Temple Of Talos (TO Tal): Nether Realm, (9) (Talpa) Nine Armors, (b) (Thor) North Wind, &(P) (Susanoo) North Star
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... eathlyCold
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The North has long been considered by many cultures the direction of Evil and Darkness and the Cold due to more northerly places being colder, darker, less hospitable, and also harboring peoples who due to the harsher climates may develop cultures of theft of resources.
For the Chinese, it was the Northern Barbarians, for the people of the West, it was the Northmen, and their sea raids and this repeats again in Warhammer lore and before then in Tolkien's Silmarillion. Ancient Egypt was attacked by the Northern Sea Peoples, and the Northern Assyrians raided the people South to them as did the Europeans in their bringing their enslavement to the "Dark Continent" and Raping their resources and people.
In the Elder Scrolls, The Lord of Rape and Slavery is known as Molag Baal, he is also the Lord of Vampires. He lives in a place called Cold Harbor or something, it is freezing cold.
Meanwhile, Satan in Dante's Inferno sits in a cold hell that is frozen as a hideous monster in massive chains, a slave, deep in darkness low down.
Today the North is considered up rather than down due to the way maps are made from European trends. In the Past, South was often considered Upper and North considered Lower in some cases such as Ancient Egypt and there are maps which seem to imply a completely different way of thinking among various people.
The North has commonly been associated with evil, as has the North Star or Pole Star.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amatsu-Mikaboshi
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" Another source for the oni's image is a concept from China and Onmyōdō. The north direction was once termed the kimon (鬼門, "demon gate"), and was considered an unlucky direction through which evil spirits passed. Based on the assignment of thetwelve zodiac animals to the cardinal directions, the kimon was also known as theushitora (丑寅), or "Ox Tiger" direction, and theoni's bovine horns and cat-like fangs, claws, and tiger-skin loincloth developed as a visual depiction of this term.[sup][8][/sup]Temples are often built facing that direction, and Japanese buildings sometimes have L-shaped indentions at the northeast to ward oni away. Enryakuji, on Mount Hiei northeast of the center of Kyoto, and Kaneiji, in that direction from Edo Castle, are examples. The Japanese capital itself moved northeast fromNagaoka to Kyoto in the 8th century."
The Tiger is also depicted as a black cat in some astrological art from East Asia.
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http://www.brighthub.com/science/space/ ... 59010.aspx
" an evil star called Al Kiblah. According to them, the star killed the great warrior of the sky who forever resides in a giant coffin that is outlined by the stars of the Big Dipper. The other stars are in mourning for their fallen hero and march slowly around the night sky, forever in funeral procession. Meanwhile, the northern pole star acts as a villainous outcast, forever motionless and fixed at the coldest corner of the northern sky. "
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" Fixed star Polaris is of the nature of Saturn and Venus. It causes much sickness, trouble, loss of fortune, disgrace and great affliction, and may give legacies and inheritances attended by much evil. [1]The Pole Star is the main star of the small Bear situated on the Tail, has a Saturn nature, combined with qualities of Sun and Venus. It might seem strange to include this fixed star here, as its latitude is about 60° and therefore placed far outside of the ecliptic in which the planets move. Measured on the ecliptic, it is situated closely conjunct with Alpha Orionis, Betelgeuse, the main star of Orion.The Chinese considered the Pole Star as “the great honorable Lord of the Heavens.” In a relevant position in the natal chart it gives spiritual powers to the nearer, who will be highly respected. The Pole Star serves as a guide and indicator. If it is conjunction planets in the angles, the native will have a good sense of discretion and is able to follow his or her instincts. The native clearly recognizes his or her aims, and will pursue and achieve them. [3]Polaris, α Ursa Minoris, the Pole Star, is not as bright as we may think, It is still east to find by following up a line through the lower and upper stars at the end of the pan part of the Dipper. Ptolemy gives it Saturn-Venus rating, entirely right for the star which serves so well to guide us in our wanderings, and that is just what it tells us about people when we find it strong on their horoscopes. According to its aspects, they are excellent or not so good at receiving and giving guidance, but give it they always will, and to any and all who will listen. [4]Polaris rules the pancreas in the human body. [5]Constellation Ursa Minor is like Saturn and in some degree like Venus. It is said to give indifference and improvidence of spirit, and to lead to many troubles. [1]Astrologically both Bears were said to presage an evil influence. They are particularly injurious as regards to the affairs of nations and kings. [2] "
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https://books.google.ca/books?id=0FTfwo ... ar&f=false
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http://www.crystalinks.com/draco.html
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" When the pyramids were built, the star closest to the pole was Thuban, in Draco, the dragon.The stars close to the pole never set. The Egyptians described these stars as "imperishable" or "undying." Khufu expected that when he died, he would join not only with the Sun, but with Thuban as well - maintaining order in the celestial realm, just as he had on Earth.Pharaoh also expected to join with Osiris, the god of the dead, who was represented by the stars that we know today as Orion. "
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" 3. The North: Bible students have suggested that the north is a symbol of the permanent or the eternal, perhaps because the polar stars were permanently visible in the sky. It is the place of God’s celestial dwelling (Isa. 14:13) and from which His glory descends (Job 37:22) with blessings or judgments (Eze. 1:4). He is the true King of the North.But the north—represented by the left hand—is also a symbol of disaster. The enemy of God’s people came from the north (Jer. 1:14, 15; Eze. 38:6), bringing destruction. In a sense, the enemy was the false king of the north who tried to usurp God’s role and is finally destroyed by the Lord (Zeph. 2:12; Dan. 11:21-45). "
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https://books.google.ca/books?id=CSwOAA ... ce&f=false
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"Yasht 15.43 assigns Angra Mainyu to the nether world, a world of darkness. So alsoVendidad 19.47, but other passages in the same chapter (19.1 and 19.44) have him dwelling in the region of the daevas, which theVendidad asserts is in the north. There (19.1, 19.43–44), Angra Mainyu is the daevanam daevo, "daeva of daevas" or chief of thedaevas. The superlative daevo.taema is however assigned to the demon Paitisha ("opponent")."
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So associated themes are darkness, coldness, death, decay like trees leaves falling or withering, shadow, sea, blackness also turning black like frostbite, deepness, water, lack of light, the unknown, origin, invasion, raids, rape, slavery, chains, encircling, and Chaos, snow, frozen, serpents and dragons, sea serpents and dragons, ox, horns, dark fur, caves, depth
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http://warhammerfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Chaos_Wastes
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http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Molag_Bal
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" Molag Bal resembles a large, bipedal hybrid of a bull and a reptile, and usually appears in a form adorned with horns, fangs, claws and a long tail. His scaly appearance is matched by his demeanor: this serpentine Daedric Prince is the master of corruption, and his entire realm of Coldharbour in Oblivionconsists of nothing but death and destruction. "
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" Attention is claimed by the names of certain animals and plants: the ON. Iörmungandr is a snake, and Iörmunrekr a bull "
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In Tacitus' work Germania from the year 98,regnator omnium deus (god, ruler of all) was a deity worshipped by the Semnones tribe in asacred grove. Comparisons have been made between this reference and the poemHelgakviða Hundingsbana II, recorded in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources. GermaniaEditAccording to Tacitus:
Of all the Suevians, the Semnones recount themselves to be the most ancient and most noble. The belief of their antiquity is confirmed by religious mysteries. At a stated time of the year, all the several people descended from the same stock, assemble by their deputies in a wood; consecrated by the idolatries of their forefathers, and by superstitious awe in times of old. There by publicly sacrificing a man, they begin the horrible solemnity of their barbarous worship. To this grove another sort of reverence is also paid. No one enters it otherwise than bound with ligatures, thence professing his subordination and meanness, and the power of the Deity there. If he falls down, he is not permitted to rise or be raised, but grovels along upon the ground. And of all their superstition, this is the drift and tendency; that from this place the nation drew their original, that here God, the supreme Governor of the world, resides, and that all things else whatsoever are subject to him and bound to obey him.[sup][1][/sup]
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Tezcatlipoca (/ˌtɛzˌkætliˈpoʊkə/; Classical Nahuatl: Tezcatlipōca Nahuatl pronunciation: [teskatɬiˈpoːka][sup][1][/sup]) was a central deity in Aztec religion, and his main festival was the Toxcatl ceremony celebrated in the month of May. One of the four sons ofOmeteotl, he is associated with a wide range of concepts, including the night sky, the night winds, hurricanes, the north, the earth,obsidian, enmity, discord, rulership, divination, temptation, jaguars, sorcery, beauty, war and strife. His name in the Nahuatl language is often translated as "Smoking Mirror"[sup][2][/sup] and alludes to his connection to obsidian, the material from which mirrors were made inMesoamerica which were used for shamanicrituals and prophecy.[sup][3][/sup] Another talisman related to Tezcatlipoca was a disc worn as a chest pectoral. This talisman was carved out of abalone shell and depicted on the chest of both Huitzilopochtli and Tezcatlipoca in codex illustrations.[sup][4][/sup][sup][5][/sup]He had many epithets which alluded to different aspects of his deity: Titlacauan /ˌtɪtləˈkaʊən/ ("We are his Slaves"), Ipalnemoani ("He by whom we live"), Necoc Yaotl ("Enemy of Both Sides"), Tloque Nahuaque ("Lord of the Near and the Nigh") and Yohualli Èhecatl ("Night, Wind"), Ome Acatl[sup][6][/sup] ("Two Reed"), Ilhuicahua Tlalticpaque ("Possessor of the Sky and Earth").[sup][7][/sup]When depicted he was usually drawn with a black and a yellow stripe painted across his face. He is often shown with his right foot replaced with an obsidian mirror, bone, or a snake—an allusion to the creation myth in which he loses his foot battling with the Earth Monster. Sometimes the mirror was shown on his chest, and sometimes smoke would emanate from the mirror. Tezcatlipoca'snagual, his animal counterpart, was the jaguarand his jaguar aspect was the deityTepeyollotl ("Mountainheart"). In the Aztec ritual calendar the Tonalpohualli Tezcatlipoca ruled the trecena 1 Ocelotl ("1 Jaguar")—he was also patron of the days with the nameAcatl ("reed").[sup][8][/sup]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dante%27s_Satan
Talos: Storm North
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kFoyauextlH
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Talos: Storm North
Last edited by kFoyauextlH on Sun Aug 31, 2025 2:09 am, edited 4 times in total.
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kFoyauextlH
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Re: Talpa: Nether Realm, (9) Nine Armors, (b) North Wind, and (P) North Star
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/The_Nine_Armors
The symbols in the new title, 9, b, P, are all the same shape basically, the same symbol, but are turned around and flipped variously. The 999 is 27, the 666 is "The Beast" (lol, that stuff annoys me a lot, and at one time it may have been 616 or something before becoming the famous 666). The symbol appears as:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomoe
https://www.siliconera.com/wp-content/u ... symbol.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/3c/50/e4/3c50 ... 73e8e7.jpg
The b is for Boreas and B is b and P combined, which would work in that position too or after it. The P is Pole and Polar.
The Northern Wind and region was associated with darkness and negative things like death and discomfort for what seems to be obvious reasons, the wind is chilling and ends up making people feel uncomfortable and kills living things, and the dead feel cold to the touch eventually, and the Northern regions tend to have less light and then when it is very cold there is less life around possibly. So everything associated with bad things were sometimes linked to the North and North East directions.
https://donnykimball.com/kimon-7f7a2829 ... be8bmvM9HX
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As I sit down to write this, I’m many kilometers up in the sky aboard a Finnair flight bound for Helsinki. For the next few days, I’ll dutifully be escorting a group of Japanese journalists around the Finnish capital. While I much rather be digging up hidden gems back in Japan, I need to fund my travels somehow (these trips don’t pay for themselves after all) and managing press tours like this is one way for me to make a quick buck or two. So, seeing as I can’t actually introduce a new destination to you this week, I want to take a few minutes to cover another topic that I’ve been wanting to examine for some time now, the phenomenon of the Kimon (lit. “Demon Gate”).
Now if you’ve never heard of the Kimon before, know that, like death and taxes, it is something that everyone under the sun is subject to. You have one. I have one. Even the emperor has one. We all have one. It’s the place where the terrifying oni (Japanese demons that are loosely analogous to the western ogre) and other malignant spirits sneak into your house. Unlike the far more benevolent Santa Claus though, these foul fiends don’t come bearing prettily wrapped presents. Instead, the haunts entering via the Kimon have little but malevolence and ill will to share. Yikes, not exactly what you want coming down your chimney on Christmas eve!
Now, following a description like that, you’re probably clamoring to know where your Kimon is so that you can go and plug it up or something. Ah, if only life were so simple! You see, in traditional Asian geomancy, the entire direction of northeast is thought to be unlucky. This section of the compass falls right between the cardinal orientations for “bull” and “tiger.” In many renditions, oni are depicted to be a cross between these animals with their horns and tiger pelt loincloths. Even to this day, houses are designed so that there are no doors or entrances facing the northeast. Moreover, local beliefs assert that nothing related to fire or water should be placed in that direction as they too entice the oni.
While no one really knows for sure, some of the research I’ve done into the Kimon phenomenon suggests that, like with many things “Japanese,” this superstition comes originally from the pages of Chinese antiquity. I’ve read that the fear of the northeast spawned from seasonal winds that would gust into homes if there was a door or window facing that direction. To prevent the maladies caused by these icy blasts, people started erecting structures that didn’t have their northeastern areas exposed to the elements. Over the years, the practical reasons faded into the mists of time, leaving behind only the custom. Sometime thereafter, this belief made its way over to Japan with other tidbits of traditional Chinese culture.
Once you know about the Kimon, you’ll start to notice its influence all around you in Japan. Next time you’re out and about, pay special attention to the residences and buildings that you encounter. Assuming you can discern which direction is northeast, you’ll notice a peculiar lack of windows or doors oriented towards where the evil spirits are said to enter from. In fact, there’s an entire industry that has popped up surrounding the Kimon. Case in point, many contractors actually have a specialist in house who is an expert in preventing the hellions of the northeast from entering. Moreover, you can even buy compasses made for divining the location of a home’s Kimon.
Traditionally, many buildings in Japan have been erected with some sort of odd irregularity towards the northeast. In many cases, this peculiarity takes the form of an L-shaped indentation that is said to keep out the oni and other spirits. If you look carefully, you can see that the Kyoto Imperial Palace has notched corners on the northeastern exterior. Likewise, similar features can be found all over Japan showing that fear of the Kimon wasn’t just relegated to the former capital. In my own experience, I’ve seen northeasterly wards on all four of the country’s major islands.
By the way, in many cases, cities were also built to have their Kimon protected with clusters of temples place towards the northeast. Allegedly, the spiritual power of these sepulchers would rebuff the evil flowing from the Kimon. If we look at the example of Kyoto, we see that Saicho’s famous Enryaku-ji complex on Mt. Hiei sits at exactly where the city’s Kimon would be. The Tokugawa shogunate’s capital of Edo (modern day Tokyo) also shared a similar layout too, though the story is a bit more complex for reasons I won’t bore or confuse you with.
Think this is all a steaming pile of cow manure? I wouldn’t be so quick to judge! There are a lot of examples of calamities befalling those who do not heed the advice regarding Kimon. Additionally, you’ll often find areas of major metropolises having issues to their northeast. For example, Tokyo’s neighborhood of Ueno lies just where the city’s Kimon should be and has for years been home to slums and red light districts. As anyone who has visited themselves can attest, Ueno also has its fair share of homeless too so perhaps there is something to this Kimon idea after all.
By the way, if you’re a suicidal maniac who actually wants to open up the Kimon, I have good news. Somewhere on the deepest and darkest recesses of the Japanese interwebz, I stumbled across the following formula for summoning the legions of darkness into this world. While I cannot say that I’ve tried to beckon a hellion into the physical realm yet myself, I’ve read online that the below account actually has some truth to it. Note that I take absolutely zero responsibility for whatever trouble you get yourself into should you choose to follow through. Just sayin’…
Step One
Take the Hibiya line from Akihabara to Kayabacho. After getting off at the station, go to the platform for trains bound for Hatchobori. Under the iron bars, you’ll find some salt on the ground. Scatter it with your feet.
Step Two
Make your way to the Tozai Line and get off at Takadanobaba. From there, go to the platform for the Seibu Shinjuku Line. Like in step one, you’ll also find some iron bars with salt littered about on the ground. Again, scatter it with your feet.
Step Three
Get back on the Tozai Line and make your way again to Kayabacho Station. From there, you’ll want to exit the ticket gate before heading to exit 4A. Form there, go down the stairs and scatter ten grains of rice.
