The Museum of Witchcraft and Paganism

A digital museum for the occult

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Welcome!

The Museum of Witchcraft and Paganism's Mission Statement: To provide community, resources for worship, and historical context to contemporary pagans and witches.

My name is Hermes, and I am your museum director. I am a history student who has been focusing my studies on historical witchcraft and paganism for the last year and a half. My mission is to combat misinformation in these communities in fun and engaging ways.

I hope to bring this museum into the physical world someday, as many online occult spaces do. You can read more about my goals for it here and here.

This page is not a temple. I am not a religious authority. I am a practicing pagan and witch, but I do not claim to be able to speak for the gods.

Featured tags:

"Artist talk" for information on featured artists, pantheons, and cultures

"Ancient art" for pre-Renaissance art

"Premodern art" for the Renaissance to the 19th century art

"Modern art" for 19th and 20th century art

"Contemporary art" for 21th century art

"Library" for books, texts, and other resources

"Games" for educational games: digital and printable

“Goals” for what I aspire the physical museum to be

My personal pagan/witchy blog: @god-blog

The Re-Discovery of Witches:

Donate to Celebrate Modern Witchcraft: Savannah Art Exhibit, organized by Hermes Astle

ART EXHIBITION ON WITCHES The Re-Discovery of Witches, an art exhib… Hermes Astle needs your support for Celebrate Modern Witchcraft: Sa

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Origins of Valentine's Day

Who was Saint Valentine?

There are actually three Saint Valentines: Valentine of Rome, Valentine of Terni, and Valentine of Rhaetia. The most famous, Valentine of Terni, is where we get most of our modern ideas of Valentine's Day.

Valentine of Terni lived in the Roman Empire in the early to mid 200s. At this point, it had been a hundred years since Christianity started to gain popularity but would still be another hundred years before it was legalized. Emperor Claudius II the Gothic didn't like that Christian men were using their marital status to not serve in the army and when he found out that Valentine was officiating Christian marriages, he had Valentine arrested.

While in jail, the jailer's blind daughter, Julia, and Valentine started a romantic relationship. Valentine ultimately preformed a miracle and cured her blindness. On February 14th, when Emperor Claudius found out, he had Valentine beheaded. But before Valentine went to the block, he gave Julia a note that said, "From your Valentine."

Valentine was canonized in 496 AD by Pope Galasius. He was made the patron saint of lovers due to his commitment to officiating marriages and his relationship with Julia.

How did modern Valentine's Day start?

Around 1360-1370 in England, it was widely believed that birds mated on February 14th. In association with this, lovers would give each other gifts and love notes on that day. It was at this time that stories about Saint Valentine started circulating, including the story about his love note to Julia. Valentine's Day was a very popular subject and was written extensively about by Otto III de Grandson, Charles I of Orléans, and Geoffrey Chaucer, the author of The Canterbury Tales. It was through these medieval practices that we got a lot of our modern traditions like giving valentines cards, calling lovers "our valentines," and giving gifts.

Skull of Saint Valentine, Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Further reading:

Church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin - Wikipedia

The Rome church where you can venerate St. Valentine’s skull – Catholic Mass Online Search

Valentine's Day - Wikipedia

Who Was Saint Valentine? Life and Legacy of the Patron of Love

Valentine of Terni - Wikipedia

Saint Valentine - Wikipedia

[thememedaddy]

[kat2107]

Let me tell you a story.

I am an archeologist. I specialize in a somewhat obscure but by no means boring or meaningless Neolithic culture in Germany.

It has a Wikipedia page. A well curated, surprisingly extensive Wiki page that encapsulates all the important information about the culture, including literature references for further research.

One day, we asked Chat GPT about this culture. W were curious which details it would get wrong.

ALL OF THEM, except for the fact that it's a culture in present day Germany.

It didn't even get the chronological time frame wrong and called it a celtic culture.

When we told it it's wrong, it came at us with made up literature sources. Literally made up. It took two well known German archeologist who weren't even active at the same time, added a year - both were already dead - and sold that as source.

