Arseny
@elstersen.bsky.social
Symbols, myths, anthropology, art, linguistics, history. This is a notebook of TILs: things I wish I could learn more about! he/him Support Ukraine! 🇺🇦
An interesting fact about Mont-Saint-Michel, and that while its exteriors are obviously Gothic, the interiors are now strikingly Eastern Orthodox. The monks/nuns who live there come from the Monastic Fraternities of Jerusalem, that are Catholic, but Desert Fathers-inspired, almost ecumenical.
a Hagioscope (aka squint) is an architectural device in a church: a dedicated place with a narrow window that limits the field of view to the altar. So that a person could concentrate on the (according to this theology) main part of the service. Think camera zoom, but with no camera, and no zoom!
Heidi The History Mouse@thehistorymouse.bsky.social · last yr.The perfect hagioscope guides your eye to the holy cross #HolyCrossMark #Somerset #StoneworkSunday #SundayStonework
Got to sing in church for the first time in years, in a style that is a bit foreign to me (Ukrainian scores in Czech; I did Greek and Georgian in the past), but it was fun! Kind of unusual to retune so fast and so often, I prefer it modal, but still fun!
A lovely neopagan (or rather druidic, I think, in the sense of Czech neo-Druids socieity) artifact on one of the mountains nearby. The spirit goes where it wishes!
Course packet for my ancient magic class is put together! Looking forward to getting to teach first-years about the history of science, medicine, justice, and religion
The "from X till Y" phrase in Czech is so nicely symmetrical! Kinda almost like parentheses: OD X DO Y
til it's particularly hard to translate literary books between Slovak to Czech (two _extremely_ close languages) as Czech has a deep diglossia between literary and spoken languages, while Slovak, getting codified much later (oppressed before) doesn't have it. "Neutral translation" is impossible!
Arseny@elstersen.bsky.social · 4mo agoCase in point. I'm again in the land where fortunately all local texts are Always given with a helpful translation. You can't read Czech? No problem at all, don't you worry, here's the same thing in Slovak!!
Round-Headed White Thorn (thistle) on the slopes of the Hare-Town Mountain near the White River
From @Wall_CAP : A temple to Antenociticus, discovered in 1862 near the Condercum (Benwell) fort on the Hadrian's Wall. Built around AD 178-180. Antenociticus is not mentioned anywhere else around the Empire, so was probably a local god. I'm amazed: 1) How church-like this plan is 2) LOCAL GOD!! 😍
Dongba symbols are a system of pictographic glyphs used by the Bon priests of the Naxi people in southern China. Dongba is largely a mnemonic system, and cannot by itself represent the Naxi language; different authors may use the same glyphs with different meanings en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dongba_...
An open-air Mithraeum in Rožanec, Slovenia, late 2nd sentury. (It wasn't originally open-air; there was a building immediately adjacent to the rock) More info: en.odkrijtebelokrajino.com/mitrov-tempelj
I'm low-key obsessed with the Cao’an temple: the Only still-functioning Manichaean temple in the world!! Built in 14C, disguised as a Buddhist temple to avoid the purge, still functioning as such, retaining the original image of Mani (Photos: @antiokhos.bsky.social ) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cao%27an
Yazidi temple Cim'aya Merave in Bacin, Turkey. The village was populated by Kurds of the Şemikan tribe, who now all emigrated. They return once a year on May 29 to celebrate a day of Şîxadî: a 12th century saint, a founder of Yazidism, and an avatar of Tawûsî Melek. www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HIM...
til Van Gogh used to write illusrated letters about art to his brother Theo source: www.upworthy.com/how-one-woma...
We randomly have one book from this series (published in 1975), my kid liked it, then I opened the flyleaf, and it contains a full list of all characters. Responsible Rabbit! Vain Vulture!! Positive Pig!!! But sadly a single book is like 30€ as they are US only, and were never republished :(
The craziest thing about potatoes is how complex their taste is. It's mostly starch, so you expect something boring, flat, uniform, but then fried potatoes are a counterpoint of taste, with notes of meat, nuts, bread, fruits almost, unpredictable from bite to bite as every piece is fried differently
It's _unbelievable_ how much better "Frog and Toad" is, if you honestly read it aloud to a kid, instead of just skimming the text with your eyes. Skimming: oh that's sweet I guess, and easy to read. Aloud: Goodness Gracious, it shapes my vocal production, and also legit improves me as a person!!
I'm pretty sure that the intro / title track of "Severance" is 2 little moves from "My Funny Valentine" by Ahmad Jamal Trio (1961), reimagined and promoted to a full composition. But at least a cursory google search doesn't seem to acknowledge it in any way 🤔 www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lW8...
I'll Take Romance / My Funny Valentine (Remastered 2014)
YouTube video by Ahmad Jamal Trio - Topic
youtube.com
A fact iv always enjoyed is that Frank Lloyd Wright wanted the Guggenheim 2 be pink, even pink marble. Solomon Guggenheim wasnt keen so they agreed on beige, and in the end the city approved the Corbusier-style white you see now, which, if u think about it, is very non-Wrightean
Be not afraid! For this Witch Hat Monday I bring you the most blursed creature of all, Biblically Accurate Brushbuddy 👁️👁️👁️👁️👁️ #Δhat #Δ帽子 #witchhatatelier
I randomly discovered a painter, saw his earlier and later works, and was like, OMG poor kid, it's not gonna end well Indeed it didn't. Heinrich Vogeler (1872-1942). Born in Düsseldorf, romanticist Jugendstil, turned Bolshevik, immigrated to USSR, deported to Kazakhstan, died in a forced labor camp
From @publicdomainrev.bsky.social: The Reverse of a Framed Painting (ca. 1670) by Cornelis Norbertus Gijsbrechts. An imitation painting (trompe l’oeil), a subversion of figurative image, a foreshadow of non-representational images of 20-21C... publicdomainreview.org/collection/r...
I got myself a new sketchbook to finally start drawing again, where the whole idea of it is that it is ugly. My old idle sketchbook was conceived as an artsy hobby, and as I turns out, I am afraid to draw in it. So here's the hope that if I designate the new one as ugly, it won't stay empty
If I were king, I'd mandated that city cemeteries carried a playground for every 300 graves, and an ice cream/gyoza stand for every 1000. And lots of trees of course. Beeches, oaks and sycamores mostly. Also mandatory connectivity with pedestrian trails, none of this "one entrance" nonsense
Մկրտիչ is an Armenian name that means "the Baptist": pronounced [məkəɾˈtit͡ʃʰ], romanized as Mkrtich. The last name given to kids of Mkrtich is Mkrtchian: a common Armenian last name. German renders [tʃʰ] as "tsch" So in German ppl with this last name are called Mkrttschian. 8 consonants in a row.
Speculative worldbuilding archeo- art history!! 🤩
Jan Pospíšil@janpospisil.bsky.social · 3mo agoAssets that came from these concepts were also in the first Kromlech dev diary - they're bronze decorations for barrowfolk tombs and other locations. You can see repeated motifs of horned sorcerer kings and Heron who carries souls back from Danain, so they can serve as undead sentinels.
The second season of Dorohedoro is cool, but now I kinda miss the innocent confused mystery of the first season. I feel that I know too much, and part of the magic is gone. It's a bit like Dirk Gently or GRRM: some worlds feel deeper when they could be finished, but aren't