Step Four
Take the Hibiya Line from Kayabacho to Tsukiji and go to the platform that heads towards Tsukiji Hongan-ji. There, you’ll find some more iron bars with salt on the ground. Like with the previous steps, scatter this about with your feet.
Step Five
Get back on the Hibiya Line and close your eyes. With your eyelids tightly shut, think about the one thing you want most then claps your hands together and continue to ride the train.
This method of opening the Kimon and letting in evil originally appeared on the occult message board of the infamous Japanese site 2 Chan. About a month after it originally was posted on July 10, 2008, reports started circling that a netizen who had actually followed the instructions mysteriously ended up dead. While I am most certainly a stickler for authenticity and first hand experiences, opening the demon gate is one thing that I will not be trying myself. As much as I love my readers, there’s limits to what I’ll do for content.
Until next time travelers…
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The way that guy types is really annoying with all the nerdiness and cringe inducing awkwardness lol, like a cold gust of wind.
So these ideas end up becoming like an avalanche with further confirmation bias that ends up becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy, they ended up ghettoizing those areas and positioning all the things there, by avoiding it and making it the areas only those who don't care or had no choice were pushed into. It may have even gone so far as to alter the shape of their own physical neurology, because the shape of the place you navigate influences the way things up wiring inside, just like plant-life moving towards what it wants, like sunlight and water, and animals changing behaviors as necessary and other patterns based on resource availability.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.070039597
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6573257/
https://neurosciencenews.com/ai-taxi-dr ... ion-28380/
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/mar/14/timradford
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It's official. London taxi drivers have The Knowledge, and they have bigger brains because of it.
London researchers report today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - a prestige-laden US journal - that they scanned the brains of 16 right-handed London cabbies and found that in all cases, the size of a region of the brain called the hippocampus was millimetres larger than in a comparable group of 50 ordinary righthanded men who did not drive cabs
The hippocampus is closely associated with spatial memory - where the brain keeps its maps. London taxidrivers, famous for knowing routes between thousands of places in the city, spend two years assembling a detailed map which they file away in the memory.
"The hippocampus is where we store the things we consciously remember. As part of that, we would include navi gation. We know in animals that navigation and the hippocampus are intimately linked. So, it would seem now, is the human hippocampus," said Eleanor Maguire, of the institute of neurology at University College, London.
Tests with rats, squirrels and birds had shown that if the hippocampus is damaged, the creature can no longer find its way around.
Ordinary mortals too have shown that they use the hippocampus to find their way around. But the brains of London taxi drivers grew to accommodate the gazetteer of a whole city. The better they knew their way around, the bigger the hippocampus.
"The taxi drivers have an inordinate amount of knowledge. They have a really elaborate map of a very large city which they are using con stantly and that, it would seem, has impacted upon the distribution of grey matter in the hippocampus," Dr Maguire said.
"What we did was look at the amount of time spent as a taxi driver and then looked at a brain scan. We found a significant correlation, in that the posterior of back part of the hippocampus increased in size. The longer you were a taxi driver the bigger it got."
The researchers had previously placed volunteer drivers in scanners, quizzed them on the best routes around London, and watched the brain fire up. This time, they simply invited them to lie back - silently - and have their gray matter measured by two different techniques.
"They are an excellent group of people to study," she said. "They have already acquired a vast amount of spatial information. It's the kind of study you can only do in this city, because taxi drivers elsewhere aren't licensed in the same way."
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https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Nether_Spirits
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Badamon
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Kayura%27s_Amulet
Notice the symbol appearing on this amulet.
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Tomoe (巴; also written 鞆絵),[a] commonly translated as "comma",[2][3] is a comma-like swirl symbol used in Japanese mon (roughly equivalent to a heraldic badge or charge in European heraldry). It closely resembles the usual form of a magatama.
Three tomoe
The tomoe appears in many designs with various uses. The simplest, most common patterns of the device contain from one to four tomoe, and are reminiscent of similar designs that have been found in wide distribution around the world. When circumscribed in a circle, it often appears in a set of three, with this design known as the mitsudomoe (三ツ巴).[4]
Etymology
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Originally, the Chinese character 巴, a hieroglyphic character that represents a person lying on their stomach was applied, because of the similarity in shape. But it is likely not directly related to the Japanese word "Tomoe" itself. The character 巴 (Chinese pronunciation bā) has several meanings, ranging from a Sichuan toponym to a crust formed by dryness, parts of the body such as hands or cheeks, and, as a verb, bearing the sense of "to hope", "expect" or "be anxious over". The Chinese character used to depict, according to Bernhard Karlgren's interpretation of the small seal script graph, a python.[5]
The most common view is that the word refers to a picture e (絵) of a tomo (鞆), or drawings on the latter, the tomo in question, in archaic Japanese tömö, being a round leather arm protector, like the bracer or gauntlet tab of European archery.[8] Roy Andrew Miller describes it as "a small hollow sack or bulb of sewn leather with leather tie straps, sometimes embossed with a comma like decorative device (tomoe) of continental origin".[6] It was worn on the left elbow or wrist of an archer either to prevent chafing from the bowstring (tsuru: 弦) twanging back to position on the release of an arrow, or to strike fear into the enemy from the sharp sound caused by the bowstring hitting the wrist guard.[9][10][6] The 'tomo picture' (tomoe) can therefore be interpreted either as a visual pun on the tomo represented, or, otherwise, as taking its name from that object. Several such examples are conserved in Nara at the Shōsōin.[6]
Another view is The Japanese word itself may be of Mongolic origin, since it bears comparison with Middle Mongol tomuüa "twisted horse headdress", from the verb tomu (plait, twist), and Ordos Mongolian t'omok ('a little bag hung on a horse's head'). In this latter connection Tang ceramic figures of horses show small sacks tethered to the lower neck, perhaps to stop the horse from throwing its head back.[11]
Theories of its origin
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The origin of the tomoe design is uncertain. The most common view is that tomoe patterns originated in magatama jewelry from late Jōmon period approximately 1,000 BCE of Japan which was used for the shinto rituals. A pattern resembling the two-comma tomoe (futatsudomoe) has been found in ancient cultures on all inhabited continents.[12] A stylized design on a Yangshao bowl dates back to 2,000 BCE.[13] The motif of two encircling dolphins biting each other's tails has been found on Cretan ceramics dating from the Minoan period (1700–1400 BCE), and the two fish biting each other in circular fashion recurs in both Chinese and Central Mexican ware.[14] It is frequently seen on prehistoric Celtic remains, and one mirror from Balmaclellan is almost identical to the mitsudomoe.[15] In China, the double comma form came to be assimilated to the Yin-Yang philosophy of opposing male/female principles, formalized in the Tàijítú design of the late Song dynasty period.[c] This in turn recurs in the seventh century in Unified Silla (now Korea), where it was known as taegeuk.[17] and also in the Japanese futatsudomoe and mitsudomoe patterns, the former in association with divinatory rites, the latter frequently linked to temple drums with apotropaic functions.[3] According to Jean Herbert in these contexts, the mitsudomoe embodied three spirits, the yin-yang dyad being represented by an aramitama (rough kami) and a nigimitama (gentle kami), while the third comma denoted the sakimitama, or lucky spirit.[d] However, there is no clear evidence tomoe, taijitu and yin-yang is directly related.
Neil Gordon Munro argued that the basis for the mitsudomoe pattern, a motif found also among the Ainu, was the eastern European and western Asian figure of the triskelion, which he believed lay behind the Chinese three-legged crow design, and, in his view, its reflex in the mythical Japanese crow, the Yatagarasu (八咫烏).[18][19]
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Other tripedal creatures in Chinese mythology
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In Chinese mythology, there are other three-legged creatures besides the crow, for instance, the 魊; yu "a three-legged tortoise that causes malaria".[14]
The three-legged crow symbolizing the sun has a yin yang counterpart in the 蟾蜍; chánchú "three-legged toad" symbolizing the moon (along with the moon rabbit). According to an ancient tradition, this toad is the transformed Chang'e lunar deity who stole the elixir of life from her husband Houyi the archer, and fled to the moon where she was turned into a toad.[15]
The Fènghuáng is commonly depicted as being two-legged but there are some instances in art in which it has a three-legged appearance.[16][17]
Xi Wangmu (Queen Mother of the West) is also said to have three green birds (青鳥; qīngniǎo) that gathered food for her and in Han-period religious art they were depicted as having three legs.[18][19] In the Yongtai Tomb dating to the Tang dynasty Era, when the Cult of Xi Wangmu flourished, the birds are also shown as being three-legged.[20]
Japan
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Main article: Yatagarasu
Yatagarasu guides legendary Emperor Jimmu towards the plain of Yamato.
In Japanese mythology, this flying creature is a raven or a jungle crow called Yatagarasu (八咫烏; "eight-span crow")[21] and the appearance of the great bird is construed as evidence of the will of Heaven or divine intervention in human affairs.[22]
Although Yatagarasu is mentioned in a number of places in Shintō, the depictions are primarily seen on Edo wood art, dating back to the early 1800s wood-art era. Although not as celebrated today, the crow is a mark of rebirth and rejuvenation; the animal that has historically cleaned up after great battles symbolized the renaissance after such tragedy.
Yatagarasu as a crow-god is a symbol specifically of guidance. This great crow was sent from heaven as a guide for legendary Emperor Jimmu on his initial journey from the region which would become Kumano to what would become Yamato, (Yoshino and then Kashihara). It is generally accepted that Yatagarasu is an incarnation of Kamotaketsunumi no Mikoto, but none of the early surviving documentary records are quite so specific.[23]
In more than one instance, Yatagarasu appears as a three legged crow not in Kojiki but in Wamyō Ruijushō.
Both the Japan Football Association and subsequently its administered teams such as the Japan national football team use the symbol of Yatagarasu in their emblems and badges respectively.[24] The winner of the Emperor's Cup is also given the honor of wearing the Yatagarasu emblem the following season.
Although the Yatagarasu is commonly perceived as a three-legged crow, there is in fact no mention of it being such in the original Kojiki. Consequently, it is theorised that this is a result of a later possible misinterpretation during the Heian period that the Yatagarasu and the Chinese Yangwu refer to an identical entity.
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As a leather[e] wrist protector tomo appear to have been employed at least as early as the Kofun period, where they are frequently attested on haniwa terracotta figurines depicting archers,[21] and may even have had, aside from their military function, a ritual or fetish value, perhaps related to their phallic shape.[11] The pattern was also interpreted as water swirling, and because it is a water-related pattern, the Tomoe pattern was applied to roof tiles on buildings at the end of the Heian period as a fire protection.
The tomoe emblem established itself as a common emblem during the Fujiwara ascendency of the late Heian period, around the 10th–11th centuries, and proliferated through to Kamakura times. It is thought that a resemblance between the tomoe and the Emperor Ōjin found in the Nihongi may also account for its rising popularity among samurai, since Ōjin was apotheosized as a god in Hachiman shrines.[9][22]
In the Nihongi account, when Ōjin was born, inspection of his body revealed a fleshy growth on his arm similar to a warrior's wrist or elbow pad, and for this reason he was called homuta (誉田: lit.(Lord) Armguard)[23] (OJ: pomuda),[f] an old word for a tomo.[g]
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The mitsudomoe is closely associated with Shinto shrines, in particular those dedicated to Hachiman, the god of war and archery. Hachiman in Shinto cosmology and ritual, as for example at Hakozaki Shrine, is repeatedly connected with the number three.[28] In Shintoist thinking, this number is taken to represent the three aspects of the four mitama or 'souls' (the other, the kushimitama being considered far rarer).[29]
It is also commonly displayed on banners and lanterns used in festivals and rituals related to Amaterasu-ōmikami,[30] who in the Kojiki confronts her brother Susanoo when he usurps her terrain on earth by dressing as an archer, adorned with magatama beads and 'an awesome high arm-guard' (itu nö takatömö).[h]
A third element of its symbolic panorama concerns water, an association engendered by its swirling pattern. For this reason, it is said to be located on roofs and gables as a charm against fire.[32]
Since Hachiman was worshipped as the guardian of warriors, it was adopted as a common design element in Japanese family emblems (家紋, kamon) by various samurai clans[33] such as the Nagao, Kobayakawa and Utsunomiya. Among aristocrats, the Saionji family used it as its family emblem. The Koyasan Shingon sect of Buddhism uses the mitsudomoe as a visual representation of the cycle of life.
Tomoe also is a personal name, dating at least back to Tomoe Gozen (巴御前), a famous female warrior celebrated in The Tale of the Heike account of the Genpei War. In Kyoto's Jidai Matsuri festival, she appears in the Heian period section of the procession in samurai costume, and parades as a symbol of feminine gallantry.[34]
The tomoe has also been adopted as a corporate logo in Japan.[35]
The mitsudomoe is also the logo of the OBS Studio application since it released in 2012.[36]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gankyil
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauburu
Labubu are rabbits, and in East Asian cultures as well as among the more closely related people, the rabbit is connected to the moon as people tended to see a rabbit made out of the shapes darkened by craters. The 999 as 27 is also connected to the moon because of the 27.5 days in a lunar month, and the moon has to do with coolness of the night, the "children of the night", maternal things due to tying it with cycles, and water due to influencing the tides, as well as lunacy or mental illness, connected to demons and demonic possession, as well as the night being thought to be associated with all "dark", and thus criminal conduct and evilness that may be attempted to be hidden, though the moon would cast some light on such things and reveal them. Sleep, dreams, meditations, shutting the eyes, all these things end up in a closely related and even intertwining ontological network of ideas that appeared in most human cultures, but with some particulars in East Asia that were continuously strengthened and built upon and emphasized, similar even to how genes can keep repeating and making certain physical features very dominant, but which can end up getting changed or drastically reduced much more easily than people might expect in some cases, it works similarly with ideas, and it isn't always clear which are really going to make it, and generations of emphasizing something can get washed away surprisingly fast, and in other cases it may remain or otherwise re-emerge, and that is especially likely if it was rational or based on the environment or something that still can make sense and is around, like the technical likelihood of commissioning crimes or something one doesn't want others to see or find out about under the cover of darkness, that will repeatedly occur and likely continue to link crime or other things people may want to hide or are shy about, to the concept of darkness and the concealment it offers, so extending to the idea of concealment.
Hesiod was documenting ontological networks and hierarchies of concepts, like how such and such is one thing that then this other thing connects to as something which stems from it.
Since I was very young, I have connected myself closely to this character, who has this toy now that I am really wanting to purchase, but it is a very expensive figure for such a small thing, and I already have something else quite expensive that resembles the character very closely and is better in some ways due to not having the disturbing eye patch, even though that is a fine symbol and reminder, it has the negative association of being maimed and blinded in one eye, which also disrupts 3d vision and depth perception, though as a symbol it can represent insight into the darkness, the unknown, introspection, and imagination, among whatever else one may like to make it associated with.
https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/ ... ils/330323
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Dais
This is who I have instead who is pretty much the same character:
https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/ ... ils/239869
Still, the spider or arachnid is an important symbol to me and a personal symbol, and I grew up with Venom from Marvel Comics and this character as some of my favorites.
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The Armor of Illusion, or the Armor of the Spiders, is a representation of the Summer season. It has the power to create extremely realistic visions and allows Dais to camouflage himself. His weapon is a combination of six scythes, which can either extend or be used to create large webs. Also, a morning star and a nunchuka can be found on the arm guards. The Spider armor's special attack is "Tochimou" (which translates as Spiderweb Cast," but was changed to "Web of Deception" in the dub).
If Dais were to use his armor for good, he could use his illusion power to calm the troubled mind.
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Each of the nine armors were infused with a Confucian or Bushido virtue:
Righteousness/Benevolence (Wildfire/Rekka-Fire)
Grace/Courtesy (Halo/Kōrin/Nimbus-Light)
Trust (Torrent/Suiko-Water)
Justice (Hardrock/Kongō/Stone-Earth)
Wisdom (Strata/Tenkū/Heavens-Air)
Loyalty (Ogre/Riki-Spring)
Obedience (Jackal/Darkness/Shikoku-Winter)
Piety (Snake/Yakushi-Autumn)
Serenity (Spider/Mugen-Summer)
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Serenity and Justice, and Justice for Serenity, Serenity for Justice. Spider and Rock.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeostasis
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Spiders maintain homeostasis through a combination of physiological adaptations and behavioral regulation, managing their internal environments to cope with external stressors like temperature and drought. They use behavioral strategies such as changing location to find favorable temperatures or moisture levels, and they have physiological mechanisms including heat shock proteins (HSPs) to respond to stress, along with the ability to metabolize carbohydrates and proteins to manage energy and nutrients. Water balance is a critical aspect of spider homeostasis, with responses ranging from dehydration resistance to behavioral adjustments to find water.
