Look At All The Cool Rocks I Found @sissyphos - Tumblr Blog

Burg Hochosterwitz, Austria 🇦🇹

Guardians of life: The indigenous women fighting oil exploitation in the Amazon

Felipe Jacome’s set of photos Amazon: Guardians of Life documents the struggles of indigenous women defending the Ecuadoran Amazon through portraits combined with the powerful written testimonies. The words across each photograph are a self-reflection of the lives of women, their culture, history and traditions, and especially about the reasons for fighting oil drilling on their ancestral lands. The color designs framing each portrait use the same natural dyes found in face paint to expand on the symbols and designs that reflect their personalities, courage and struggle. (via)

donuts-multifandom-hellhole

Something that I get chills about is the fact that the oldest story told made by the oldest civilization opens with "In those days, in those distant days, in those ancient nights."

This confirms that there is a civilization older than the Sumerians that we have yet to find

Some people get existential dread from this

Me? I think it's fucking awesome it shows just how much of this world we have yet to discover and that is just fascinating

sleepymccoy

@makaeru peer review cos this made me check when the Sumerians happened and I forget how recent history is for every other continent. 7000 - 8000 years ago just isn't that long when you're in Australia, and the amount of detailed history we have access to here is wonderful and should be recognised more internationally

Source (non Aboriginal)

And a quote I picked out from a longer interview with an Aboriginal local elder about the area where he touched on the history

Source (the rest of the interview is really interesting and all transcribed, have a look if you're curious)

chaotic-archaeologist

This is part of my Ancient Civilizations class that I teach, which does a whole week about Australia and the Torres Strait Islands because I was sick of never seeing them represented in USAmerican history contexts. With the help of @micewithknives and @acearchaeologist I've learned so many incredible things about Australia's past and it's been incredibly rewarding to share them with students.

aggressivelybicaptainamerica

My favorite fact about Aboriginal oral history is the fact that we pretty recently discovered that the Aboriginal myth of the 7 Sisters, an origin story for the Pleiades star cluster, accurately reflects a point TEN THOUSAND YEARS AGO when two stars in the constellation got close enough together to no longer be distinguishable by the naked eye.

The story? 6 sisters running from something that took their 7th sister.

jinkohhh

as a gilgar gunditj woman, i was not expecting to see my culture on my dash.

thank you for spreading our words and treating our culture with respect.

tinagodiva

Stirling Castle, Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Stirling Castle is one of the most important historic castles in Scotland. Built on a volcanic rock, it has a strategic location that controlled the main route between the Highlands and Lowlands.

The castle played a major role in the Wars of Scottish Independence. It changed hands many times between Scottish and English forces. Nearby, William Wallace won the famous Battle of Stirling Bridge.

In the 15th and 16th centuries, Stirling Castle became a royal residence. Mary, Queen of Scots was crowned there in 1543. Later, the castle was used as a military fortress and barracks.

Today, it is one of Scotland’s most visited landmarks, admired for its rich history, grand halls, and panoramic views.

tinagodiva

Burg Lauenstein, Germany 🇩🇪

Burg Lauenstein is a historic medieval castle in Germany, first mentioned in the 12th century. It was originally built as a fortress to protect the surrounding area and control important trade routes through the region. Over the centuries, the castle was expanded and used as a noble residence by local rulers. It witnessed many political and military changes during the Middle Ages. Today, Burg Lauenstein is a well-preserved cultural landmark, admired for its towers, stone walls, and rich regional history.

tinagodiva

Trostberg Castle, South Tyrol, Italy 🇮🇹

Trostburg Castle is a medieval castle in South Tyrol, Italy, dating back to the 12th century. It was one of the most important noble residences in the region and was owned for centuries by the Counts of Wolkenstein-Trostburg. The castle is well preserved today and is known for its historic architecture and cultural significance.

tinagodiva

Burg Eltz, Germany 🇩🇪

Burg Eltz is a famous medieval castle in Germany, built in the 12th century (around 1157). It has remained in the same family—the Eltz family—for over 850 years, which is very rare in Europe.

The castle is located in a forested valley and was never destroyed in wars, unlike many other castles. Because of this, it still preserves its original architecture, furniture, and treasures from the Middle Ages.

