Im a teen italian artist,so in case my writing is really bad you know why
i like drawing in both traditional and digital form, im not really consistent
I dont have a DNI list because i dont really care about that, but i dont like all that proshipping(or whatever you want to call it) thing and right wing stuff(i mean this is tumblr so who cares), i just ignore those topics🤷♂️🤷♂️
now my main interest are the moomins
(my favourite adaptations are the books, comics and Moominvalley 2019)
this could change but for now i mainly post about the moomins
Other interest of mine are
-farewell fiammetta(italian comic)
-dhmis
-la commedia dell’arte
But im also really interested in learning mythological/urban legends/tradizione of many cultures, but mostly alps italian ones(where im from)
Im not really active on tumblr, for me this place its mostly self indulgent reblogs and an archive of some of my art(mostly moomins)
Three different young trollkinds chilling underneath the shadow during hot summer day. Snusmumriken [Snufkin] attaching a white feather on one of his many hat designs (feather design from the 1984 theater), Mumintrollet chilling beside wearing Snusmumriken's hat with Lilla My sitting on the top like in the comic strips.
Snusmumriken’s old hat is one of the few things he’s very possessive about alongside his golden harmonica he inherited from his mother’s paternal aunt (from the short story Cedric).
Few of less-known designs of Snusmumriken. Later depiction, he often has visibly longer hair.
Snusmumriken temporarily left his hat in the dragon short story to reveal his biggest twist/secret: He was an emo kid all along! (Nature beings like trolls and näcken already very commonly having messy unkept hair to signal their closeness to nature in folklore which also is why many of Tove Jansson’s trolls like Toft has such hairstyle rather than just some cool edgy aesthetics)
I take the opportunity to post a post about Snusmumriken's hat and similar historical hats during the hat day in 1st August that I had always wanted to do. This day is also all girlfriends' day which I felt like I had too many options like my translation of Tove Jansson's 40s love song collection for Vivica Bandler, history/analysis of Toflan & Vifslan [F the English names!], analysis of Rent spel and Den stora resan and same-gender female romance in Tove Jansson's artworks. However, that's too many options so I decided to go for the easier post that was almost finished. Although there are plenty of hat days. Also, it was World Friendship Day in July 31, another friendship holiday... Only my artwork is friendship motivated despite originally intended to only feature Snusmumriken alone.
What Kind of Hat does Snusmumriken [Snufkin] Wear?
Snusmumriken’s hat is a pointy conical felt hat. It’s characterized by a tall pointy crown and broad brim. While just like rest of Snusmumriken, his design is very inconsistent even within the same book. In general, early hat design started out incredibly taller and pointier but gets shorter and rounder with few times resembles a Sou’wester hat.
People across the world, ethnicities and classes commonly wore pointy hats and felt hats, especially throughout the middle ages to the end of 1800s. Typical rural folk and travelers were often depicted with pointy conical felt hats which is often becoming a common visual signature for these people.
Those hats are very practical as both heat regulation to cool down and protection against sunlight, keep yourself warm during cold as well as keep yourself dry during rain. Yes I have tested such hats before and they were highly effective against rain (one hat I wore was almost as wide as myself!). That rain instance was when I briefly tested one old hat during auction which was allowed to do. Other instances was from exhibits allowing testing old clothing.
Like much like everything else about his design, Snusmumriken's hat has various practical and expressive functions. As he plays harmonica, it's often noted his hat covers his ears, likely for him to stay focused. He often pull his hat over his eyes for various reasons like protecting his eyes against sunlight, thinking (sometimes) or hide vulnerability like discomfort or even fear. Sometimes, his hat might cover his eyes for no specific reason other than just maybe happened to be like that at the moment without him intentionally pulling it down (just like many of such hats does).
Although his eyes are often half-covered by his hat by default which often make him unintentionally look tired, bored and grumpy however this is not unique to Snusmumriken as other characters who either wear something on their head (like Muminpappan and Rådd-djuret [Muddler]) or fringe (like Snorkfröken [Snorkmaiden] sometimes) often does this as well. In Muminserien (comic strips), certain angles reveals him having expressive large round eyes underneath his hat. Certain renditions, he has tired-looking, bland sharp triangular eyes (very similar to tsumire eyes) which many of Tove Jansson's characters have such as Tooticki, Susanna (from Den farliga resan 1977), various signatures of children, the girl from Sommarboken 1972 [Summer book] (rare signature depiction), Tove's design of Bilbo from Hobbit (looks like Snufkin-Link hybrid). This is very much like Tove Jansson's art style without having any emotional indication as they can look like that when being happy.