Temperature Regulation
Behavioral Thermoregulation:
As ectotherms (animals whose internal temperature depends on external heat), spiders actively regulate their body temperature by moving to areas of suitable warmth or shade.
Physiological Responses:
Spiders can also respond physiologically to temperature stress by producing heat shock proteins (HSPs), which protect cells from damage caused by heat.
Local Adaptation:
Spiders from different climates can show differences in their thermal tolerance, with individuals from warmer areas having lower temperature thresholds for escape behaviors, indicating local adaptation to their environment, according to this 2021 study on besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com.
Water Balance
Dehydration Stress:
Dehydration is a common stressor for spiders, particularly due to their high surface-area-to-volume ratio and vulnerability from hydraulically mediated leg extension.
Resistance and Tolerance:
Spiders exhibit varying degrees of dehydration resistance (ability to reduce water loss) and tolerance (ability to withstand non-lethal water loss).
Behavioral Adjustments:
Spiders adjust their behavior to find free water or to limit exposure to dry conditions, which is crucial for maintaining body water.
Metabolic and Nutritional Homeostasis
Nutrient Regulation:
Some spiders can regulate the balance of nutrients from their prey, an example of nutritional homeostasis, although the extent of this ability is still being studied.
Carbohydrate and Protein Metabolism:
Spiders can increase the rate of carbohydrate and protein metabolism to combat stress and maintain homeostasis.
Energy Reserves:
Spiders can survive for extended periods between meals by ratcheting down their metabolism, an adaptation for surviving periods of low food availability.
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https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Eig ... _292153173
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gibberalic
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13y ago
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Edited 13y ago
In most exothermic (cold blooded) animals body size is a pretty good predictor of metabolism. So basically the smaller you are the slower you metabolism and the less you need to eat. Spiders are special in that their metabolism is 50% lower than would be expected for their size. So if you had a cricket and a spider that were the same size the cricket would require twice the food of the spider, roughly.
Add to that that spiders are carnivorous. Carnivores need to eat less on average than ye old herbivores because the metabolic energy gained from 1kg of steak is greater than that of 1kg of lettuce.
They are, usually, sedentary ambush hunters also. So the energy expended to gain a meal is low. They do have to make webs, which are 'expensive' but they can eat them and gain back most of the protien used to make them. So it's kind of like buying your first house; once you've paid for it, you can use the proceeds from its sale to buy your next house.
So low metabolism, good energy conversion, and a low-energy geared predatory style make for very low energy needs. Hence, they need only eat once in a while.
Sufficient explanation?
EDIT - Some o' you peeps be asking for sources. I'm having a little trouble finding good ones that aren't behind a paywall as I realise that many of you won't have academic privileges. So these aren't the papers that I would normally recommend but they are at least free. As an aside, does anyone know how to take a source web address that has been accessed through a university proxy and remove the proxy routing from the http address?
Mentions the lower metabolic standard of most spiders - http://compphys.bio.uci.edu/bennett/pubs/38.pdf [PDF!!!!] Very old, but mentions the use adaptations part - http://www.americanarachnology.org/JoA_ ... 4_p129.pdf [PDF!!!] Web differences and metabolism - https://repositorio.ufba.br/ri/bitstrea ... piders.pdf [PDF!!!!]
gibberalic
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13y ago
Several months between meals would certainly not be anything out of the ordinary. Spiders can actually ratchet down their metabolism, so technically the longer they go between meals, the longer they can go.
But, yup, definitely months rather than weeks or days.
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scubascratch
OP
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13y ago
Wow I had no idea it could be months that is crazy. If an average meal to a spider is something like 10mg housefly, I think this is only about 0.01 calorie, then in theory they are expending something like 40 milliwatt-seconds but over say 2 months, this is less than a milliwatt per day. I guess even tinier things consume less energy but this is pretty impressive. Go nature!
[deleted]
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13y ago
I keep a large number of tarantulas; when small, they are very much like normal, ordinary house spiders. I track how often they are fed and watered. From experience, I can state they can go at least 2 months without food at sizes down to 1/4" or so. I've had some 3rd instar Nhandu chromatus spiderlings (slings) go at least 3 months without food, because they refused the prey I was giving them (flour beetles) in an experiment.
Once they mature out, male tarantulas generally stop eating. Some grammostolas (principally the "rosie" G. rosea) will go for over a year once they reach maturity, drinking only water while in search of a mate.
At an American Tarantula Society meeting, one woman related how, when her family evacuated from New Orleans during the hurricane, they had to leave behind their tarantulas. By some bit of luck, they survived; their cages floated as the water rose, and despite the heat and absence of food for several weeks or months until their owners returned, they were in otherwise good condition.
TheATrain218
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13y ago
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Edited 13y ago
Our blood consists of fluid containing both dissolved and encapsulated proteins, nutrients, fats, sugars etc. and cells floating along in the fluid. White blood cells are components of the immune system, and red blood cells are the oxygen carrying vessels.
Red blood cells do so with hemoglobin, which as the name suggests, consists of an iron ion surrounded by protein. The iron atom in this hemoglobin molecule captures oxygen molecules in the oxygen-rich / CO2 poor environment of the lung and carries it through the body until it passes through an oxygen-poor/CO2 rich environment where the oxygen is released into the tissue, most often traded for CO2. Rinse and repeat with every heartbeat.
When they are referring to copper-based circulatory fluid, they're referring to hemolymph/haemolymph that circulates in the spider's body. Spiders, crustaceans, and other organisms that use this type of fluid don't have fully enclosed circulatory systems as in mammals, and this fluid bathes their tissues with help from their muscle movement and a rudimentary heart. The only cells it contains are immune cells, and its oxygen carriers are free-floating.
Hemolymph uses hemocyanin (heme as in the ring structure that holds the metal ion, just like in mammals; cyanin as in copper or cyan, the natural color of copper-containing compounds) as its oxygen carrier. Because of the chemistry of copper and iron ions, hemocyanin can carry fewer oxygen atoms than hemoglobin.
So no, there's no liquid-metal circulatory system a-la a T1000 terminator, its just a different biochemical oxygen carrier used sans red (or, in their case, bluegreen) blood cells.
As to why higher-order animals evolved to use iron rather than copper, bound in cells rather than free-floating, is mostly a physics-based problem. A non-closed circulatory system is ineffective in organisms without an exoskeleton maintaining internal pressure. Once an organism exceeds a certain size, hemolymph has trouble carrying enough oxygen for distant tissue, and an organism would expend a great deal of resources creating enough protein to keep its extremeties oxygenated. Hemeoglobin bound in cells specifically designed to create and maintain it is an energy-advantageous arrangement.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemolymph
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gibberalic
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13y ago
Yup, this is correct. Very few spiders eat 'solids'. They inject a fluid into their prey with their chelicerae (what you probably called spider fangs as a kid) and this fluid liquifies and digests the insect. This is then slurped back up. It's called external digestion and is pretty popular in the world of small animals.
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All these are symbols typically linked to Apollo, down to the copper and the strings, the bite and the toxins, the word "toxin" itself being a symbol for Apollo also, as it connects to a word referring to archery symbols like the bow and the arrow, just like the tomoe connected to the arm guard linked to archery as well:
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The English word "toxin" ultimately derives from the Ancient Greek word τόξον ( tóxon), meaning "bow" or "arrow". The related Ancient Greek adjective, τοξικόν (toxikón), meant "poison meant to be used on arrows". This concept then passed into Latin as toxicus ("poisoned") and from there into French toxique and finally into English in the mid-1600s.
Here's a step-by-step breakdown of the word's etymology:
Ancient Greek: The root is τόξον (tóxon), referring to a bow or arrow.
Ancient Greek (continued): The adjective τοξικόν (toxikón) was used to describe "poison for use on arrows".
Latin: The term was adopted into Latin as toxicum (poison) or toxicus (poisoned).
Late Latin/French: The Late Latin term evolved into the French word toxique.
English: The word entered English around the mid-17th century, initially referring to something literally poisoned or pertaining to arrows, and later evolving to describe naturally occurring poisons from living organisms.
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The symbols in the new title, 9, b, P, are all the same shape basically, the same symbol, but are turned around and flipped variously. The 999 is 27, the 666 is "The Beast" (lol, that stuff annoys me a lot, and at one time it may have been 616 or something before becoming the famous 666). The symbol appears as:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomoe
https://www.siliconera.com/wp-content/u ... symbol.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/3c/50/e4/3c50 ... 73e8e7.jpg
The b is for Boreas and B is b and P combined, which would work in that position too or after it. The P is Pole and Polar.
The Northern Wind and region was associated with darkness and negative things like death and discomfort for what seems to be obvious reasons, the wind is chilling and ends up making people feel uncomfortable and kills living things, and the dead feel cold to the touch eventually, and the Northern regions tend to have less light and then when it is very cold there is less life around possibly. So everything associated with bad things were sometimes linked to the North and North East directions.
https://donnykimball.com/kimon-7f7a2829 ... be8bmvM9HX
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As I sit down to write this, I’m many kilometers up in the sky aboard a Finnair flight bound for Helsinki. For the next few days, I’ll dutifully be escorting a group of Japanese journalists around the Finnish capital. While I much rather be digging up hidden gems back in Japan, I need to fund my travels somehow (these trips don’t pay for themselves after all) and managing press tours like this is one way for me to make a quick buck or two. So, seeing as I can’t actually introduce a new destination to you this week, I want to take a few minutes to cover another topic that I’ve been wanting to examine for some time now, the phenomenon of the Kimon (lit. “Demon Gate”).
Now if you’ve never heard of the Kimon before, know that, like death and taxes, it is something that everyone under the sun is subject to. You have one. I have one. Even the emperor has one. We all have one. It’s the place where the terrifying oni (Japanese demons that are loosely analogous to the western ogre) and other malignant spirits sneak into your house. Unlike the far more benevolent Santa Claus though, these foul fiends don’t come bearing prettily wrapped presents. Instead, the haunts entering via the Kimon have little but malevolence and ill will to share. Yikes, not exactly what you want coming down your chimney on Christmas eve!
Now, following a description like that, you’re probably clamoring to know where your Kimon is so that you can go and plug it up or something. Ah, if only life were so simple! You see, in traditional Asian geomancy, the entire direction of northeast is thought to be unlucky. This section of the compass falls right between the cardinal orientations for “bull” and “tiger.” In many renditions, oni are depicted to be a cross between these animals with their horns and tiger pelt loincloths. Even to this day, houses are designed so that there are no doors or entrances facing the northeast. Moreover, local beliefs assert that nothing related to fire or water should be placed in that direction as they too entice the oni.
While no one really knows for sure, some of the research I’ve done into the Kimon phenomenon suggests that, like with many things “Japanese,” this superstition comes originally from the pages of Chinese antiquity. I’ve read that the fear of the northeast spawned from seasonal winds that would gust into homes if there was a door or window facing that direction. To prevent the maladies caused by these icy blasts, people started erecting structures that didn’t have their northeastern areas exposed to the elements. Over the years, the practical reasons faded into the mists of time, leaving behind only the custom. Sometime thereafter, this belief made its way over to Japan with other tidbits of traditional Chinese culture.
Once you know about the Kimon, you’ll start to notice its influence all around you in Japan. Next time you’re out and about, pay special attention to the residences and buildings that you encounter. Assuming you can discern which direction is northeast, you’ll notice a peculiar lack of windows or doors oriented towards where the evil spirits are said to enter from. In fact, there’s an entire industry that has popped up surrounding the Kimon. Case in point, many contractors actually have a specialist in house who is an expert in preventing the hellions of the northeast from entering. Moreover, you can even buy compasses made for divining the location of a home’s Kimon.
Traditionally, many buildings in Japan have been erected with some sort of odd irregularity towards the northeast. In many cases, this peculiarity takes the form of an L-shaped indentation that is said to keep out the oni and other spirits. If you look carefully, you can see that the Kyoto Imperial Palace has notched corners on the northeastern exterior. Likewise, similar features can be found all over Japan showing that fear of the Kimon wasn’t just relegated to the former capital. In my own experience, I’ve seen northeasterly wards on all four of the country’s major islands.
By the way, in many cases, cities were also built to have their Kimon protected with clusters of temples place towards the northeast. Allegedly, the spiritual power of these sepulchers would rebuff the evil flowing from the Kimon. If we look at the example of Kyoto, we see that Saicho’s famous Enryaku-ji complex on Mt. Hiei sits at exactly where the city’s Kimon would be. The Tokugawa shogunate’s capital of Edo (modern day Tokyo) also shared a similar layout too, though the story is a bit more complex for reasons I won’t bore or confuse you with.
Think this is all a steaming pile of cow manure? I wouldn’t be so quick to judge! There are a lot of examples of calamities befalling those who do not heed the advice regarding Kimon. Additionally, you’ll often find areas of major metropolises having issues to their northeast. For example, Tokyo’s neighborhood of Ueno lies just where the city’s Kimon should be and has for years been home to slums and red light districts. As anyone who has visited themselves can attest, Ueno also has its fair share of homeless too so perhaps there is something to this Kimon idea after all.
By the way, if you’re a suicidal maniac who actually wants to open up the Kimon, I have good news. Somewhere on the deepest and darkest recesses of the Japanese interwebz, I stumbled across the following formula for summoning the legions of darkness into this world. While I cannot say that I’ve tried to beckon a hellion into the physical realm yet myself, I’ve read online that the below account actually has some truth to it. Note that I take absolutely zero responsibility for whatever trouble you get yourself into should you choose to follow through. Just sayin’…
Step One
Take the Hibiya line from Akihabara to Kayabacho. After getting off at the station, go to the platform for trains bound for Hatchobori. Under the iron bars, you’ll find some salt on the ground. Scatter it with your feet.
Step Two
Make your way to the Tozai Line and get off at Takadanobaba. From there, go to the platform for the Seibu Shinjuku Line. Like in step one, you’ll also find some iron bars with salt littered about on the ground. Again, scatter it with your feet.
Step Three
Get back on the Tozai Line and make your way again to Kayabacho Station. From there, you’ll want to exit the ticket gate before heading to exit 4A. Form there, go down the stairs and scatter ten grains of rice.
Step Four
Take the Hibiya Line from Kayabacho to Tsukiji and go to the platform that heads towards Tsukiji Hongan-ji. There, you’ll find some more iron bars with salt on the ground. Like with the previous steps, scatter this about with your feet.
Step Five
Get back on the Hibiya Line and close your eyes. With your eyelids tightly shut, think about the one thing you want most then claps your hands together and continue to ride the train.
This method of opening the Kimon and letting in evil originally appeared on the occult message board of the infamous Japanese site 2 Chan. About a month after it originally was posted on July 10, 2008, reports started circling that a netizen who had actually followed the instructions mysteriously ended up dead. While I am most certainly a stickler for authenticity and first hand experiences, opening the demon gate is one thing that I will not be trying myself. As much as I love my readers, there’s limits to what I’ll do for content.
Until next time travelers…
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The way that guy types is really annoying with all the nerdiness and cringe inducing awkwardness lol, like a cold gust of wind.
So these ideas end up becoming like an avalanche with further confirmation bias that ends up becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy, they ended up ghettoizing those areas and positioning all the things there, by avoiding it and making it the areas only those who don't care or had no choice were pushed into. It may have even gone so far as to alter the shape of their own physical neurology, because the shape of the place you navigate influences the way things up wiring inside, just like plant-life moving towards what it wants, like sunlight and water, and animals changing behaviors as necessary and other patterns based on resource availability.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.070039597
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6573257/
https://neurosciencenews.com/ai-taxi-dr ... ion-28380/
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/mar/14/timradford
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It's official. London taxi drivers have The Knowledge, and they have bigger brains because of it.
London researchers report today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - a prestige-laden US journal - that they scanned the brains of 16 right-handed London cabbies and found that in all cases, the size of a region of the brain called the hippocampus was millimetres larger than in a comparable group of 50 ordinary righthanded men who did not drive cabs
The hippocampus is closely associated with spatial memory - where the brain keeps its maps. London taxidrivers, famous for knowing routes between thousands of places in the city, spend two years assembling a detailed map which they file away in the memory.
"The hippocampus is where we store the things we consciously remember. As part of that, we would include navi gation. We know in animals that navigation and the hippocampus are intimately linked. So, it would seem now, is the human hippocampus," said Eleanor Maguire, of the institute of neurology at University College, London.
Tests with rats, squirrels and birds had shown that if the hippocampus is damaged, the creature can no longer find its way around.