Today, Burg Eltz is one of the best-preserved castles in Germany and a popular tourist attraction.

caintooth

you have to love trans women more than you hate transmisogyny, you have to love jews more than you hate antisemitism, you have to love Black people more than you hate white supremacy, you have to love Indigenous people more than you hate colonialism, you have to love the disabled and mentally ill more than you hate ableism, you have to love. you have to love.

caintooth

you have to love the environment more than you hate the corporations, you have to love animals more than you hate industries, you have to love your neighbors- human, animal, plant, fungi- more than you hate the government.

hot-rangers-in-chains

Not a whump post but I’m gonna infodump for a moment about some research — specifically the castle that the imperial palace in For His Kingdom is based on! I used Malbork Castle in Poland for it, pictured below:

The main entrance would lead across the river (in my story, it is smaller and more of a moat), with the main castle keep being huge and impressive while much of the city would be across the moat where Cinn would be able to see it from his cage on the outer wall of the keep.

This palace is really cool, as it has a whole heating tunnels system to keep it warm rather than relying only on fireplaces! Interestingly, it was originally built for the Teutonic Order of the Crusades so it has a somewhat unusual layout but it was later a residence of Polish kings and is still the largest castle in Europe!

Here’s some great shots of the courtyard of the main keep, the equivalent of which is where Cinn would have been whipped:

Also note the wide space in the left of the second image at the top, as that is a key location for the next installment of the story, being where wagons/carriages/etc. would be prepared as well as being where much of the daily activity of the palace would occur.

Of course, the red brick isn’t quite the aesthetic I wanted, and that was taken from the imperial palace of the Hapsburgs (left) for the exterior and inspired by medieval cathedrals and the Munich Residenz (right) for the interior:

I needed to verify the layout for the next chapter since a lot of it takes place outside the handful of smaller parts of the castle I’ve been focusing in so this infodump is the result. I hope it’s enjoyable even if it’s not the usual for this page!

depsidase

sleepy-giraffe

Oh no it’s one of my hyperfixations.

So fun fact I am currently in school to learn how to build affordable housing. They don’t teach you how to murder strip malls so I must learn this on my own. Someday the two will fuse and I will be an angel of death for shopping centers. This is my calling.

There have been attempts to turn malls into affordable housing. Sadly retrofitting commercial properties into habitable living spaces is usually more expensive than just making a new building. All that big empty space with uniform climate control is cool and all but it’s not habitable living quarters. you know what it’s GREAT for????

HYPER-LOCAL AGRICULTURE BAYBEEEEEEE

Indoor farming got a bad rep recently because it couldn’t become profitable fast enough to satisfy the capitalists funding it. But these places have loads of height for more space-efficient vertical farms, and while plants won’t need the blasted AC of most shopping malls, they probably do appreciate a steady climate (something that’s getting harder to find outdoors).

“But wait,” you say, “the food court has all those fully outfitted kitchens. It would be a waste not to incorporate that into daily living.”

hello????????? Literal farm-to-table restaurants that grow their vegetables right across the hallway are you KIDDING ME??????????????? (better keep that shit cheap tho no gentrification on my watch)

“But wait wait wait,” you say again, “how can it be *local* farming when there’s no housing nearby? Also this isn’t about food we need fucking housing????”

I hear you, man, I hear you. But you know what is right around a shopping mall? Acres upon acres of the most depressing use of land in history: fucking dog shit crusty ass empty fucking parking lots.

The amount of space these bad boys take up is STAGGERING, and it’s often enough to fit an entire neighborhood. Just check out what this one architect in Maine did to replan the Portland mall (they won an award for it):

*everything on that map that’s in color is currently flat cement*

One mid-sized mall in Maine can fit an entire downtown area WITH GREEN SPACE in its parking lot, and *still have room for parking.*

So yeah, the housing in malls idea is cool thinking. Think bigger. WAY bigger.

Think of all the space strip malls and their parking lots take up. Imagine all that space becoming housing and small businesses and third spaces and NATURE.

These stores are dying fast. The real estate is cheap as fuck. It is extremely doable within the next decade. We just have to fucking do it.

isuggesteatingtherich

i have a suggestion

depsidase

love this.

anexperimentallife

Allowing an addict to eat might be the most holy thing my tax dollars have ever done.

castrolle

Someone fighting addiction needs access to food at the very fucking least. So many women with addiction are forced into prostitution just to feed themselves. Addiction is a disease. Any one of us can have our entire brain chemistry changed with hard drugs by no fault of our own. Without something like food stamps, it'll just kill them faster or put them in an even more dangerous situation