And it LITERALLY would only have had to quote Wikipedia to get everything right.

THAT is how unbelievably shitty and wrong all those AIs are.

They are making shit up. They are not sourcing information, they're just slapping words together by their most like relative occurance.

Do not trust ChatGPT or any other so-called AI ever.

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Happy Samhain!

I have a terrific announcement! In 2026, The Museum of Witchcraft and Paganism will be hosting our first in-person exhibition! It's called The Re-Discovery of Witches, named after the 1647 pamphlet by "witchfinder general" Matthew Hopkins, and it focuses on the modern reclaiming of the identity "witch."

Featuring five contemporary artists from Savannah, Georgia who identify as practicing witches, it will include works in fibers, ceramics, painting, metal work, woodblock printing, and broom-making. This exhibition explores the identity of modern witches juggling both the modern commodification of the witch and its heavy historical baggage.  

This is where you come in! Unfortunately, we are still struggling to come up with the funds to rent the gallery space and host a small reception. We have started a GoFundMe (link in my pinned post) and any donations, no matter how small, will be a huge help! Thank you all so much and blessed be!

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Donate to Celebrate Modern Witchcraft: Savannah Art Exhibit, organized by Hermes Astle

ART EXHIBITION ON WITCHES The Re-Discovery of Witches, an art exhib… Hermes Astle needs your support for Celebrate Modern Witchcraft: Sa

Thank you so much to everyone who's donated! It's been less than three weeks and we're already 25% of the way to our final goal! Let's keep the momentum going!

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Bringing this back for the new year!

Here's a breakdown of where the money will go if you're unsure:

Gallery:

$250--gallery deposit ($250/$250 raised)

$400--gallery rent ($91/$400 raised)

Reception:

$150--food ($0/$150 raised)

$240--wine ($0/$240 raised)

$50--cups, plates, utensils ($0/$50 raised)

$50--firewood ($0/$50 raised)

Other:

$60--just-in-case funds ($0/$60 raised)

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Happy Samhain!

I have a terrific announcement! In 2026, The Museum of Witchcraft and Paganism will be hosting our first in-person exhibition! It's called The Re-Discovery of Witches, named after the 1647 pamphlet by "witchfinder general" Matthew Hopkins, and it focuses on the modern reclaiming of the identity "witch."

Featuring five contemporary artists from Savannah, Georgia who identify as practicing witches, it will include works in fibers, ceramics, painting, metal work, woodblock printing, and broom-making. This exhibition explores the identity of modern witches juggling both the modern commodification of the witch and its heavy historical baggage.  

This is where you come in! Unfortunately, we are still struggling to come up with the funds to rent the gallery space and host a small reception. We have started a GoFundMe (link in my pinned post) and any donations, no matter how small, will be a huge help! Thank you all so much and blessed be!

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Donate to Celebrate Modern Witchcraft: Savannah Art Exhibit, organized by Hermes Astle

ART EXHIBITION ON WITCHES The Re-Discovery of Witches, an art exhib… Hermes Astle needs your support for Celebrate Modern Witchcraft: Sa

Thank you so much to everyone who's donated! It's been less than three weeks and we're already 25% of the way to our final goal! Let's keep the momentum going!

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Bringing this back for the new year!

Here's a breakdown of where the money will go if you're unsure:

Gallery:

$250--gallery deposit ($250/$250 raised)

$400--gallery rent ($96/$400 raised)

Reception:

$150--food ($0/$150 raised)

$240--wine ($0/$240 raised)

$50--cups, plates, utensils ($0/$50 raised)

$50--firewood ($0/$50 raised)

Other:

$60--just-in-case funds ($0/$60 raised)

[egypt-museum]

Pantheistic God Bes

Late Period, 26th Dynasty, reign of Psamtik I, ca. 664-610 BC.