Ordinary mortals too have shown that they use the hippocampus to find their way around. But the brains of London taxi drivers grew to accommodate the gazetteer of a whole city. The better they knew their way around, the bigger the hippocampus.
"The taxi drivers have an inordinate amount of knowledge. They have a really elaborate map of a very large city which they are using con stantly and that, it would seem, has impacted upon the distribution of grey matter in the hippocampus," Dr Maguire said.
"What we did was look at the amount of time spent as a taxi driver and then looked at a brain scan. We found a significant correlation, in that the posterior of back part of the hippocampus increased in size. The longer you were a taxi driver the bigger it got."
The researchers had previously placed volunteer drivers in scanners, quizzed them on the best routes around London, and watched the brain fire up. This time, they simply invited them to lie back - silently - and have their gray matter measured by two different techniques.
"They are an excellent group of people to study," she said. "They have already acquired a vast amount of spatial information. It's the kind of study you can only do in this city, because taxi drivers elsewhere aren't licensed in the same way."
"
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Nether_Spirits
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Badamon
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Kayura%27s_Amulet
Notice the symbol appearing on this amulet.
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Tomoe (巴; also written 鞆絵),[a] commonly translated as "comma",[2][3] is a comma-like swirl symbol used in Japanese mon (roughly equivalent to a heraldic badge or charge in European heraldry). It closely resembles the usual form of a magatama.
Three tomoe
The tomoe appears in many designs with various uses. The simplest, most common patterns of the device contain from one to four tomoe, and are reminiscent of similar designs that have been found in wide distribution around the world. When circumscribed in a circle, it often appears in a set of three, with this design known as the mitsudomoe (三ツ巴).[4]
Etymology
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Originally, the Chinese character 巴, a hieroglyphic character that represents a person lying on their stomach was applied, because of the similarity in shape. But it is likely not directly related to the Japanese word "Tomoe" itself. The character 巴 (Chinese pronunciation bā) has several meanings, ranging from a Sichuan toponym to a crust formed by dryness, parts of the body such as hands or cheeks, and, as a verb, bearing the sense of "to hope", "expect" or "be anxious over". The Chinese character used to depict, according to Bernhard Karlgren's interpretation of the small seal script graph, a python.[5]
The most common view is that the word refers to a picture e (絵) of a tomo (鞆), or drawings on the latter, the tomo in question, in archaic Japanese tömö, being a round leather arm protector, like the bracer or gauntlet tab of European archery.[8] Roy Andrew Miller describes it as "a small hollow sack or bulb of sewn leather with leather tie straps, sometimes embossed with a comma like decorative device (tomoe) of continental origin".[6] It was worn on the left elbow or wrist of an archer either to prevent chafing from the bowstring (tsuru: 弦) twanging back to position on the release of an arrow, or to strike fear into the enemy from the sharp sound caused by the bowstring hitting the wrist guard.[9][10][6] The 'tomo picture' (tomoe) can therefore be interpreted either as a visual pun on the tomo represented, or, otherwise, as taking its name from that object. Several such examples are conserved in Nara at the Shōsōin.[6]
Another view is The Japanese word itself may be of Mongolic origin, since it bears comparison with Middle Mongol tomuüa "twisted horse headdress", from the verb tomu (plait, twist), and Ordos Mongolian t'omok ('a little bag hung on a horse's head'). In this latter connection Tang ceramic figures of horses show small sacks tethered to the lower neck, perhaps to stop the horse from throwing its head back.[11]
Theories of its origin
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The origin of the tomoe design is uncertain. The most common view is that tomoe patterns originated in magatama jewelry from late Jōmon period approximately 1,000 BCE of Japan which was used for the shinto rituals. A pattern resembling the two-comma tomoe (futatsudomoe) has been found in ancient cultures on all inhabited continents.[12] A stylized design on a Yangshao bowl dates back to 2,000 BCE.[13] The motif of two encircling dolphins biting each other's tails has been found on Cretan ceramics dating from the Minoan period (1700–1400 BCE), and the two fish biting each other in circular fashion recurs in both Chinese and Central Mexican ware.[14] It is frequently seen on prehistoric Celtic remains, and one mirror from Balmaclellan is almost identical to the mitsudomoe.[15] In China, the double comma form came to be assimilated to the Yin-Yang philosophy of opposing male/female principles, formalized in the Tàijítú design of the late Song dynasty period.[c] This in turn recurs in the seventh century in Unified Silla (now Korea), where it was known as taegeuk.[17] and also in the Japanese futatsudomoe and mitsudomoe patterns, the former in association with divinatory rites, the latter frequently linked to temple drums with apotropaic functions.[3] According to Jean Herbert in these contexts, the mitsudomoe embodied three spirits, the yin-yang dyad being represented by an aramitama (rough kami) and a nigimitama (gentle kami), while the third comma denoted the sakimitama, or lucky spirit.[d] However, there is no clear evidence tomoe, taijitu and yin-yang is directly related.
Neil Gordon Munro argued that the basis for the mitsudomoe pattern, a motif found also among the Ainu, was the eastern European and western Asian figure of the triskelion, which he believed lay behind the Chinese three-legged crow design, and, in his view, its reflex in the mythical Japanese crow, the Yatagarasu (八咫烏).[18][19]
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Other tripedal creatures in Chinese mythology
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In Chinese mythology, there are other three-legged creatures besides the crow, for instance, the 魊; yu "a three-legged tortoise that causes malaria".[14]
The three-legged crow symbolizing the sun has a yin yang counterpart in the 蟾蜍; chánchú "three-legged toad" symbolizing the moon (along with the moon rabbit). According to an ancient tradition, this toad is the transformed Chang'e lunar deity who stole the elixir of life from her husband Houyi the archer, and fled to the moon where she was turned into a toad.[15]
The Fènghuáng is commonly depicted as being two-legged but there are some instances in art in which it has a three-legged appearance.[16][17]
Xi Wangmu (Queen Mother of the West) is also said to have three green birds (青鳥; qīngniǎo) that gathered food for her and in Han-period religious art they were depicted as having three legs.[18][19] In the Yongtai Tomb dating to the Tang dynasty Era, when the Cult of Xi Wangmu flourished, the birds are also shown as being three-legged.[20]
Japan
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Main article: Yatagarasu
Yatagarasu guides legendary Emperor Jimmu towards the plain of Yamato.
In Japanese mythology, this flying creature is a raven or a jungle crow called Yatagarasu (八咫烏; "eight-span crow")[21] and the appearance of the great bird is construed as evidence of the will of Heaven or divine intervention in human affairs.[22]
Although Yatagarasu is mentioned in a number of places in Shintō, the depictions are primarily seen on Edo wood art, dating back to the early 1800s wood-art era. Although not as celebrated today, the crow is a mark of rebirth and rejuvenation; the animal that has historically cleaned up after great battles symbolized the renaissance after such tragedy.
Yatagarasu as a crow-god is a symbol specifically of guidance. This great crow was sent from heaven as a guide for legendary Emperor Jimmu on his initial journey from the region which would become Kumano to what would become Yamato, (Yoshino and then Kashihara). It is generally accepted that Yatagarasu is an incarnation of Kamotaketsunumi no Mikoto, but none of the early surviving documentary records are quite so specific.[23]
In more than one instance, Yatagarasu appears as a three legged crow not in Kojiki but in Wamyō Ruijushō.
Both the Japan Football Association and subsequently its administered teams such as the Japan national football team use the symbol of Yatagarasu in their emblems and badges respectively.[24] The winner of the Emperor's Cup is also given the honor of wearing the Yatagarasu emblem the following season.
Although the Yatagarasu is commonly perceived as a three-legged crow, there is in fact no mention of it being such in the original Kojiki. Consequently, it is theorised that this is a result of a later possible misinterpretation during the Heian period that the Yatagarasu and the Chinese Yangwu refer to an identical entity.
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As a leather[e] wrist protector tomo appear to have been employed at least as early as the Kofun period, where they are frequently attested on haniwa terracotta figurines depicting archers,[21] and may even have had, aside from their military function, a ritual or fetish value, perhaps related to their phallic shape.[11] The pattern was also interpreted as water swirling, and because it is a water-related pattern, the Tomoe pattern was applied to roof tiles on buildings at the end of the Heian period as a fire protection.
The tomoe emblem established itself as a common emblem during the Fujiwara ascendency of the late Heian period, around the 10th–11th centuries, and proliferated through to Kamakura times. It is thought that a resemblance between the tomoe and the Emperor Ōjin found in the Nihongi may also account for its rising popularity among samurai, since Ōjin was apotheosized as a god in Hachiman shrines.[9][22]
In the Nihongi account, when Ōjin was born, inspection of his body revealed a fleshy growth on his arm similar to a warrior's wrist or elbow pad, and for this reason he was called homuta (誉田: lit.(Lord) Armguard)[23] (OJ: pomuda),[f] an old word for a tomo.[g]
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The mitsudomoe is closely associated with Shinto shrines, in particular those dedicated to Hachiman, the god of war and archery. Hachiman in Shinto cosmology and ritual, as for example at Hakozaki Shrine, is repeatedly connected with the number three.[28] In Shintoist thinking, this number is taken to represent the three aspects of the four mitama or 'souls' (the other, the kushimitama being considered far rarer).[29]
It is also commonly displayed on banners and lanterns used in festivals and rituals related to Amaterasu-ōmikami,[30] who in the Kojiki confronts her brother Susanoo when he usurps her terrain on earth by dressing as an archer, adorned with magatama beads and 'an awesome high arm-guard' (itu nö takatömö).[h]
A third element of its symbolic panorama concerns water, an association engendered by its swirling pattern. For this reason, it is said to be located on roofs and gables as a charm against fire.[32]
Since Hachiman was worshipped as the guardian of warriors, it was adopted as a common design element in Japanese family emblems (家紋, kamon) by various samurai clans[33] such as the Nagao, Kobayakawa and Utsunomiya. Among aristocrats, the Saionji family used it as its family emblem. The Koyasan Shingon sect of Buddhism uses the mitsudomoe as a visual representation of the cycle of life.
Tomoe also is a personal name, dating at least back to Tomoe Gozen (巴御前), a famous female warrior celebrated in The Tale of the Heike account of the Genpei War. In Kyoto's Jidai Matsuri festival, she appears in the Heian period section of the procession in samurai costume, and parades as a symbol of feminine gallantry.[34]
The tomoe has also been adopted as a corporate logo in Japan.[35]
The mitsudomoe is also the logo of the OBS Studio application since it released in 2012.[36]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gankyil
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauburu
Labubu are rabbits, and in East Asian cultures as well as among the more closely related people, the rabbit is connected to the moon as people tended to see a rabbit made out of the shapes darkened by craters. The 999 as 27 is also connected to the moon because of the 27.5 days in a lunar month, and the moon has to do with coolness of the night, the "children of the night", maternal things due to tying it with cycles, and water due to influencing the tides, as well as lunacy or mental illness, connected to demons and demonic possession, as well as the night being thought to be associated with all "dark", and thus criminal conduct and evilness that may be attempted to be hidden, though the moon would cast some light on such things and reveal them. Sleep, dreams, meditations, shutting the eyes, all these things end up in a closely related and even intertwining ontological network of ideas that appeared in most human cultures, but with some particulars in East Asia that were continuously strengthened and built upon and emphasized, similar even to how genes can keep repeating and making certain physical features very dominant, but which can end up getting changed or drastically reduced much more easily than people might expect in some cases, it works similarly with ideas, and it isn't always clear which are really going to make it, and generations of emphasizing something can get washed away surprisingly fast, and in other cases it may remain or otherwise re-emerge, and that is especially likely if it was rational or based on the environment or something that still can make sense and is around, like the technical likelihood of commissioning crimes or something one doesn't want others to see or find out about under the cover of darkness, that will repeatedly occur and likely continue to link crime or other things people may want to hide or are shy about, to the concept of darkness and the concealment it offers, so extending to the idea of concealment.
Hesiod was documenting ontological networks and hierarchies of concepts, like how such and such is one thing that then this other thing connects to as something which stems from it.
Since I was very young, I have connected myself closely to this character, who has this toy now that I am really wanting to purchase, but it is a very expensive figure for such a small thing, and I already have something else quite expensive that resembles the character very closely and is better in some ways due to not having the disturbing eye patch, even though that is a fine symbol and reminder, it has the negative association of being maimed and blinded in one eye, which also disrupts 3d vision and depth perception, though as a symbol it can represent insight into the darkness, the unknown, introspection, and imagination, among whatever else one may like to make it associated with.
https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/ ... ils/330323
https://roninwarriors.fandom.com/wiki/Dais
This is who I have instead who is pretty much the same character:
https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/ ... ils/239869
Still, the spider or arachnid is an important symbol to me and a personal symbol, and I grew up with Venom from Marvel Comics and this character as some of my favorites.
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The Armor of Illusion, or the Armor of the Spiders, is a representation of the Summer season. It has the power to create extremely realistic visions and allows Dais to camouflage himself. His weapon is a combination of six scythes, which can either extend or be used to create large webs. Also, a morning star and a nunchuka can be found on the arm guards. The Spider armor's special attack is "Tochimou" (which translates as Spiderweb Cast," but was changed to "Web of Deception" in the dub).
If Dais were to use his armor for good, he could use his illusion power to calm the troubled mind.
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Each of the nine armors were infused with a Confucian or Bushido virtue:
Righteousness/Benevolence (Wildfire/Rekka-Fire)
Grace/Courtesy (Halo/Kōrin/Nimbus-Light)
Trust (Torrent/Suiko-Water)
Justice (Hardrock/Kongō/Stone-Earth)
Wisdom (Strata/Tenkū/Heavens-Air)
Loyalty (Ogre/Riki-Spring)
Obedience (Jackal/Darkness/Shikoku-Winter)
Piety (Snake/Yakushi-Autumn)
Serenity (Spider/Mugen-Summer)
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Serenity and Justice, and Justice for Serenity, Serenity for Justice. Spider and Rock.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeostasis
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Spiders maintain homeostasis through a combination of physiological adaptations and behavioral regulation, managing their internal environments to cope with external stressors like temperature and drought. They use behavioral strategies such as changing location to find favorable temperatures or moisture levels, and they have physiological mechanisms including heat shock proteins (HSPs) to respond to stress, along with the ability to metabolize carbohydrates and proteins to manage energy and nutrients. Water balance is a critical aspect of spider homeostasis, with responses ranging from dehydration resistance to behavioral adjustments to find water.
Temperature Regulation
Behavioral Thermoregulation:
As ectotherms (animals whose internal temperature depends on external heat), spiders actively regulate their body temperature by moving to areas of suitable warmth or shade.
Physiological Responses:
Spiders can also respond physiologically to temperature stress by producing heat shock proteins (HSPs), which protect cells from damage caused by heat.
Local Adaptation:
Spiders from different climates can show differences in their thermal tolerance, with individuals from warmer areas having lower temperature thresholds for escape behaviors, indicating local adaptation to their environment, according to this 2021 study on besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com.
Water Balance
Dehydration Stress:
Dehydration is a common stressor for spiders, particularly due to their high surface-area-to-volume ratio and vulnerability from hydraulically mediated leg extension.
Resistance and Tolerance:
Spiders exhibit varying degrees of dehydration resistance (ability to reduce water loss) and tolerance (ability to withstand non-lethal water loss).
Behavioral Adjustments:
Spiders adjust their behavior to find free water or to limit exposure to dry conditions, which is crucial for maintaining body water.
Metabolic and Nutritional Homeostasis
Nutrient Regulation:
Some spiders can regulate the balance of nutrients from their prey, an example of nutritional homeostasis, although the extent of this ability is still being studied.
Carbohydrate and Protein Metabolism:
Spiders can increase the rate of carbohydrate and protein metabolism to combat stress and maintain homeostasis.
Energy Reserves:
Spiders can survive for extended periods between meals by ratcheting down their metabolism, an adaptation for surviving periods of low food availability.
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https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Eig ... _292153173
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gibberalic
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13y ago
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Edited 13y ago
In most exothermic (cold blooded) animals body size is a pretty good predictor of metabolism. So basically the smaller you are the slower you metabolism and the less you need to eat. Spiders are special in that their metabolism is 50% lower than would be expected for their size. So if you had a cricket and a spider that were the same size the cricket would require twice the food of the spider, roughly.
Add to that that spiders are carnivorous. Carnivores need to eat less on average than ye old herbivores because the metabolic energy gained from 1kg of steak is greater than that of 1kg of lettuce.
They are, usually, sedentary ambush hunters also. So the energy expended to gain a meal is low. They do have to make webs, which are 'expensive' but they can eat them and gain back most of the protien used to make them. So it's kind of like buying your first house; once you've paid for it, you can use the proceeds from its sale to buy your next house.