One of many early vagabond-like character designs that resembles Snusmumriken. This one even has a beard!
Gallery of Nordic Hats Similar to Snusmumriken's Hat
Förfadern! They found our 600-years old medieval ancestor’s hat! The ancestor of all Snusmumrikar [Snufkins] and Joxare [Joxters]! (Yes, these two are different kinds in the Swedish original revision by Tove Jansson herself that's heavily neglected in English) He got buried and/or died in the ditch! Source: Västerbottens museum in Umeå
Dalecarlian Snusmumrikar or Joxare recruited by King Gustav Vasa and prepared for bloody revenge against the evil bloodthirsty Danes in the 1520s! (They are actually Darlkarlar). Source: Nyköpingshus 2025
Yes, our Swedish king Gustav Vasa was a Snusmumrik! Or at least dressed like the native Snusmumrikar at Dalarna to convince them to beat the shit out of the Danes!
Birchbark hat! From one of our early ancestors from Lekvattnet in Värmland around the 1500s. Likely made by some forest Finns at a Finmmark. Source: Nordiska museet
Left: hat from late-1800s [Source], right: doll hat from early-1800s [Source]
Traditionally crafted tomte figure. Folkloric beings throughout Europe tends to either wear whatever the common rural folks wore (can symbolizing closeness to nature and rustic ruralness) or old-fashioned clothing (can symbolize either ancient and eccentricity) which includes pointy conical hats. Hobgoblins and witches are one of many examples.
Other Hats from All over the Globe
As mentioned before, there are plenty of brimmed tall hats all around the globe.
Hats from the Anglosphere
Man with a Hat painting by Adriaen Brouwer 1630s. Source: Wikipedia
These hats where incredibly common in the Angloshpere and elsewhere in Northwestern Europe. They had various designs and could be worn by both men and women. One common type had various names such as Capotain, Capatain, Copotain, Copintank, Sugarloaf or Steeple hat with one of the most known variant is called the American Pilgrim hat. The were fashionable throughout the 1600s. They looks rather similar to the North European hats above which I'm very unsure about their relation whatever these Nordic hats are a type of Capotain hats or just related. Although Capotain hats are rather restricted to Northwestern Europe and America during the 1600s while the Nordic hats existed since middle ages to 1800s. However, this might be wrong but I honestly can't tell whatever a hat from the Angloshpere is a type of Capotain or something else but I lump every Anglospheric hat here.
Guy Fawkes and his rebellious conspirator gang were also Snusmumrikar!
Some of us were buccaneer pirates! (I know that's Caribbean but don't have time separate the image) Apparently William Dampier was a Snusmumrik! Source: Recruiting for a Pirate Ship in 17th Century (1932) by Arthur David McCormick and William Dampier by Severino Baraldi
Hat from a Confederate soldier at Arkansas. They often wore ordinary local civilian hats. Source: Kansas Historical Society
Witch! She reminds me of McGonagall. No this is just the British noblewoman Mrs. Salesbury 1675.
Also, I know Wikipedia articles are like independent communities with different editors often not connected to each other. But this disproves the speculation that Witch Hats originate from Jewish hats despite traditional Jewish hats that Jews were mandatory to wear in medieval Central Europe (NOT England!) are very distinctly unique with rings and balls that don’t even look like witch hats. Also pointy hats were freaking everywhere at the time such as amongst British noble women like Mrs. Salesbury here which these witch hats resemble the most. It’s so goddamn ironic that the witch hat article that mainly blames witch hats on anti-semitism directs to pointy hat articles where the very first thing you see is Mrs. Salesbury’s portrait! Obviously, witch hats originate from 1700s England based on common fashion that was considered old-fashioned and almost only worn by old people at the time. This speculation that witch hats are anti-semitic in origin are from typical radical sociology “studies” obsessed with trying to find “oppression” in absolutely everything like normal mundane things for the grand spectacle, sounds interesting and aligns with their ideology over all else and builds their papers around it with intense tunnel vision/oversight, confirmation bias, cherry-picking and ignoring obvious contradictions like why the hell does an English noble woman like this wears an even more witch-like hat than these Jewish hats? How embarrassing.