Now in the Louvre. E 11554

[podcastwizard]

if you're in the throes of cosmic despair i cannot recommend museums enough. art or science or history it doesn't matter. oh we're all connected, all of us and everything, throughout all time and space, and no one, no one, no one is alone? awesome. that's what i thought i just wanted to make sure.

[along-the-silkroad]

Basalt water basin from Temple of the god Assur at the synonymous religious and ideological capital of the Assyrians, Assur, dating to the reign of King Sennacherib (c. 704-681 BCE).

Ashur was, in Mesopotamian belief, both the tutelary deity of the city of Ashur and the supreme god of the Assyrian state. Originally, he was likely no more than a local divinity associated with the city that bore his name. From around 1800 BC, however, a growing tendency emerged to equate him with the Sumerian god Enlil (known in Akkadian as Bel). Later, during the reign of the Assyrian king Sargon II (721–705 BCE), Ashur was increasingly identified with Anshar, the primordial father of An (Akkadian: Anu) in Mesopotamian cosmology.

These developments reached their fullest expression under Sennacherib, Sargon’s successor, when systematic efforts were made to attribute to Ashur the cosmic deeds traditionally associated with Marduk, along with the entirety of Babylon’s New Year festival rites. Such religious reinterpretations were closely tied to the contemporary political rivalry between Assyria and Babylonia. As a result of this layering of identities, Ashur never acquired a clearly individual personality; his character was largely defined by his role as the divine embodiment of a dynamic, militaristic city that rose to imperial dominance.

For the Assyrians, Ashur was the source of legitimate rule over Assyria and the divine patron of its military campaigns. Kings dedicated detailed accounts of their conquests to him, underscoring his function as guarantor of Assyrian power. Ultimately, Ashur appears less as a distinct god with unique traits than as a symbolic representation of Assyria itself, personifying the political ambitions and imperial ideology of the state.

[hildegardavon]

William Wynne Ryland, 1732-1783

The Judgment of Paris, n/d, etching

Private Collection

[hellenicpaganism]

[god-blog]

Do you want to see my favorite painting of the Gods?

Banquet of the Gods, 1625–1630, by Giovanni Antonio Galli detto Spanarino (1585–1652), oil on canvas, Uffizi Museum

I just love how human they look, how much they’re acting like a family. If you look carefully, you’ll see that Bacchus is pouring so much wine it’s overflowing both the cup and the tray onto the floor. Ganymede’s playfully pushing him. Everyone’s laughing. Cupid is climbing on Jupiter (who has smile lines) like a little kid and their grandfather who sneaks them candy. It just feels so familiar,,,, like a scene from a family gathering. Both in Antiquity and now, there’s a level of separation from the Gods because they are above humans. Everything must be perfect and serious. I just love how this allows them to be relatable, accessible, and imperfect.

The museum plaque reads:

In a dark and cloudy setting on Mount Olympus a company of gods is gathering. On the left, the young Cupid grasps the arm of Jupiter, depicted as a bearded old man with a thunderbolt on his lap. In the middle ground we see Mercury with his winged cap. The scene focuses on Ganymede holding a tray with a cup that Bacchus, shown from behind, his head wreathed in vine leaves, is filling with wine, while behind them another figure is already drinking. The realism of the bust of Jupiter, the strong contrast of light and shade and the unsettling darkness of the sky, show Spadarino to have been one of Caravaggio's most faithful and gifted followers.

A photo I took that doesn’t have watermarks but is at an angle:

[pastellus]

Another gem from my latest ROM visit that filled me with immeasurable glee:

Look at that little owl!! He's so goofy and cute and so dear to me and so so very clearly a LITTLE OWL (Athene Noctua) which is, of course, the species of owl that represents Athena

Look at how small that little guy is:

Athena holding a helmet and a spear, with an owl. Attributed to the Brygos Painter (c. 490–480 BC). The Metropolitan Museum of Art. And, look at these incredible further examples cute little owls in pottery:

Armed owl. Attic red-figure Anthesteria oinochoe, ca. 410–390 BC

Skyphos with Owl between two branches of olive wood. Attic red-figure pottery. Archaeological National Museum of Spain.