So low metabolism, good energy conversion, and a low-energy geared predatory style make for very low energy needs. Hence, they need only eat once in a while.
Sufficient explanation?
EDIT - Some o' you peeps be asking for sources. I'm having a little trouble finding good ones that aren't behind a paywall as I realise that many of you won't have academic privileges. So these aren't the papers that I would normally recommend but they are at least free. As an aside, does anyone know how to take a source web address that has been accessed through a university proxy and remove the proxy routing from the http address?
Mentions the lower metabolic standard of most spiders - http://compphys.bio.uci.edu/bennett/pubs/38.pdf [PDF!!!!] Very old, but mentions the use adaptations part - http://www.americanarachnology.org/JoA_ ... 4_p129.pdf [PDF!!!] Web differences and metabolism - https://repositorio.ufba.br/ri/bitstrea ... piders.pdf [PDF!!!!]
gibberalic
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13y ago
Several months between meals would certainly not be anything out of the ordinary. Spiders can actually ratchet down their metabolism, so technically the longer they go between meals, the longer they can go.
But, yup, definitely months rather than weeks or days.
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scubascratch
OP
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13y ago
Wow I had no idea it could be months that is crazy. If an average meal to a spider is something like 10mg housefly, I think this is only about 0.01 calorie, then in theory they are expending something like 40 milliwatt-seconds but over say 2 months, this is less than a milliwatt per day. I guess even tinier things consume less energy but this is pretty impressive. Go nature!
[deleted]
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13y ago
I keep a large number of tarantulas; when small, they are very much like normal, ordinary house spiders. I track how often they are fed and watered. From experience, I can state they can go at least 2 months without food at sizes down to 1/4" or so. I've had some 3rd instar Nhandu chromatus spiderlings (slings) go at least 3 months without food, because they refused the prey I was giving them (flour beetles) in an experiment.
Once they mature out, male tarantulas generally stop eating. Some grammostolas (principally the "rosie" G. rosea) will go for over a year once they reach maturity, drinking only water while in search of a mate.
At an American Tarantula Society meeting, one woman related how, when her family evacuated from New Orleans during the hurricane, they had to leave behind their tarantulas. By some bit of luck, they survived; their cages floated as the water rose, and despite the heat and absence of food for several weeks or months until their owners returned, they were in otherwise good condition.
TheATrain218
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13y ago
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Edited 13y ago
Our blood consists of fluid containing both dissolved and encapsulated proteins, nutrients, fats, sugars etc. and cells floating along in the fluid. White blood cells are components of the immune system, and red blood cells are the oxygen carrying vessels.
Red blood cells do so with hemoglobin, which as the name suggests, consists of an iron ion surrounded by protein. The iron atom in this hemoglobin molecule captures oxygen molecules in the oxygen-rich / CO2 poor environment of the lung and carries it through the body until it passes through an oxygen-poor/CO2 rich environment where the oxygen is released into the tissue, most often traded for CO2. Rinse and repeat with every heartbeat.
When they are referring to copper-based circulatory fluid, they're referring to hemolymph/haemolymph that circulates in the spider's body. Spiders, crustaceans, and other organisms that use this type of fluid don't have fully enclosed circulatory systems as in mammals, and this fluid bathes their tissues with help from their muscle movement and a rudimentary heart. The only cells it contains are immune cells, and its oxygen carriers are free-floating.
Hemolymph uses hemocyanin (heme as in the ring structure that holds the metal ion, just like in mammals; cyanin as in copper or cyan, the natural color of copper-containing compounds) as its oxygen carrier. Because of the chemistry of copper and iron ions, hemocyanin can carry fewer oxygen atoms than hemoglobin.
So no, there's no liquid-metal circulatory system a-la a T1000 terminator, its just a different biochemical oxygen carrier used sans red (or, in their case, bluegreen) blood cells.
As to why higher-order animals evolved to use iron rather than copper, bound in cells rather than free-floating, is mostly a physics-based problem. A non-closed circulatory system is ineffective in organisms without an exoskeleton maintaining internal pressure. Once an organism exceeds a certain size, hemolymph has trouble carrying enough oxygen for distant tissue, and an organism would expend a great deal of resources creating enough protein to keep its extremeties oxygenated. Hemeoglobin bound in cells specifically designed to create and maintain it is an energy-advantageous arrangement.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemolymph
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gibberalic
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13y ago
Yup, this is correct. Very few spiders eat 'solids'. They inject a fluid into their prey with their chelicerae (what you probably called spider fangs as a kid) and this fluid liquifies and digests the insect. This is then slurped back up. It's called external digestion and is pretty popular in the world of small animals.
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All these are symbols typically linked to Apollo, down to the copper and the strings, the bite and the toxins, the word "toxin" itself being a symbol for Apollo also, as it connects to a word referring to archery symbols like the bow and the arrow, just like the tomoe connected to the arm guard linked to archery as well:
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The English word "toxin" ultimately derives from the Ancient Greek word τόξον ( tóxon), meaning "bow" or "arrow". The related Ancient Greek adjective, τοξικόν (toxikón), meant "poison meant to be used on arrows". This concept then passed into Latin as toxicus ("poisoned") and from there into French toxique and finally into English in the mid-1600s.
Here's a step-by-step breakdown of the word's etymology:
Ancient Greek: The root is τόξον (tóxon), referring to a bow or arrow.
Ancient Greek (continued): The adjective τοξικόν (toxikón) was used to describe "poison for use on arrows".
Latin: The term was adopted into Latin as toxicum (poison) or toxicus (poisoned).
Late Latin/French: The Late Latin term evolved into the French word toxique.
English: The word entered English around the mid-17th century, initially referring to something literally poisoned or pertaining to arrows, and later evolving to describe naturally occurring poisons from living organisms.
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kFoyauextlH
- Posts: 742
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Re: Talpa: Nether Realm, (9) Nine Armors, (b) North Wind, and (P) North Star
I copy paste from websites to preserve their writing in another location, such as this, due to how frequently they seem to disappear and aren't always completely available through archives either.
https://printsofjapan.wordpress.com/201 ... elsewhere/
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Welcome to my web – spiders (蜘蛛) in Japanese art and elsewhere
“…beads of morning dew not long for this world glistening jewel-like on a fragile spider’s web,
or wispy clouds dissolving into nothingness evoked impermanence…”
Photo of a spider web after a rain shower,
taken and posted by Snowdrop at her web log at ramages2.exblog.jp
(The quote above this gorgeous photo is from Parody, Irony and Ideology in the Fiction of Ihara Saikaku by David Gundry on page 23.)
The amazing thing is that the spider in Japan gets to have it both ways…
T. Volker in his book on The Animal in Far Eastern Art… noted: “”The spider, kumo, was either an innocent, even a favourable, being or an evil demon as seen, either from the point of view of a woman or a poet, or from that of a warrior; as met with either during the daytime or at night. For on the one hand the spider is an emblem of hability and industry, on the other hand of ruse and sorcery. And as soon as mankind was asleep, spiders became monstrously big. A spider in the morning means an invitation to a “chanoyu“, a teaceremony [sic], and a spider in the evening means that robbers are to be expected. This foretelling capacity of the spider is well known in Europe too, for as the French saying is: “Araignee au matin: chagrin, au midi: plaisir, an soir: grand espoir“.”
My loose translation of the French saying quoted above is: “A spider in the morning means sorrow, in the afternoon pleasure and in the evening great hope.”
Let’s start with the spider as a symbol of the dark side – tsuchigumo (土蜘蛛)
Sakata no Kintoki killing the tsuchigumo or Earth Spider – 1806
Katsukawa Shun’ei (勝川春英 – 1762-1819)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Now I will dive into the weeds of the tsuchigumo (or Tsuchigumo) issue: what exactly was it?
According to a lot of great scholars the early Japanese – as we know them today – referred to other native peoples derogatorily as ‘earth-spiders.’ Why? Because many of these other early people lived either in caves or in holes in the ground. In the Kojiki it says in Book 2, Chapter 52:
When [Kamu-yamatö-ipare-biko-nö-mikötö] arrived at the great pit dwelling of Osaka,
there were eighty mighty men with tails, of the Tuti-gumo, waiting inside the pit-dwelling
with great clamor.
Then the child of the heavenly deities commanded that a banquet be given the eighty mighty men.
The banquet was a ruse. The emperor Jimmu’s men who are supposed to serve a feast to the pit dwellers were also told to carry their weapons with them. Then, when a particular song was begun, Jimmu’s men would cut down their guests, thus conquering that part of Japan.
Katsukawa Shuntei (勝川春亭 – 1770-1824) triptych
Ritsumeikan University Library
So, you are probably asking yourself – and I am being sarcastic here: “Who would ever apply a demeaning name to another group of people.” My question: “Who doesn’t?”
When I was younger, I was sent off in the early 1970s to a prep-school in Arizona for a year – a great experience. I was assigned to the last room in a dorm called ‘West Papago’. I was told that the dorm was named after a native tribe. It wasn’t until I was reading an article in the New York Times from September 9, 1990 that I read the truth: “In other cases Indian names have been found offensive because they came from a hostile tribe. The name of those inhabiting the Papago Reservation in Arizona was changed to Tohono O’dham when it was discovered that the name Papago, given them by another tribe, means ”Bean-eaters.” The name of the reservation, however, can only be changed by Congress.” If I had been reading the Times more assiduously in 1979, June 24th to be exact, I would have read that it was the Pima tribe that gave them that name. I even have a faint memory of having read that early Spanish explorers might have been the ones who asked the Pima, “What is the name of those people over there?” The Pima, naturally, said: “The bean-eaters.” But, who knows? Memories can be a tricky thing and I do admit that I have a tendency at the least to embellish. [Salvador Dali once said that everything he said was a lie. And yet we quote many of those lies today as if they were the Gospel truth. My point… you can figure this one out.]
“Jumping spider looking at me”
Posted at Wikipedia Commons by coniferconifer
In the Tsuchigumo zōshi there is a description of what happened after Raikō and Tsuna finally slayed the monster:
“In a lighting flash, Raikō unsheathed his broken sword and decapitated it. As Tsuna moved to open the creature’s
great belly, he found a deep gash in the middle of…. [where Raikō had slashed at the apparition of a great beauty in
an old abandoned, dilapidated house earlier. She vanished into thin air, but left a trail of white blood which led
them to the monster’s cave.] From the sword’s incision, 1,990 heads poured out. When they cut open its flank,
numerous small spiders about the size of seven- or eight year-old children noisily trotted about. When they looked
further into the stomach, they found very small skulls, numbering around twenty. The warriors dug a grave in the
ground and buried the skulls, then set fire to the monster’s den.”
Yoritmitsu and his men attacking the Earth Spider
This triptych is by Utagawa Yoshitsuya (歌川芳艶 – 1822-66) and dates from ca. 1850.
We have put it here – out of chronological order – because it looks so much like the photograph above it.
Jules Michelet (1798-1874), speaking about spiders in the 1875 English edition of L’Insecte (originally published in 1858), noted:
“The worst of it is, as far as the poor creature is concerned, that it is profoundly ugly.
It is not one of those which, ugly to the naked eye, are rehabilitated by the microscope.”
[The bold type is my choice.]
Watanabe no Tsuna and Sakata Kintoki playing go in a room with monsters
In the background are Hirai Yasumasa and Minamoto Yorimitsu (Raikō)
by Utagawa Kunisada (歌川国貞 – 1786-1864)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Utagawa Kuninaga (歌川国長 – died in 1827 or 1829)
Harvard Museums
The Earth Spider – 1843
Utagawa Sadahide (歌川貞秀 – 1807-73)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Four Retainers of Raikō and the Monster Candle (四天王化物蝋燭)
Anonymous 1868
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Scene from the kabuki dance piece Tsuchigumo – 1866
Toyohara Kunichika (豊原国周 1835-1900)
The Kunichika triptych shown above illustrates a scene from a play written by Kawatake Mokuami (1816-93), the playwright who more than anyone else tried to bring the traditional kabuki theater into a new age. His work was based on older kabuki plays, which in turn were based on older Nō theater productions, which themselves were based on much older mythic tales.
Leave it to Yoshitoshi to give us another variation on this story –
Prince Kurokumo receiving special powers from the Earth Spider – 1867
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (月岡芳年 – 1839-92)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Ashmolean Museum at Oxford owns another copy of this print. Their curatorial files state: “Here the earth spider transfers magical powers to Prince Kurokumo to help him plot revenge on his enemy, the tenth-century warrior Minamoto no Yorimitsu (also known as Raikō).”
The Earth Spider often took the form or a beautiful, seductive woman with a come-hither look in her eye
Kabuki theater particularly loved staging performances where the spider is presented as a beauty. Of course, it was traditionally a man who was playing a woman, but considering their skill levels these actors made their audience believe they were actually watching a femme fatale. In the first example I am going to show you, by Toyokuni I, I can’t get over the fact that the spider/woman has a look akin to that of a female saint or even the Madonna in European art. The hair adornments make it look almost like a celestial aura or halo. But, of course, here the contemporary Japanese reference would have been more to a greatly desired and famous courtesan, than a European saint. Still…
The actor Segawa Kikunojō V as the Spirit of the Old Spider – 1818
Utagawa Toyokuni I (1769-1825)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
It might not be so obvious that the woman represented is a stand-in for the Earth Spider. Take the example by Toyokuni III shown below. It dates from 1853. It is from the center panel of a triptych. It represents Sangoku no Tayu – actually the Earth Spider – holding an umbrella. She is certainly elegant and voluptuous, but what clue tells us she is ‘the spider’? Perhaps it is the umbrella which is loosely reminiscent of a spider web.
The courtesan Sangoku no Tayu who is actually the Earth Spider
Center panel from a triptych from 1853
Toyokuni III
The next image is also by Toyokuni III, from the same year, illustrating the same kabuki play production and the same character. However, here the connection between the woman and the spider is made more apparent.
Middle panel of an 1853 triptych also by Toyokuni III
Waseda University
Usugumo (薄雲) is the 19th chapter of the Tale of Genji and so much more –
Usugumo literally means ‘wispy clouds’, or, at least, that is one translation. Because of the ‘gumo’ part of that word the Tale early on was linked by a homonym to the Earth Spider. One Japanese word, kumo means spider (蜘蛛), while another one with the same pronunciation means a cloud (雲). Like pair and pear or their and there. In time, there were a series of great beauties, courtesans, who were known by the name Usugumo – the wispy clouds and not the spider. And yet… and yet… and yet… in so many early myths the spirit of the Earth Spider often took the form of a stunningly attractive woman.
The courtesan Usugumo as the spirit of the Earth Spider – 1864
Utagawa Kunisada II (1823-80)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Are you confused yet? Is it me or is it the subject? I don’t know, but I am sure I share some of the blame. I am just not bright enough to untangle this mess. Now, some more information that will only make this topic more maddening. Andrew Gerstle in Chikamatsu: Five Late Plays – Chikamatsu who lived from 1653-1725 – Gerstle wrote about Acts 4 and 5 of The Tethered Steed and the Eight Provinces of Kantō: “[These acts] shift the focus to the theme of the power of legitimate government as represented by the supernatural powers invested in particular swords received or blessed by the gods who protect the imperial center, a major theme of traditional battle literature from earliest times. The nō play Tsuchigumo (Earth Spider), the source of the action in acts 4 and 5, is a fantastic dance piece, but it also about protecting the center from threatening forces at the periphery, in this case a supernatural spider. Chikamatsu merges three elements: the Masakado-Yoshikado rebellion, the vengeful spirit of jealousy represented by Kochō (Yoshikado’s sister) who becomes the earth spider, and the traditional “earth spider” story, with its focus on the might of the “spider killing” (kumo-kirimaru, or hizamaru) sword, representing the power of the “legitimate” forces who protect the imperial center.”
At one point in the play, The Tethered Steed… Kochō speaks threateningly to a group of women:
“You don’t recognize this figure? Once before, long ago, I lived in the world, harboring grudges, passing many years
on Mount Kazuragi, waiting a chance for revenge. I am the spirit of the Earth Spider. My brother Shōgun Tarō
Masakado plotted to take over all Japan and make it the devil’s empire. As his younger sister, Ijoined in his plan but
lost my way for love, was murdered and left to rot in the earth. My spirit has taken form in the five elements. Know
the power of my rage!
Narrator: Her glare is fierce, but the four women remain firm, unafraid of the phantom.
Iwafuji: What foolish babble! Attacking the imperial realm draws the wrath of both heaven and hell. Didn’t you learn
your folly when you were destroyed by Yorimitsu? Your deeds condemn you to suffer endless death and rebirth as an
evil, poisonous spider. We’ll sever your ties to this world.