This is dear sweet Mother Louse, a famous Alewife who ran an alehouse known as Louse Hall in Oxford during mid-1600s.
Other Hats
German Oktoberfest hats, very much based on medieval hats.
Mexican hat between the 18th to 20th century. Some of us were Maxicans! (Lost my sources)
Sombreros can be highly diverse in shape and design. Many have tall pointy crowns.
Portrait of the Emissary of Congo Dom Miguel de Castro 1643 by the Dutch painter Jasper Jeronimus Becx. Is one giant feather or a bunch of feathers?
Traditional Korean gat hat. [Source]
Humao hat from Tang dynasty
Is Snusmumriken's Hat Based on a Real Person's hat?
Family photo of Tove Jansson's maternal Swedish uncle Harald Hammarsten in comparison of Snusmumriken from Farlig midsommar 1954. Harald's daughter claims that Snusmumriken is based on her father. (Swedish)
Many men’s fashion during the time period such as Tove Jansson’s relatives might coincidentally look like Snusmumriken in the 40s due to wearing overcoats and felt hats (fedoras) with olive green being one of the most popular color for men (Tove Jansson noted various men wearing green hats) however I think this is very much a coincidence. Snusmumriken's hat is not a fedora but a much older hat design as mentioned above. Snusmumriken's green coloration is very obviously nature-motivated. I think it’s very unlikely that his specific visual design is based on one single person since his first design looks like a highly generic vagabond caricature with a very minimalistic face (and looks like a baffled wide-eyed Tomtenisse with barely a mouth). That makes it impossible to link his earliest appearance to a real person in by itself. Again, as shown before, Tove Jansson made various illustrations of vagabond-like men similar to Snusmumriken of various facial shapes. More about Snusmumriken's character design evolution in the future.
One single surreally written Norwegian biography "Møte med Tove Jansson" 1986 claims that Snusmumriken's hat reminded Tove Jansson of an old friend's "extremely old" hat she found "terrible" (the ONLY source from Tove Jansson herself that implies any connection with Snusmumriken to Atos Wirtanen which not even these biographies uses for their surface-level vibe-based interpretations that's still very much inaccurate despite crediting this book for everything else. Also, Atos wears a normal modern green fedora, not these actually old hats as seen in this post. Just like other public statement, Tove actively avoids mention Atos in public unlike others in her life except when mentioning the Ny tid's comic strips in the essay "Atos, min vän" however never made connection to Snusmumriken elsewhere.) however that source was like a really inconsistent hallucinating fever dream of a recollection rather than direct quotes from her, likely due to originally written down in another language. Such as claiming Tove wanted to switch hats with this "old friend", abrupt sentence about women can wear hats too, suddenly this "old friend" don't want the hat once Tove washes it so she wrote a song as memory of this old green hat which this passage abruptly ends with citing Snusmumrikens vårvisa from 1984 which was only 2 years old when this biography was written while ignoring this old green hat motive had always existed all over the books. Also as said, there were plenty of men wearing green hats like Atos at the time. (More of "Møte med Tove Jansson" 1986 and the weird Snusmumriken's hat passage in later posts, as well as various other issues with biographies).
Within the same passage, Tove claims Snusmumriken also remind her of her uncles Harald (which is the closest confirmation by Tove for Harald's daugher's claim that Snusmumriken is based of Harald) and Einar.
Although there's one later passage in the same biography that's consistent from other of Tove Jansson's interviews which is that there are only two characters being portraits of two real life people: Tooticki and Muminmamman, while most other characters are fragments of herself with Snusmumriken being closest, seemingly more so than Mumintrollet, as her absolute favorite character (which is a far more common creative progress of either being based on parts of the creator or pure imagination rather than each character must be one-to-one to another real life person). For characterization, Tove Jansson is the one person most similar to Snusmumriken above all and shared the most similar characteristics, very typical for an author's favorite. (Overview can be seen at my Valentine post).