Attic red-figure kylix, owl between two olive branches. Found in the Mengíbar Necropolis. Archaeological National Museum of Spain.

Owl skyphos. From Most na SočI, end of the 5th century BC. Tolmin Museum.

Owl skyphos. Attic, mid-5th century BCE. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Terracotta rim fragment of a kylix. Attic, dating 480–470 BCE. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

I just wanted to share these because they also always make me smile. One of my favourite things about going to the museum has always been looking at sculptures and pottery.

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Did Christianity Steal From Paganism? Yes... No... It's Complicated. Part 2: Vikings

Tis the season so I figured I'd talk about the topic that's been the subject of debate for a long time, most recently with the 2024 Olympics. I will be discussing the visual aspect of these religions, not the theological aspects.

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: No

Let's get into it: The Viking era is from 800-1050 AD and can be divided into seven parts based off the style of visual art that was popular. The first style is called the Oseberg style (775-800 AD) and would be the basis of all the Viking styles of art after it. It was made of three forms that were derived from Pagan pre-Viking art: ribbon animals, gripping beasts, and ambiguous forms. You can see it on the bow of the ship below; the ship dates to the 9th century and was found in a burial mound in Tønsberg, Norway. Remember these forms because they're going to be important later.

The Vikings started coming into contact with Christian Anglo Saxon (modern day English) missionaries in the 700-800s, but they had little effect. The missionaries were well received by the kings but when their Pagan chieftains threatened to rescind their support, the missionaries were sent away. Another example of that is in 878 AD, the Christian king of the Anglo Saxons, Alfred the Great of Wessex, and the Pagan king of the Vikings, Guthrum the Old, were at war. King Alfred ended up winning and as part of the peace treaty, Guthrum had to get baptized into Christianity. He did so but maintained his Pagan worship and did not implement Christianity.

Besides the kings, common people had also started to slowly assimilate to Christianity. Christians had a rule that they couldn't trade with Pagans so Pagan Vikings began primsigning. Primsigning is an old Norse word meaning "to make the sign of the cross," the way to show you followed Christian beliefs before converting all the way through baptism. Even though they weren't being baptized and were still practicing Paganism, primsigning was enough for Christians to feel comfortable trading with them and brought the Vikings more into the world of Christianity.

An interesting example of this is in Kopparsvik, Sweden, where a large number of Viking individuals were buried in a prone position from 900-1050 AD. This is completely different from traditional Pagan Viking burials: there were no grave goods, no animal sacrifices, no mighty ships. Typically, a prone position is a sign of showing humility towards God and all the figures had notches carved into their teeth (below). Historians theorize that they used the notches to secretly signal to Christian merchants that they were also Christian to get discounts while not being alienated from their Pagan communities.

The coin below is from ~921 AD. It's a Viking coin from York, England and wonderfully shows the mixing of Pagan and Christian iconography. Coins like this typically had the name of the Viking king engraved on them but this one has "St. Peter." However, it also depicts the hammer of Thor on both the head (left) and reverse (right). It really demonstrates the visual mixing of religions.

Sometime between 940-1000 AD, the cross below was made. It was found in St Andrew's Church, Andreas, Isle of Man (between England and Ireland), and is another great example of the combination of Pagan and Christian art. On one side (left) it depicts Odin with one of his ravens fighting the wolf Fenrir at Ragnarök. The other side (right) depicts Christ triumphing over Satan. Both of these are stories of good vs evil and depict a god triumphing at the end of days. It would have drawn attention to the theological similarities between Christianity and Norse Paganism, making it easier for people to conflate the differing theologies.