Narrator: The four attack, swords in hand, pushing their skirts aside. (First) The spider flies up. (Second) They attack
from the right. (First) She parries from the left. (Second) They attack from behind. (First) She whirls to face them.
They try all sorts of stratagems to assail the monster.
Women: You won’t get away. There’s no escape. (battle cadence) No way out!
Narrator: The four cry out together as they surround the fiend. The specter suddenly vanishes, and a fire roars up. The
flames explode into a raging inferno.
Kohata: Curse it! We’ve lost her.
Narrator: (emotional cadence) In despair, they are left helpless in the garden.
(First) Amid the charred trees and singed kimonos, a hearty laugh is heard. Kochō flutters about lightly as if walking on
mist and carried by the fragrance of plum blossoms yet heavy is the karma which weighs down the branches under her
feet. She seems neither to walk nor fly.”
[My apologies to Professor Gerstle. I didn’t exactly follow his notations to a tee. I made a judgement call so that your reading of this passage would go more smoothly. His is the better example within the context of his book, but… Sorry.]
This is number 19, Usugumo (薄雲) ‘Wisps of Clouds’,
from a series called ‘Ukiyo-e Parallels for the Cloudy Chapters of the Tale of Genji’
Genji kumo ukiyoe awase (源氏雲浮世絵合) – ca. 1845-46
(Yoshikado is the one standing there with his sister/spirit/spider looming behind him.
Yasukata is the seated one holding the sword.)
Sometimes the spider isn’t a woman because there is a woman killing the spider –
Kamigashihime killing the spiders – 1757
Tsukioka Settei (1710-87)
Princess Kamigashi “…reportedly lived during hte reign of the legendary Emperor Keikō (71-130). She is said to have gone after the Earth Spider. One of the most dramatic prints ever is her slaying the Tsuchigumo by Kuniyoshi.
Kamigashihime (神我志姫) about to slay the Tsuchigumo – ca. 1825-30
Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Don’t forget the Nō play Tsuchigumo
Scene from Tshuchigumo – 1901
Tsukioka Kōgyo (月岡耕漁 – 1869-1927)
Ritsumeikan University
Noriko Reider tells us:
“According to the Noh text, Minamoto no Raikō is stricken by an unknown illness. His maid, Kochō, brings medicine
but it does not help. One night, a strange priest appears at Raikō’s bedside and begins casting silken threads across
Raikō’s bedside and begins casting silken threads across Raikō’s body. Surprised, Raikō strikes the creature with his
renowned sword and the being disappears, dripping blood behind it. It turns out that Raikō’s illness was caused by this
strange creature, whose real identity is the spirit of the spider that had been killed by the emperor’s army at Mt.
Katsuraki. Raikō’s vassal follows the trail of blood and kills the spirit of the spider.”
Noh Spider (土蜘蛛)（NHK Educational Television）
Reider goes on to point out that the maid/nurse Kochō may actually have been the spirit of the spider in an alluring female form – not an uncommon thing for spiders to turn themselves into. “This Kochō was once the stunningly beautiful woman who waited for Raikō in the haunted house. As the beauty turned out to be a gigantic female spider, Kochō in the Noh play is a spirit of the spider who also shape-shifted into the priest.”
The medicine she had been administering to Raikō was actually poison. What else would it be? But if that wasn’t sinister enough, the priest that comes to him is also that same spider’s spirit, but now in a different form. This stuff is just as good as the stuff they put on television or in the movies. It certainly captures the imagination.
The priest had recited the beginnings of a famous poem originally composed by a concubine to her absent lover, the emperor.
わがせこが
くべきよひなり
ささがにの
くものふるまひ
かねてしるしも
Waga seko ga
kubeki yoi nari,
sasagani no
kumo no furumai
kanete shirushi mo…
The full love poem by Sotōri Iratsume reads:
“This is the night,
my husband will come,
the little crab,
the spider’s action,
it manifests in advance”
Note: “the little crab” is another expression substituted for a spider.
How do you scare the bejeezus out of a group of rough, tough samurai warriors?
The answer is simple: you tell them a bunch of scary stories building to a crescendo. “[The] interest in ghostly story telling transformed from a fad to an actual obsession due to an emerging parlor game — hyakumonogatari kaidankai, which translates as “a gathering of 100 weird tales.” The way to play was simple. Late at night, a group would gather together and light 100 candles about the room, sometimes in a circle, sometimes wherever there was space to put them. The guests would tell kaidan, one after the other, and each time a story was told, they would reach over and extinguish a single candle. The room would slowly darken, and the tension would heighten.” This is quoted from Zack Davisson’s Yurei: The Ghost Story. Later he notes that “…the grizzled veterans of old campaigns would gather the young pups together to play the game as a test of courage, to see who was brave enough to withstand the gruesome tales and who would shiver when the final light was doused.”
Then Davisson cites a particularly telling example:
“In a dark cave high in the mountains, a group of samurai gathered to test each other’s courage with tales of horror.
The candles cast flickering shadows on the wall, and with each tale told in succession, the nerves of the young men
began to fail along with the fading firelight. With only one candle remaining, the last storyteller reaches out to
complete the ritual and plunge the cave into total darkness. Suddenly a great black hand reaches down from the top
of the cave, sending the samurai scattering. One warrior keeps his wits however, and a quick swipe of his sword
severs the body of a spider gently lowering itself near the final candle — a spider whose shadow was the origin of the
enormous hand.”
The proof of the popularity of the Tsuchigumo image remaining popular well into the 20th century
Tsuchigumo – ca. 1940
Ueno Tadamasa (上野忠雅 – 1904-70)
Achenbach Foundation
(their example is mislabeled)
Not all Japanese art works of spiders were focused on the Tsuchigumo – but even there many of them were related
Illustration from the Eiyū gashi (英雄画史) – 1836
Keisai Eisen (1790-1848 – 渓斎英泉)
Staatsbibliothek Berlin
There is another copy of these two ehon prints in the collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Their curatorial files tell us what’s happening in this scene: “This scene depicts the 14th century warrior O_mori Hikoshichi fighting with demons. As a retainer of the great warlord Ashikaga Takauji (1305-1358), Hikoshichi joined the rebellion against emperor Godaigo and ultimately cornered and killed his fiercest general, Kusunoki Masashige (1294-1336). After the battle, Hikoshichi discovers Masashige’s ghost has returned to haunt him. The malevolent spirit first appears as a beautiful woman who transforms into a witch (shown here in the lower right corner). Later, at night, it changes into a giant spider and again attacks Hikoshichi.”
I don’t know about you, but… it is always a learning process. I love the double-page book illustration by Eisen shown above. Then yesterday I was doing some research – on just about everything in the universe – when I ran across this Shuntei print shown below. It dates from 1798 and shows Kintoki, the overturned go board and the horrible specter of the large, disembodied female head. Eisen had to get his ideas from somewhere. Maybe this helped.
Katsukawa Shuntei
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Now, with a bit of embarrassment, it turns out that I did know this print from a book by James King and Yuriko Iwakiri, Japanese Warrior Prints. Oooops. I forgot. They wrote: “The enormous head hovering on the left in this print is a form of goblin called ōgao or ōkubi (literally, ‘a large face’). As staged in the Kabuki dance, Kumo no ito azusa no yumihari (The Spider Thread of the Bowstring, 1765) by Kanai Sanshō (1731-97), Sakata no Kintoki and Usui Sadamitsu were on night-watch at Raikō’s mansion. They were passing the time by playing go, when various goblins under the spell of the Earth Spider (tsuchigumo), appeared one after another and attempted to kill Raikō…. Realizing that these were merely ghastly apparitions, Kintoki and Sadamitsu dispatched them with little trouble and thus squashed the Earth Spider’s evil plans.”
Illustration to the Tale of Shiranui, Part one – 1853
Toyokuni III (aka Kunisada)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Scene from the kabuki play Shikimoyō Shiranui Monogatari (四季模様白縫譚) – 1874
Utagawa Yoshitaki (歌川芳滝 – 1841-99)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
I found it! I found it! I am so excited! I found it!
For whatever reason, back in 2013 we had a bumper crop of spiders which meant we had a bumper crop of spider webs. One very moist, foggy morning the place looked like a wonderland. I went out and took a series of photos, but until today was unable to find any of them. (Today is December 13, 2017.) Then, while looking for something completely different in my emails I ran across I image I had sent to a friend. Now I can show it to you, too. Personally, I think it is lovely and credit the modern technology of the digital camera and nature for this opportunity.
Also, I think the photograph by Snowdrop at the top of this page is better.
It catches the light and sparkles. This is something my picture lacks.
Alas, alack.
Shoki ensnaring a demon in a spider web
Soga Shōhaku (曾我蕭白: 1730-81)
Kimbell Museum of Art
Object d’art with an emphasis on spiders
Late 18th century lacquer box
Spider going after a wasp
The Walters Art Museum
Netsuke with spider and fly on lotus leaf – 19th century
The Hermitage
Kagamibuta netsuke – 19th century
Victoria and Albert Museum
19th century fireman’s coat of
Raikō slaying the Earth Spider
Brooklyn Museum
Mizugumo (水蜘蛛) – or spider shoes for walking on water
ca. 1467-1703
The early cultures of Peru and Colombia liked their spiders… or, at least, they respected them!
Nose ornament – possibly the Salinar culture – Northern Peru
100 BC to 200 AD
Metropolitan Museum of Art
In Gold of the Americas Julie Jones wrote in 2002 that by the late centuries of the 1st millennium BC :
“In Peru the technology appears to have had specific meaning, for long after casting techniques were employed for other metals, gold objects were still chiefly hammered into intricate and complex shapes.
The four spiders “caught” in the delicate web of the ornament shown above illustrate the firm command of technique that existed by the end of the millennium. An elegant, lightweight, airy object, it was made with great control of medium and design, with its delicate parts simply
fused together in a balanced combination of open and opaque areas. The roundness of the spiders is echoed in the shapes of the web, and their compact bodies and four legs are clearly visible. Their tiny fangs appear, too, menacingly, in spite of the simplicity of the creatures’ forms. Spiders had long had a place in Peruvian mythology, and their association with fertility and sacrifice would have been understood by
all ancient viewers of the ornament.”
The curatorial files of the museum add: “Spider imagery occurs in Peruvian art from the middle of the first millennium B.C. onward, suggesting that spiders played a role in early Andean mythology. The spiders’ ability to catch and kill live prey associates them with sacrifice. Information from the sixteenth-century Inca peoples links spiders with rainfall and fertility.”
Gold and silver Moche earflare – 390-450
Metropolitan Museum of Art
In 1998 Deborah Schorsch wrote in “Silver-and-Gold Moche Artifacts from Loma Negra, Peru”:
“Mechanical joins were also used in the manufacture of the frontals from a pair of circular earflares divided between the Metropolitan Museum.. and the National Museum of the American Indian… Each frontal represents a silver spider in the center of a gold web… The spiders are three-dimensional, each having been formed from two raised sheets of silver that were pressure-fitted… The legs are made from four round silver wires, each threaded through a pair of holes on opposite sides of the body… The wires were fitted into rectangular holes in the webs and flattened so as not to slip out, holding the spiders mechanically in place.”
Early Peruvian, pre-Columbian, Moche golden spider (with eggs?) –
Exact date unknown
Museo Oro del Perú y Armas del Mundo
But, perhaps, the most remarkable early, pre-Columbian gold is the Sipán spider beads –
In 1987 a burial tomb at Sipán, Peru was excavated and some astounding items were found. Néstor Ignacio Alva Meneses wrote: “Many of the objects featured stylized zoomorphic images modeled into ornaments and effigies. One of the most elaborate and significant burial ornaments was a pectoral of ten gold, biconvex beads. Each piece of the necklace bore the representation of a spider suspended in the center of its web with its abdomen transformed into a human head…”
Sipán bead with an anthropormorphized human head seen from the belly of a spider.
(It appears large here, but is small in reality. It’s a bead, damnit! That is one of the
things that make it so darned breathtaking.)
We know that the spider and the anthropomorphized spider were firmly planted in the native psyches ages before the tour-de-force shown above. For example, there is a steatite carved bowl, rubbed with cinnabar, at Dumbarton Oaks, which shows a human-headed spider holding the head of a human. It is from the Cupinisque society, dated 900 to 600 BCE. Another steatite piece, this time a cup, from the same date, is decorated with stylized spiders. See below.
Cupinisque culture, coastal Peru
900 to 600 BCE, steatite cup with spiders
Dumbarton Oaks
Their curatorial files note: “Spiders are often represented on stone vessels from the Cupisnique culture, and it is likely that a supernatural being with arachnid attributes played an important role in Cupisnique religious thought. Based on iconographic evidence and ethnographic analogy, spiders were probably associated with rainfall, fertility, and perhaps divination. Their web-weaving abilities offer a metaphorical counterpart for weaving, one of the most important art forms in the Andes.”
Amber gives a view into our prehistoric past
Spider in Polish amber – age unknown, but it must be ancient
acquired in the late 17th century
The Hermitage
I thought I spotted a spider in this painting, but I was wrong. There are at least seven, eight, nine, maybe ten of them
While searching for spider images, I ran across this painting by Balthasar van der Ast in the Rijksmuseum. I have a fondness for still life paintings and have always liked this artist. He structured it in such a way as to make it clear that there was a spider crawling over a peach. You can’t miss it. It is right there just below the center of the painting, in the best lit area, one meant to attract our eye. We were meant to see it. Point blank!
Still-life with fruits and flowers – ca. 1620-21
Balthasar van der Ast (1593/4-1657)
The Rijksmuseum
(Odd thing: the reason we don’t know the exact date of this painting is because it is signed and dated in the lower left as 1620 and the same thing in the lower right, except there it is dated 1621. The same can not be said for his birth date. There we only know that it occurred in one of two years – either 1593 or 94. Like it matters…)
Detail #1. Boy, could this guy paint.
I was perfectly happy leaving my inspection at the one spider he wanted us to see, but, you know me, I like to look a little more into the details. And voila! Along the right side of the painting there are quite a few more. Adults and babies. And a spider web or two to boot.
Detail #2. Wow!
As a general point, van der Ast must have liked painting images of spiders lowering themselves down one of their threads because there is another still-life by him in the National Gallery in London which offers this exact same motif. That example was painted about ten years after this one.
Consider this beauty – a little over 1/2″ tall, 1 1/4″ wide and 1″ long – and it walks!
This astounding little mechanical wonder was created by the watchmaker Tobias Reichel. According to one source, Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland – for a while, mostly at war – also had a sense of humor and enjoyed releasing this brilliant automaton to the great surprise of his visitors. I am sure they were spooked. I would be.
Mechanical spider by Tobias Reichel, ca. 1603
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden
The power of myth: simple on the surface, layered beneath
Detail of an engraving of Athena attacking Arachne
Giacomo Franco, Venice – 1584
Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna
(The full print will be shown below soon.)
Arachne was a simple girl, of low birth, from a backwater community, motherless at an early age, but with an overwhelmingly great talent for weaving. Her skill was so great that women came from far and wide to marvel at her work. Sophisticated women. Her fame became so great that two things happened, two horribly important things: 1) Athena, no slouch herself at weaving heard of this girl’s work and 2) the girl, in time, suffered from a complete and total case of hubris. She was convinced that her abilities were the equal or superior to those of any other weaver on earth… or, even in heaven. (Note Athena was renamed Minerva by the Romans and that is how Ovid wrote about her in his Metamorphosis.)
Ovid tell us that Minerva/Athena came to earth disguised as an old woman, to take a look for herself up close to see what Arachne could do. She was impressed, but warned the girl not to presume that her work could rival that of a goddess. Arachne was infuriated and swore at the old woman, throwing in a lot of insults, to boot, and told her to mind her own business and that even a goddess could not rival her work. Minerva threw off her disguise and agreed to have a competition – just between the two of them. Minerva wove brilliantly and in her tapestry she showed scenes of gods turning presumptuous humans into other forms. Not very subtle, eh? Arachne’s work was equally brilliant, but it showed scenes of lustful gods going after anything on two legs in their unstoppable amorous pursuits. Now Minerva was really, really mad. Arachne’s tapestry was so well done and so beautiful – and insulting, but true – that the goddess tore it to shreds and “With the boxwood shuttle she beat Arachne’s face repeatedly. In grief Arachne strangled herself, stopping the passage of life with a noose. Minerva pitied her as she was hanging and raised her up with these words: “Stubborn girl, live and yet hang! And – to make you anxious for the future – may the same punishment be decreed for all your descendants.”
