says he’s in trouble unless he tells her Gawain is hers to marry. Arthur feels pretty shitty about it, but Gawain said yes, so he relays this answer, to Ragnelle, and she gives him an answer:

Choice. Women want the power to make choices about their own lives and selves.

It’s better than any other answer the survey returned, so Arthur relays it to Sir Gromer, who says “god damn it, my sister gave you that answer but it’s legit so I guess you keep your head THIS TIME” and lets him go free.

Arthur goes back to the palace, and there’s much rejoicing, but Arthur isn’t rejoicing too much, because now his nephew has to marry The Loathly Lady, who shows up and insists on the bargain being met.

Gawain, being a stand-up guy, marries her, and after their wedding feast, where Arthur’s whole court pretty much stares at her very rudely, takes her back to their chambers, where he vows to himself to treat her as if she were desirable, which … go you, buddy? I guess? And when he looks up at her after deciding that, suddenly he’s looking at the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen.

Ragnelle explains she was cursed to wear that form all the time until a good knight would marry her, but that now, for half the day, she can be beautiful. She puts the choice to him: would he have her beautiful at night, in their bed, and have the court make a mockery of their marriage by day? Or would he have her beautiful by day, when everyone could applaud him for breaking her curse, and ugly at night?

We all know the answer, of course, and so did Gawain: he told her, in the end, that it’s her life, her self, and she should be able to make that choice for herself, not him.

Which, of course, in the way of fairy tales, is what breaks the spell, so she can be her beautiful self all the time.

And they all lived as happily as anyone ever manages in Arthurian legend.

[mostlydeadlanguages]

A Prayer to Ba’al (KTU 1.119.26'-36')

This Ugaritic hymn to Ba’al, embedded within a ritual of animal sacrifice, resembles other ANE wartime prayers for divine favor, whether in the Bible or in Mesopotamian ritual.  Note the tidy poetic structure: it begins and ends by framing the situation, with two stanzas of promised gratitude as its center.

I’ve hesitated about posting this for a while, for two reasons.  First, I have a gut feeling that there might be something more encoded in it (cf. my footnotes).  Second, I spent time trying to make it singable to modern melodies; although I did end up writing a different version, set to “Let It Be” (”O Ba’al”), I worry that the result is silly rather than inspiring.  So this is the unmusical translation; let me know if anyone actually wants to see the song version!

When the mighty one attacks your gate, the warrior, your walls, you shall lift up your eyes to Ba’al.

O Ba’al: If you drive the mighty one from our gate, the warrior from our walls:

A bull, O Ba’al, we will consecrate; a vow, Ba’al, we will fulfill; a firstborn [1], Ba’al, we will consecrate; a flesh sacrifice, Ba’al, we will fulfill.

A feast, Ba’al, we will prepare; the sanctuary, Ba’al, we will ascend; the path of Ba’al(’s temple), we will walk.

Then Ba’al will listen to your prayer.

He will drive the mighty one from your gate, the warrior from your walls.

Keep reading

[perkwunos]

In Japan… the mountain is par excellence the space that stands in contrast to terrains in the plain. Symmetrical volcanic cones, thickly forested mountains, and rugged crags can everywhere be seen from the valleys and hollows, imposing their background of verticality upon the flat fields and dykes. But the distinction between yama, the mountain, and sato, the inhabited place, signals not so much a reciprocal exclusion, but rather, a season alternation and a spiritual complementarity. The gods shift regularly from one zone to another. In the spring, they descend from the mountains and become deities of the rice paddies. Then, in the autumn, they make the return journey to their “interior shrine” (okumiya), usually some topographical feature, their true home, where they are believed to have originated. A local deity (kami) thus proceeds from the mountain and, within the sacred arc, each year undertakes a journey by which it alternates between the sanctuary of the fields and the sanctuary of the mountains, at the center of a kind of itinerant domestic cult that blurs the boundary between what is within the village domain and what lies beyond it. As early as the twelfth century, the sacred dimension of the mountain solitudes had made them the preferred sites for Buddhist monastic communities, to such a degree that the character signifying “mountain” also served to designate monasteries. And although it may be true that in about the same period in the West, the brothers of the order of Saint Benedict had long since fled the world in order to establish themselves in isolated places, it was as much in order to clear the forest and exorcize its wildness by dint of human labor as the better to rise toward God through prayer. This was altogether different from the situation in Japan, where monastic life was lived in the mountains not so as to transform them but, by walking there and contemplating their sites, to experience a fusion with the sensible dimension of the landscape that constituted one of the guarantees of salvation.

A Japanese mountain is neither a space to conquer nor the seat of a disturbing otherness, so it is not really perceived as “wild,” although it may, paradoxically, become so when its vegetation is totally domesticated. In many regions of the archipelago the forests growing on primeval slopes were replaced, following World War II, by industrial plantations of native conifers, mainly Japanese cypresses and sugi cedars. For the inhabitants of the mountain villages, the old forest with its deciduous or glossy-leaved species had been a place where harmony and beauty were enhanced by the presence of deities (as well as by a store of resources that were of use to the domestic economy). However, the plantations of resinous trees that replaced it evoke nothing but disorder, sadness, and disorganization. Badly cared for, taking over fields and clearings, and having lost much of their economic value, these “black trees” growing in monotonous serried ranks are now beyond the social and technical control of those who planted them. The mountain is yama; the forest is yama; uninhabited places are yama. The same term is used in all three cases. But although it is wholly domesticated, this artificial mountain forest has become a moral and economic desert; in short, it is much more “wild” than the natural forest that it replaced.

Philippe Descola, Beyond Nature and Culture

[lamus-dworski]

Dziady / Zaduszki / Pominki – the Forefathers’ Eve

Dziady / Zaduszki / Pominki – remnants of an ancient Slavic feast celebrated in Poland to commemorate the dead. Dziady are usually translated as “Forefathers’ Eve” in the English langauge.…

[meradorm-archive-deactivated202]

lamus-dworski:

Compilation of my old articles about the rite of Dziady - Slavic rite dedicated to Forefathers. 

You’ll read there about: general informations what the Dziady rite is and when is it celebrated, what was the Slavic idea of the outerworld and how might it be compared to reincarnation, what kinds of elements got syncretized with the Christian celebrations of the All Souls Day, and how is it recreated by modern Rodnovers (Slavic Native Faith believers) in Poland.

https://lamusdworski.wordpress.com/2015/10/31/dziady/

[unauthorized-magic-deactivated2]

This thread is so good. 

[caledoniaseries]

THIS. ^^ 

As a folklorist, this kind of thing bothers the hell out of me. So much of what people think of as ancient is Victorian era or newer. Or just wildly inaccurate, really.