Remember the Oseberg style from before? We're going to revisit it. By the 900s, Viking art was being done in the Mamman style; the ribbon animals and gripping beasts had combined into an icon called the Great Beast. The Great Beast was a symbol of power and strength, frequently put on longships and other Pagan items. In 986 AD, Viking King Bluetooth, a recent convert to Christianity, had the jelling stone below erected in honor of his deceased parents. On one side, he included a Great Beast; this was to show the strength and nobility of his parents and the nation they ruled. On the other side, he put an image of Christ Triumphant. This makes sense for a cenotaph as the promise of a resurrection is a comfort in the face of death. But the combination of a Pagan symbol of strength and an image of Christ is very interesting; it's doing more than pointing out the similarities between the two religions, it's uniting both Pagan and Christian subjects under his rule and proudly displaying the two different sources of the Viking's strength.

I can't end this without also talking about architecture. The last Viking art style is called the Urnes style and it's primarily because of the church below. It was built in 1132 AD in Urnes, Norway and is a stave church, meaning the whole thing was built without any nails!! The entire thing is self-supporting wood made using the post and lintel system. It's a Chrisitan church but has Pagan iconography on the sides: the last version of the Great Beast (right) and Pagan runes. It's fascinating how a Christian place of worship is decorated and protected by Pagan icons, once again showing the combination of visual cultures and methods of thought.

So, the answer everyone is looking for is NO.

The Christians didn't steal anything from the Pagans, they made an association. They produced art in the style that was popular and followed the artistic trends of the time. Christian and Pagan imagery was produced in the same medium and combined until Paganism was phased out over hundreds of years. They saw similar gods and iconography and combined them to make a message that was understandable to all audiences.

Happy Yule! Happy Winter Solstice!

Further reading:

Smarthistory – Art of the Viking Age

BBC - History - Ancient History in depth: Viking Religion

The Vikings and Christianity | History of Christian Vikings – Sons of Vikings

Treaty of Wedmore - Wikipedia

Manx runestones - Wikipedia

Prone Burials and Modified Teeth at the Viking Age Cemetery of Kopparsvik - Historische Beratung Dr. Matthias Toplak

Ancient Viking Art - Medievalists.net

Gamla Uppsala - Wikipedia

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Did Christianity Steal From Paganism? Yes... No... It's Complicated. Part 1: Rome

Tis the season so I figured I'd talk about the topic that's been the subject of debate for a long time, most recently with the 2024 Olympics. I will be discussing the visual aspect of these religions, not the theological aspects.

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: No

Let's get into it: It took about a hundred years after the death of Christ for Christianity to start gaining popularity in the Roman Empire. At around 100 AD the first congregations secretly started meeting in basements and had to be very subtle with their worship. Being Christian at this time was a crime; they refused to pay the federal taxes that exalted the emperor as a god. At this point, after the Roman Emperor died, the Senate would vote to either add them to the pantheon or erase their legacy from public consciousness. Some emperors weren't very lucky but most of them got deified. The Christian citizens of Rome refused to offer sacrifices to the emperor because it broke the first of the Ten Commandments, "Thou shalt not have no other gods before me." There isn't much Christian art from this time, and they were definitely the religious minority.

Skip forward to 306 AD, there's yet another civil war over the throne of the Empire. The two men fighting for it were Constantine I and Maxentius. In addition to battles, the two of them funded public projects to gain the approval of the people. They both built baths, aqueducts, and basilicas. Basilicas were the Roman equivalent of city halls: the local government operated out of them, trials and town meetings were held there, and there were small niches in the walls dedicated to different gods. Maxentius built the basilica on the left (below) and Constantine built the one on the right (below). Constatine's basilica, Aula Palatina, is still the largest remaining Roman structure that's a single room.

Maxentius' basilica was bigger but in 310 AD Constatine beat him and took the throne, partly because of the support he got from the Christian citizens. In 312 AD, Constatine converted to Christianity and enacted the Edict of Milan which made Christianity legal.

But look at Aula Palatina. It looks like our modern idea of a church. It has rows of benches, which would've been used for town meetings, and a semicircular niche at the end called an apse. In a Christian church, the apse is where the altar goes just like the niches in the Roman Pagan basilicas where different gods would be worshiped. Constantine didn't change the design from a Pagan basilica at all --because why fix what isn't broken? -- and just placed it into a Christian context.