“With these words Minerva sprinkled her with the juice of a magic herb. As the fateful liquid touched her, Arachne’s hair dropped off, her nose and ears vanished, and her head was shrunken, her whole body was contracted. From her side thin fingers dangled for legs, and the rest became her belly. Yet still from this she lets the thread issue forth and, a spider now, practices her former weaving art.”
The Spinners, or the Fable of Arachne (ca. 1655-60)
Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (1599-1660)
Museo Nacional del Prado
Victor Hugo – 1871
Maison Victor Hugo
Finger painting album leaf – 1684
Gao Qipei (高其佩 – 1660-1734)
Minneapolis Museum of Art
L’araignée, elle sourit, les yeux levés (The spider, she smiles, eyes raised) – 1881
Charcoal on paper
Odilon Redon (1840-1916)
Musée d’Orsay
J. K. Huysmans (1848-1907) pays tribute in his 1884 novel À rebours to Redon and his own decadence in his reference to a series of Redon drawings, possibly including this one: “…a horrible spider with a human face lodged in the middle of its body.”
A silver gelatin print of dew on a spider web, ca. 1910
Wilson Alwyn Bentley (American – 1865-1931)
Metropolitan Museum of Art
You may not know Bentley’s name, but chances are, if you are of a certain semi-advanced and/or advanced age, you probably know his work. He is the man who perfected the technique of doing close-up photographs of snowflakes. It all started when he was 15 when his mother gave him a microscope. Did I mention they lived in Vermont? Below is just one example.
Silver gelatin print
Metropolitan Museum of Art
**********
AS USUAL, I WILL POST IMAGES FIRST
AND ADD TEXT LATER. THAT MEANS –
IF YOU CARE YOU SHOULD COME BACK SOON AND OFTEN!
BUT I WARN YOU, IT IS GOING TO GET A BIT CREEPY.
THANKS!
"
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/722614
"
Sipán lords were buried with crescent-shaped regalia, perhaps a reference to the blade of a ritual knife known as a tumi. The backflap (a type of body armor, suspended from the waist) and rattle here both depict an anthropomorphized spider whose paired legs form an X that extends from its body. Known as the Spider Decapitator, this fearsome creature brandishes a knife and a severed human head (another is incised at the base of the headdress’s crescent). Spiders catch prey in their webs and drain vital fluids—much like Moche warriors who captured their enemies, tied them with ropes, and drained their blood.
"
https://smarthistory.org/moche-royal-tomb-sipan/
https://gogeometry.com/Sipan.htm
https://imgur.com/gallery/spider-beads- ... 0-ad-C4m2G
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huaca_Rajada
"
In February 1987, a man by the name of Ernil Bernal led a band of huaqueros (tomb looters) who tunneled into one of the pyramids located at Huaca Rajada. Over the next few nights, they took a large number of valuable metal objects, destroying hundreds of ceramics and human remains in the process. Untold numbers of artifacts were lost, sold for profit to private collections on the black market.[10] Alva arrived with the police a day or more later, after an exceedingly ornate mask had been confiscated from the huaqueros stash house and presented to the researcher.[11] There are a number of accounts from the events taking place upon the arrival of Alva and the police, however it is clear that they were able to drive the huaqueros away from the site, erect fences around the tombs, and begin excavation.[12] Thereafter Alva and his team excavated 12 more tombs while villagers and huaqueros threw rocks and taunted them in an attempt to get the researchers out of the site and allow the looting to continue. The villagers were unsuccessful, however, as Alva completed his work which became the foundation of the "Royal Tombs of Sipán" discussed below.[13][14]
"
Gosh, if that is true, what annoying pieces of sh*t they are made out to be lol.
I visited these places recently in a dream.
I think this was one of the areas I went to, since I think that this was the name mentioned in the dream and it looks similar, though the area I was around had a museum or tourist center for a nearby archeological site and the whole area was very dry.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cusco
"
The indigenous name of this city is Qusqu. Although the name was used in Southern Quechua, its origin is found in the Aymara language. The word is derived from the phrase qusqu wanka ('rock of the owl'), related to the city's foundation myth of the Ayar siblings. According to this legend, Ayar Awqa (Ayar Auca) acquired wings and flew to the site of the future city; there he was transformed into a rock to mark the possession of the land by his ayllu ("lineage"):[4]
Then Ayar Oche stood up, displayed a pair of large wings, and said he should be the one to stay at Guanacaure as an idol in order to speak with their father the Sun. Then they went up on top of the hill. Now at the site where he was to remain as an idol, Ayar Oche raised up in flight toward the heavens so high that they could not see him. He returned and told Ayar Manco that from then on he was to be named Manco Capac. Ayar Oche came from where the Sun was and the Sun had ordered that Ayar Manco take that name and go to the town that they had seen. After this had been stated by the idol, Ayar Oche turned into a stone, just as he was, with his wings. Later Manco Capac went down with Ayar Auca to their settlement...he liked the place now occupied in this city Cuzco. Manco Capac and his companion, with the help of the four women, made a house. Having done this, Manco Capac and his companion, with the four women, planted some land with maize. It is said that they took the maize from the cave, which this lord Manco Capac named Pacaritambo, which means those of origin because...they came out of that cave.[5]: 15–16
"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallku
Weird that they ended up with the same word with a similar meaning as the word used in the Middle East.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%91usta
https://printsofjapan.wordpress.com/201 ... elsewhere/
"
Welcome to my web – spiders (蜘蛛) in Japanese art and elsewhere
“…beads of morning dew not long for this world glistening jewel-like on a fragile spider’s web,
or wispy clouds dissolving into nothingness evoked impermanence…”
Photo of a spider web after a rain shower,
taken and posted by Snowdrop at her web log at ramages2.exblog.jp
(The quote above this gorgeous photo is from Parody, Irony and Ideology in the Fiction of Ihara Saikaku by David Gundry on page 23.)
The amazing thing is that the spider in Japan gets to have it both ways…
T. Volker in his book on The Animal in Far Eastern Art… noted: “”The spider, kumo, was either an innocent, even a favourable, being or an evil demon as seen, either from the point of view of a woman or a poet, or from that of a warrior; as met with either during the daytime or at night. For on the one hand the spider is an emblem of hability and industry, on the other hand of ruse and sorcery. And as soon as mankind was asleep, spiders became monstrously big. A spider in the morning means an invitation to a “chanoyu“, a teaceremony [sic], and a spider in the evening means that robbers are to be expected. This foretelling capacity of the spider is well known in Europe too, for as the French saying is: “Araignee au matin: chagrin, au midi: plaisir, an soir: grand espoir“.”
My loose translation of the French saying quoted above is: “A spider in the morning means sorrow, in the afternoon pleasure and in the evening great hope.”
Let’s start with the spider as a symbol of the dark side – tsuchigumo (土蜘蛛)
Sakata no Kintoki killing the tsuchigumo or Earth Spider – 1806
Katsukawa Shun’ei (勝川春英 – 1762-1819)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Now I will dive into the weeds of the tsuchigumo (or Tsuchigumo) issue: what exactly was it?
According to a lot of great scholars the early Japanese – as we know them today – referred to other native peoples derogatorily as ‘earth-spiders.’ Why? Because many of these other early people lived either in caves or in holes in the ground. In the Kojiki it says in Book 2, Chapter 52:
When [Kamu-yamatö-ipare-biko-nö-mikötö] arrived at the great pit dwelling of Osaka,
there were eighty mighty men with tails, of the Tuti-gumo, waiting inside the pit-dwelling
with great clamor.
Then the child of the heavenly deities commanded that a banquet be given the eighty mighty men.
The banquet was a ruse. The emperor Jimmu’s men who are supposed to serve a feast to the pit dwellers were also told to carry their weapons with them. Then, when a particular song was begun, Jimmu’s men would cut down their guests, thus conquering that part of Japan.
Katsukawa Shuntei (勝川春亭 – 1770-1824) triptych
Ritsumeikan University Library
So, you are probably asking yourself – and I am being sarcastic here: “Who would ever apply a demeaning name to another group of people.” My question: “Who doesn’t?”
When I was younger, I was sent off in the early 1970s to a prep-school in Arizona for a year – a great experience. I was assigned to the last room in a dorm called ‘West Papago’. I was told that the dorm was named after a native tribe. It wasn’t until I was reading an article in the New York Times from September 9, 1990 that I read the truth: “In other cases Indian names have been found offensive because they came from a hostile tribe. The name of those inhabiting the Papago Reservation in Arizona was changed to Tohono O’dham when it was discovered that the name Papago, given them by another tribe, means ”Bean-eaters.” The name of the reservation, however, can only be changed by Congress.” If I had been reading the Times more assiduously in 1979, June 24th to be exact, I would have read that it was the Pima tribe that gave them that name. I even have a faint memory of having read that early Spanish explorers might have been the ones who asked the Pima, “What is the name of those people over there?” The Pima, naturally, said: “The bean-eaters.” But, who knows? Memories can be a tricky thing and I do admit that I have a tendency at the least to embellish. [Salvador Dali once said that everything he said was a lie. And yet we quote many of those lies today as if they were the Gospel truth. My point… you can figure this one out.]
“Jumping spider looking at me”
Posted at Wikipedia Commons by coniferconifer
In the Tsuchigumo zōshi there is a description of what happened after Raikō and Tsuna finally slayed the monster:
“In a lighting flash, Raikō unsheathed his broken sword and decapitated it. As Tsuna moved to open the creature’s
great belly, he found a deep gash in the middle of…. [where Raikō had slashed at the apparition of a great beauty in
an old abandoned, dilapidated house earlier. She vanished into thin air, but left a trail of white blood which led
them to the monster’s cave.] From the sword’s incision, 1,990 heads poured out. When they cut open its flank,
numerous small spiders about the size of seven- or eight year-old children noisily trotted about. When they looked
further into the stomach, they found very small skulls, numbering around twenty. The warriors dug a grave in the
ground and buried the skulls, then set fire to the monster’s den.”
Yoritmitsu and his men attacking the Earth Spider
This triptych is by Utagawa Yoshitsuya (歌川芳艶 – 1822-66) and dates from ca. 1850.
We have put it here – out of chronological order – because it looks so much like the photograph above it.
Jules Michelet (1798-1874), speaking about spiders in the 1875 English edition of L’Insecte (originally published in 1858), noted:
“The worst of it is, as far as the poor creature is concerned, that it is profoundly ugly.
It is not one of those which, ugly to the naked eye, are rehabilitated by the microscope.”
[The bold type is my choice.]
Watanabe no Tsuna and Sakata Kintoki playing go in a room with monsters
In the background are Hirai Yasumasa and Minamoto Yorimitsu (Raikō)
by Utagawa Kunisada (歌川国貞 – 1786-1864)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Utagawa Kuninaga (歌川国長 – died in 1827 or 1829)
Harvard Museums
The Earth Spider – 1843
Utagawa Sadahide (歌川貞秀 – 1807-73)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Four Retainers of Raikō and the Monster Candle (四天王化物蝋燭)
Anonymous 1868
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Scene from the kabuki dance piece Tsuchigumo – 1866
Toyohara Kunichika (豊原国周 1835-1900)
The Kunichika triptych shown above illustrates a scene from a play written by Kawatake Mokuami (1816-93), the playwright who more than anyone else tried to bring the traditional kabuki theater into a new age. His work was based on older kabuki plays, which in turn were based on older Nō theater productions, which themselves were based on much older mythic tales.
Leave it to Yoshitoshi to give us another variation on this story –
Prince Kurokumo receiving special powers from the Earth Spider – 1867
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (月岡芳年 – 1839-92)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Ashmolean Museum at Oxford owns another copy of this print. Their curatorial files state: “Here the earth spider transfers magical powers to Prince Kurokumo to help him plot revenge on his enemy, the tenth-century warrior Minamoto no Yorimitsu (also known as Raikō).”
The Earth Spider often took the form or a beautiful, seductive woman with a come-hither look in her eye
Kabuki theater particularly loved staging performances where the spider is presented as a beauty. Of course, it was traditionally a man who was playing a woman, but considering their skill levels these actors made their audience believe they were actually watching a femme fatale. In the first example I am going to show you, by Toyokuni I, I can’t get over the fact that the spider/woman has a look akin to that of a female saint or even the Madonna in European art. The hair adornments make it look almost like a celestial aura or halo. But, of course, here the contemporary Japanese reference would have been more to a greatly desired and famous courtesan, than a European saint. Still…
The actor Segawa Kikunojō V as the Spirit of the Old Spider – 1818
Utagawa Toyokuni I (1769-1825)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
It might not be so obvious that the woman represented is a stand-in for the Earth Spider. Take the example by Toyokuni III shown below. It dates from 1853. It is from the center panel of a triptych. It represents Sangoku no Tayu – actually the Earth Spider – holding an umbrella. She is certainly elegant and voluptuous, but what clue tells us she is ‘the spider’? Perhaps it is the umbrella which is loosely reminiscent of a spider web.
The courtesan Sangoku no Tayu who is actually the Earth Spider
Center panel from a triptych from 1853
Toyokuni III
The next image is also by Toyokuni III, from the same year, illustrating the same kabuki play production and the same character. However, here the connection between the woman and the spider is made more apparent.
Middle panel of an 1853 triptych also by Toyokuni III
Waseda University
Usugumo (薄雲) is the 19th chapter of the Tale of Genji and so much more –
Usugumo literally means ‘wispy clouds’, or, at least, that is one translation. Because of the ‘gumo’ part of that word the Tale early on was linked by a homonym to the Earth Spider. One Japanese word, kumo means spider (蜘蛛), while another one with the same pronunciation means a cloud (雲). Like pair and pear or their and there. In time, there were a series of great beauties, courtesans, who were known by the name Usugumo – the wispy clouds and not the spider. And yet… and yet… and yet… in so many early myths the spirit of the Earth Spider often took the form of a stunningly attractive woman.
The courtesan Usugumo as the spirit of the Earth Spider – 1864
Utagawa Kunisada II (1823-80)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Are you confused yet? Is it me or is it the subject? I don’t know, but I am sure I share some of the blame. I am just not bright enough to untangle this mess. Now, some more information that will only make this topic more maddening. Andrew Gerstle in Chikamatsu: Five Late Plays – Chikamatsu who lived from 1653-1725 – Gerstle wrote about Acts 4 and 5 of The Tethered Steed and the Eight Provinces of Kantō: “[These acts] shift the focus to the theme of the power of legitimate government as represented by the supernatural powers invested in particular swords received or blessed by the gods who protect the imperial center, a major theme of traditional battle literature from earliest times. The nō play Tsuchigumo (Earth Spider), the source of the action in acts 4 and 5, is a fantastic dance piece, but it also about protecting the center from threatening forces at the periphery, in this case a supernatural spider. Chikamatsu merges three elements: the Masakado-Yoshikado rebellion, the vengeful spirit of jealousy represented by Kochō (Yoshikado’s sister) who becomes the earth spider, and the traditional “earth spider” story, with its focus on the might of the “spider killing” (kumo-kirimaru, or hizamaru) sword, representing the power of the “legitimate” forces who protect the imperial center.”
At one point in the play, The Tethered Steed… Kochō speaks threateningly to a group of women:
“You don’t recognize this figure? Once before, long ago, I lived in the world, harboring grudges, passing many years
on Mount Kazuragi, waiting a chance for revenge. I am the spirit of the Earth Spider. My brother Shōgun Tarō
Masakado plotted to take over all Japan and make it the devil’s empire. As his younger sister, Ijoined in his plan but
lost my way for love, was murdered and left to rot in the earth. My spirit has taken form in the five elements. Know
the power of my rage!
Narrator: Her glare is fierce, but the four women remain firm, unafraid of the phantom.
Iwafuji: What foolish babble! Attacking the imperial realm draws the wrath of both heaven and hell. Didn’t you learn
your folly when you were destroyed by Yorimitsu? Your deeds condemn you to suffer endless death and rebirth as an
evil, poisonous spider. We’ll sever your ties to this world.
Narrator: The four attack, swords in hand, pushing their skirts aside. (First) The spider flies up. (Second) They attack
from the right. (First) She parries from the left. (Second) They attack from behind. (First) She whirls to face them.
They try all sorts of stratagems to assail the monster.
Women: You won’t get away. There’s no escape. (battle cadence) No way out!
Narrator: The four cry out together as they surround the fiend. The specter suddenly vanishes, and a fire roars up. The
flames explode into a raging inferno.
Kohata: Curse it! We’ve lost her.
Narrator: (emotional cadence) In despair, they are left helpless in the garden.