For the next hundred years, Roman citizens started to mix Christian and Pagan imagery.

Families would bury both Christian and Pagan members in the same catacomb and decorated it accordingly. The fresco below (320-340 AD) is from the Catacombs of Priscilla (200-400 AD). It has an image of Christ as the Good Shepard in the middle, but the birds along the outside represent the four seasons; an image that featured commonly in Pagan catacomb frescos. Christ's clothing and contrapposto posing is also reminiscent of Pagan statues, particularly of the god Apollo.

The fresco on the left (below) from the Catacombs of Saints Marcellinus and Peter (~300 AD), is visually similar to the last one fresco we looked at. Christ is in the middle and around him are the four Evangelists and Bible stories like Jonah and the whale. In the four corners again, there are personifications of the four seasons. Elsewhere in the Catacomb, there's a depiction of Christ as Orpheus (right, below), again combining these Pagan and Christian icons. In the Bible, it says that Christ will tame all the wild animals, and the artist is likening that to the Roman Pagan story of Orpheus taming animals with his music.

If you look at the middle of this complex fresco on the left (below) from the Catacomb of Commodilla (100-800 AD), it has a depiction of Jesus and three of the apostles dressed like Roman senators (300-400 AD). On the right is a depiction of St. Paul as a Roman philosopher from the same Catacomb.

But this interest in combining artistic traditions extended to the sarcophagi that people were buried in too. Roman Pagans usually opted to be cremated rather than buried but when they did choose to be buried, they liked to carve scenes of their gods into their sarcophagi. Roman Christians, who almost always chose to be buried, did the same. The sarcophagus on the left (below) belonged to a woman named Arria (b.~350 -- d.~400 AD) and depicts a story about the Roman Pagan moon goddess Selene. The one on the right (below) belonged to a Senator named Junius Bassus (b. 317 -- d.359 AD) depicts difference scenes from the Bible like Adam and Eve and Jesus entering Jerusalem. Do you see the visual similarities? Both sarcophagi are also carved from marble.

The mosaic below is perhaps the best example of how Christian and Pagan imagery and theologies were mixed. It used to be the floor in a wealthy Roman's villa and was found in Hinton St Mary, Dorset, England; it's the furthest north Roman mosaic ever found. The bottom panel depicts a beardless Christ with a chi-rho behind his head. (The chi-rho, XP, came from the first two letters of Christ's name in Latin. It's a Christian symbol that's still used to denote that a figure is Christ.) On either side of him is a pomegranate. Pomegranates were sacred to the goddess Persephone; Roman Pagan religion taught that she went down to the Underworld for half the year and then up to the mortal world for half the year, fueling the changing seasons. Persephone and Christ are both gods that went to the afterlife and then came back to bring new life to humans; it's not hard to see how they got conflated on this mosaic. In the corners around Christ there are four men. Their imagery is reminiscent of both the four Evangelists and the gods of the four winds, again doubling Pagan and Christian imagery. In the upper panel, there's a scene portraying the Pagan story of Bellerophon spearing the Chimæra while flying on Pegasus. That story is frequently understood to be the "Good triumphing over Evil" story archetype, much like the story of Christ triumphing over death/sin is. Whoever owned this villa literally mixing both the visual and theological elements of both Paganism and Christianity.

In the late 300s, the Emperors (who were all Christian now) started introducing laws that made it harder for Pagans to practice. They banned animal sacrifices eventually Christianity was officially declared the religion of Rome in the late 400s. However, the enforcement of these laws wasn't applied very well and people continued to practice Roman Paganism until the fall of the Empire.

But even after the fall of Rome, Roman Pagan imagery persisted in a Christian context. In the West, Emperor Charlemagne of the Holy Roman Empire, which was Christian, purposely copied the imagery of the Roman Emperors. He used equestrian statues and coinage of him wearing a Roman laurel to demonstrate his power. The top two images below are of the Chrisitan Emperor Charlemagne and the bottom two are of the Pagan Emperor Marcus Aurelius.

In the East, the early Byzantine Empire were still interested in Roman drapery and architecture. Below is Archangel Michael (left) as well as Emperor Justinian and Theodora (right) preparing the Eucharist. Both images display Roman architecture and drapery. Byzantine would eventually move away from Roman influences but in its early days, they were definitely inspired by it.

So, the answer everyone is looking for is NO.

The Christians didn't steal anything from the Pagans, they made an association. They produced art in the style that was popular and followed the artistic trends of the time. Christian and Pagan imagery was produced in the same medium and combined until Paganism was phased out over hundreds of years. They saw similar gods and iconography and combined them to make a message that was understandable to all audiences.

Happy Yule! Happy Winter Solstice!

Further readings:

The Deification of Roman Emperors (Chapter 4) - Invented History, Fabricated Power

BBC - History - Ancient History in depth: Roman Religion GalleryThe Paleochristian Art of the Roman Catacombs ~ Liturgical Arts Journal

Chi Rho - Wikipedia

History of Christianity - Wikipedia

Anglicanism: a Gift in Christ – Part 1: An Ancient Church

Constantine the Great - Wikipedia

Maxentius - Wikipedia

Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus - Wikipedia

Marble sarcophagus with the myth of Selene and Endymion | Roman | Severan | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Smarthistory – Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius

Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire - Wikipedia

Equestrian statuette of Charlemagne - Wikipedia

Smarthistory – San Vitale and the Justinian and Theodora Mosaics

ARH1000 Early Christian & Byzantine Art.pdf | Free Download

The image of Christ in Late Antiquity | Semantic Scholar

mosaic floor | British Museum

[katelouisepowell]

‘The Shortest Day’ illustrations by Carson Ellis

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

Happy winter solstice!

[egypt-museum]

Winter Solstice at Karnak Temple ❄️☀️

▫️Winter Solstice, which usually falls on December 21st, is marked by unique solar alignments, particularly at Karnak Temple, where the sunrise aligns with the temple’s axis, illuminating the shrine to Amun-Ra, who embodied the sun in its daily journey across the sky, representing life, sustenance, and the cycle of day and night.

Amun Ra’s primary cult centre was at Thebes, where the Karnak Temple complex was dedicated to him. It is not certified, but not inconceivable, that the illuminating of the shrine to Amun-Ra was linked to the myth of Ra’s journey through the Underworld at night, symbolizing death and rebirth. This could parallel the idea of the sun’s “rebirth” after the Solstice.

All evidence suggests to us that the Egyptians had a deep understanding of celestial movements, and such understanding is reflected within their mythos, folklore, and even their architectural designs and temple structures. With the alignment of the sun being used almost as a divine measuring tool, dictating the locations and construction of temples, Egyptians developed sanctuaries that align directly with the sun’s movement during the Solstices and Equinoxes to this very day.

Read more

[egypt-museum]

"The Complete Egyptian Religious Calendar for the year 2026: the most comprehensive publication, at least until now, of the lists of the festivities and the daily Gods of the Egyptian religious tradition, set forth and calculated for the year 2026.

A practical application of the Egyptian Religious Calendar for the current age.

The "Egyptian Religious Calendar" combines philological rigor with theological depth, offering both a meticolous reconstruction based on authentic sources and a framework through which the eternal rhythm of the Gods may be practiced and embodied today as a living liturgy for daily life.

Faithfully reconstructed from the festival lists and calendrical registers preserved in the Temples, mainly from the Temple of Horus at Edfu, the Temple of Hathor at Dendera, and the Temple of Khnum and Neith at Esna, as well as from ancient papyri, especially the Cairo Calendar n. 86637."

— Egyptian Religious Calendar 2026: 426th–427th year of the Great Year of Ra, by Luigi Tripani