(First) Amid the charred trees and singed kimonos, a hearty laugh is heard. Kochō flutters about lightly as if walking on
mist and carried by the fragrance of plum blossoms yet heavy is the karma which weighs down the branches under her
feet. She seems neither to walk nor fly.”
[My apologies to Professor Gerstle. I didn’t exactly follow his notations to a tee. I made a judgement call so that your reading of this passage would go more smoothly. His is the better example within the context of his book, but… Sorry.]
This is number 19, Usugumo (薄雲) ‘Wisps of Clouds’,
from a series called ‘Ukiyo-e Parallels for the Cloudy Chapters of the Tale of Genji’
Genji kumo ukiyoe awase (源氏雲浮世絵合) – ca. 1845-46
(Yoshikado is the one standing there with his sister/spirit/spider looming behind him.
Yasukata is the seated one holding the sword.)
Sometimes the spider isn’t a woman because there is a woman killing the spider –
Kamigashihime killing the spiders – 1757
Tsukioka Settei (1710-87)
Princess Kamigashi “…reportedly lived during hte reign of the legendary Emperor Keikō (71-130). She is said to have gone after the Earth Spider. One of the most dramatic prints ever is her slaying the Tsuchigumo by Kuniyoshi.
Kamigashihime (神我志姫) about to slay the Tsuchigumo – ca. 1825-30
Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Don’t forget the Nō play Tsuchigumo
Scene from Tshuchigumo – 1901
Tsukioka Kōgyo (月岡耕漁 – 1869-1927)
Ritsumeikan University
Noriko Reider tells us:
“According to the Noh text, Minamoto no Raikō is stricken by an unknown illness. His maid, Kochō, brings medicine
but it does not help. One night, a strange priest appears at Raikō’s bedside and begins casting silken threads across
Raikō’s bedside and begins casting silken threads across Raikō’s body. Surprised, Raikō strikes the creature with his
renowned sword and the being disappears, dripping blood behind it. It turns out that Raikō’s illness was caused by this
strange creature, whose real identity is the spirit of the spider that had been killed by the emperor’s army at Mt.
Katsuraki. Raikō’s vassal follows the trail of blood and kills the spirit of the spider.”
Noh Spider (土蜘蛛)（NHK Educational Television）
Reider goes on to point out that the maid/nurse Kochō may actually have been the spirit of the spider in an alluring female form – not an uncommon thing for spiders to turn themselves into. “This Kochō was once the stunningly beautiful woman who waited for Raikō in the haunted house. As the beauty turned out to be a gigantic female spider, Kochō in the Noh play is a spirit of the spider who also shape-shifted into the priest.”
The medicine she had been administering to Raikō was actually poison. What else would it be? But if that wasn’t sinister enough, the priest that comes to him is also that same spider’s spirit, but now in a different form. This stuff is just as good as the stuff they put on television or in the movies. It certainly captures the imagination.
The priest had recited the beginnings of a famous poem originally composed by a concubine to her absent lover, the emperor.
わがせこが
くべきよひなり
ささがにの
くものふるまひ
かねてしるしも
Waga seko ga
kubeki yoi nari,
sasagani no
kumo no furumai
kanete shirushi mo…
The full love poem by Sotōri Iratsume reads:
“This is the night,
my husband will come,
the little crab,
the spider’s action,
it manifests in advance”
Note: “the little crab” is another expression substituted for a spider.
How do you scare the bejeezus out of a group of rough, tough samurai warriors?
The answer is simple: you tell them a bunch of scary stories building to a crescendo. “[The] interest in ghostly story telling transformed from a fad to an actual obsession due to an emerging parlor game — hyakumonogatari kaidankai, which translates as “a gathering of 100 weird tales.” The way to play was simple. Late at night, a group would gather together and light 100 candles about the room, sometimes in a circle, sometimes wherever there was space to put them. The guests would tell kaidan, one after the other, and each time a story was told, they would reach over and extinguish a single candle. The room would slowly darken, and the tension would heighten.” This is quoted from Zack Davisson’s Yurei: The Ghost Story. Later he notes that “…the grizzled veterans of old campaigns would gather the young pups together to play the game as a test of courage, to see who was brave enough to withstand the gruesome tales and who would shiver when the final light was doused.”
Then Davisson cites a particularly telling example:
“In a dark cave high in the mountains, a group of samurai gathered to test each other’s courage with tales of horror.
The candles cast flickering shadows on the wall, and with each tale told in succession, the nerves of the young men
began to fail along with the fading firelight. With only one candle remaining, the last storyteller reaches out to
complete the ritual and plunge the cave into total darkness. Suddenly a great black hand reaches down from the top
of the cave, sending the samurai scattering. One warrior keeps his wits however, and a quick swipe of his sword
severs the body of a spider gently lowering itself near the final candle — a spider whose shadow was the origin of the
enormous hand.”
The proof of the popularity of the Tsuchigumo image remaining popular well into the 20th century
Tsuchigumo – ca. 1940
Ueno Tadamasa (上野忠雅 – 1904-70)
Achenbach Foundation
(their example is mislabeled)
Not all Japanese art works of spiders were focused on the Tsuchigumo – but even there many of them were related
Illustration from the Eiyū gashi (英雄画史) – 1836
Keisai Eisen (1790-1848 – 渓斎英泉)
Staatsbibliothek Berlin
There is another copy of these two ehon prints in the collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Their curatorial files tell us what’s happening in this scene: “This scene depicts the 14th century warrior O_mori Hikoshichi fighting with demons. As a retainer of the great warlord Ashikaga Takauji (1305-1358), Hikoshichi joined the rebellion against emperor Godaigo and ultimately cornered and killed his fiercest general, Kusunoki Masashige (1294-1336). After the battle, Hikoshichi discovers Masashige’s ghost has returned to haunt him. The malevolent spirit first appears as a beautiful woman who transforms into a witch (shown here in the lower right corner). Later, at night, it changes into a giant spider and again attacks Hikoshichi.”
I don’t know about you, but… it is always a learning process. I love the double-page book illustration by Eisen shown above. Then yesterday I was doing some research – on just about everything in the universe – when I ran across this Shuntei print shown below. It dates from 1798 and shows Kintoki, the overturned go board and the horrible specter of the large, disembodied female head. Eisen had to get his ideas from somewhere. Maybe this helped.
Katsukawa Shuntei
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Now, with a bit of embarrassment, it turns out that I did know this print from a book by James King and Yuriko Iwakiri, Japanese Warrior Prints. Oooops. I forgot. They wrote: “The enormous head hovering on the left in this print is a form of goblin called ōgao or ōkubi (literally, ‘a large face’). As staged in the Kabuki dance, Kumo no ito azusa no yumihari (The Spider Thread of the Bowstring, 1765) by Kanai Sanshō (1731-97), Sakata no Kintoki and Usui Sadamitsu were on night-watch at Raikō’s mansion. They were passing the time by playing go, when various goblins under the spell of the Earth Spider (tsuchigumo), appeared one after another and attempted to kill Raikō…. Realizing that these were merely ghastly apparitions, Kintoki and Sadamitsu dispatched them with little trouble and thus squashed the Earth Spider’s evil plans.”
Illustration to the Tale of Shiranui, Part one – 1853
Toyokuni III (aka Kunisada)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Scene from the kabuki play Shikimoyō Shiranui Monogatari (四季模様白縫譚) – 1874
Utagawa Yoshitaki (歌川芳滝 – 1841-99)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
I found it! I found it! I am so excited! I found it!
For whatever reason, back in 2013 we had a bumper crop of spiders which meant we had a bumper crop of spider webs. One very moist, foggy morning the place looked like a wonderland. I went out and took a series of photos, but until today was unable to find any of them. (Today is December 13, 2017.) Then, while looking for something completely different in my emails I ran across I image I had sent to a friend. Now I can show it to you, too. Personally, I think it is lovely and credit the modern technology of the digital camera and nature for this opportunity.
Also, I think the photograph by Snowdrop at the top of this page is better.
It catches the light and sparkles. This is something my picture lacks.
Alas, alack.
Shoki ensnaring a demon in a spider web
Soga Shōhaku (曾我蕭白: 1730-81)
Kimbell Museum of Art
Object d’art with an emphasis on spiders
Late 18th century lacquer box
Spider going after a wasp
The Walters Art Museum
Netsuke with spider and fly on lotus leaf – 19th century
The Hermitage
Kagamibuta netsuke – 19th century
Victoria and Albert Museum
19th century fireman’s coat of
Raikō slaying the Earth Spider
Brooklyn Museum
Mizugumo (水蜘蛛) – or spider shoes for walking on water
ca. 1467-1703
The early cultures of Peru and Colombia liked their spiders… or, at least, they respected them!
Nose ornament – possibly the Salinar culture – Northern Peru
100 BC to 200 AD
Metropolitan Museum of Art
In Gold of the Americas Julie Jones wrote in 2002 that by the late centuries of the 1st millennium BC :
“In Peru the technology appears to have had specific meaning, for long after casting techniques were employed for other metals, gold objects were still chiefly hammered into intricate and complex shapes.
The four spiders “caught” in the delicate web of the ornament shown above illustrate the firm command of technique that existed by the end of the millennium. An elegant, lightweight, airy object, it was made with great control of medium and design, with its delicate parts simply
fused together in a balanced combination of open and opaque areas. The roundness of the spiders is echoed in the shapes of the web, and their compact bodies and four legs are clearly visible. Their tiny fangs appear, too, menacingly, in spite of the simplicity of the creatures’ forms. Spiders had long had a place in Peruvian mythology, and their association with fertility and sacrifice would have been understood by
all ancient viewers of the ornament.”
The curatorial files of the museum add: “Spider imagery occurs in Peruvian art from the middle of the first millennium B.C. onward, suggesting that spiders played a role in early Andean mythology. The spiders’ ability to catch and kill live prey associates them with sacrifice. Information from the sixteenth-century Inca peoples links spiders with rainfall and fertility.”
Gold and silver Moche earflare – 390-450
Metropolitan Museum of Art
In 1998 Deborah Schorsch wrote in “Silver-and-Gold Moche Artifacts from Loma Negra, Peru”:
“Mechanical joins were also used in the manufacture of the frontals from a pair of circular earflares divided between the Metropolitan Museum.. and the National Museum of the American Indian… Each frontal represents a silver spider in the center of a gold web… The spiders are three-dimensional, each having been formed from two raised sheets of silver that were pressure-fitted… The legs are made from four round silver wires, each threaded through a pair of holes on opposite sides of the body… The wires were fitted into rectangular holes in the webs and flattened so as not to slip out, holding the spiders mechanically in place.”
Early Peruvian, pre-Columbian, Moche golden spider (with eggs?) –
Exact date unknown
Museo Oro del Perú y Armas del Mundo
But, perhaps, the most remarkable early, pre-Columbian gold is the Sipán spider beads –
In 1987 a burial tomb at Sipán, Peru was excavated and some astounding items were found. Néstor Ignacio Alva Meneses wrote: “Many of the objects featured stylized zoomorphic images modeled into ornaments and effigies. One of the most elaborate and significant burial ornaments was a pectoral of ten gold, biconvex beads. Each piece of the necklace bore the representation of a spider suspended in the center of its web with its abdomen transformed into a human head…”
Sipán bead with an anthropormorphized human head seen from the belly of a spider.
(It appears large here, but is small in reality. It’s a bead, damnit! That is one of the
things that make it so darned breathtaking.)
We know that the spider and the anthropomorphized spider were firmly planted in the native psyches ages before the tour-de-force shown above. For example, there is a steatite carved bowl, rubbed with cinnabar, at Dumbarton Oaks, which shows a human-headed spider holding the head of a human. It is from the Cupinisque society, dated 900 to 600 BCE. Another steatite piece, this time a cup, from the same date, is decorated with stylized spiders. See below.
Cupinisque culture, coastal Peru
900 to 600 BCE, steatite cup with spiders
Dumbarton Oaks
Their curatorial files note: “Spiders are often represented on stone vessels from the Cupisnique culture, and it is likely that a supernatural being with arachnid attributes played an important role in Cupisnique religious thought. Based on iconographic evidence and ethnographic analogy, spiders were probably associated with rainfall, fertility, and perhaps divination. Their web-weaving abilities offer a metaphorical counterpart for weaving, one of the most important art forms in the Andes.”
Amber gives a view into our prehistoric past
Spider in Polish amber – age unknown, but it must be ancient
acquired in the late 17th century
The Hermitage
I thought I spotted a spider in this painting, but I was wrong. There are at least seven, eight, nine, maybe ten of them
While searching for spider images, I ran across this painting by Balthasar van der Ast in the Rijksmuseum. I have a fondness for still life paintings and have always liked this artist. He structured it in such a way as to make it clear that there was a spider crawling over a peach. You can’t miss it. It is right there just below the center of the painting, in the best lit area, one meant to attract our eye. We were meant to see it. Point blank!
Still-life with fruits and flowers – ca. 1620-21
Balthasar van der Ast (1593/4-1657)
The Rijksmuseum
(Odd thing: the reason we don’t know the exact date of this painting is because it is signed and dated in the lower left as 1620 and the same thing in the lower right, except there it is dated 1621. The same can not be said for his birth date. There we only know that it occurred in one of two years – either 1593 or 94. Like it matters…)
Detail #1. Boy, could this guy paint.
I was perfectly happy leaving my inspection at the one spider he wanted us to see, but, you know me, I like to look a little more into the details. And voila! Along the right side of the painting there are quite a few more. Adults and babies. And a spider web or two to boot.
Detail #2. Wow!
As a general point, van der Ast must have liked painting images of spiders lowering themselves down one of their threads because there is another still-life by him in the National Gallery in London which offers this exact same motif. That example was painted about ten years after this one.
Consider this beauty – a little over 1/2″ tall, 1 1/4″ wide and 1″ long – and it walks!
This astounding little mechanical wonder was created by the watchmaker Tobias Reichel. According to one source, Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland – for a while, mostly at war – also had a sense of humor and enjoyed releasing this brilliant automaton to the great surprise of his visitors. I am sure they were spooked. I would be.
Mechanical spider by Tobias Reichel, ca. 1603
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden
The power of myth: simple on the surface, layered beneath
Detail of an engraving of Athena attacking Arachne
Giacomo Franco, Venice – 1584
Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna
(The full print will be shown below soon.)
Arachne was a simple girl, of low birth, from a backwater community, motherless at an early age, but with an overwhelmingly great talent for weaving. Her skill was so great that women came from far and wide to marvel at her work. Sophisticated women. Her fame became so great that two things happened, two horribly important things: 1) Athena, no slouch herself at weaving heard of this girl’s work and 2) the girl, in time, suffered from a complete and total case of hubris. She was convinced that her abilities were the equal or superior to those of any other weaver on earth… or, even in heaven. (Note Athena was renamed Minerva by the Romans and that is how Ovid wrote about her in his Metamorphosis.)
Ovid tell us that Minerva/Athena came to earth disguised as an old woman, to take a look for herself up close to see what Arachne could do. She was impressed, but warned the girl not to presume that her work could rival that of a goddess. Arachne was infuriated and swore at the old woman, throwing in a lot of insults, to boot, and told her to mind her own business and that even a goddess could not rival her work. Minerva threw off her disguise and agreed to have a competition – just between the two of them. Minerva wove brilliantly and in her tapestry she showed scenes of gods turning presumptuous humans into other forms. Not very subtle, eh? Arachne’s work was equally brilliant, but it showed scenes of lustful gods going after anything on two legs in their unstoppable amorous pursuits. Now Minerva was really, really mad. Arachne’s tapestry was so well done and so beautiful – and insulting, but true – that the goddess tore it to shreds and “With the boxwood shuttle she beat Arachne’s face repeatedly. In grief Arachne strangled herself, stopping the passage of life with a noose. Minerva pitied her as she was hanging and raised her up with these words: “Stubborn girl, live and yet hang! And – to make you anxious for the future – may the same punishment be decreed for all your descendants.”
“With these words Minerva sprinkled her with the juice of a magic herb. As the fateful liquid touched her, Arachne’s hair dropped off, her nose and ears vanished, and her head was shrunken, her whole body was contracted. From her side thin fingers dangled for legs, and the rest became her belly. Yet still from this she lets the thread issue forth and, a spider now, practices her former weaving art.”
The Spinners, or the Fable of Arachne (ca. 1655-60)
Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (1599-1660)
Museo Nacional del Prado
Victor Hugo – 1871
Maison Victor Hugo
Finger painting album leaf – 1684
Gao Qipei (高其佩 – 1660-1734)
Minneapolis Museum of Art
L’araignée, elle sourit, les yeux levés (The spider, she smiles, eyes raised) – 1881
Charcoal on paper
Odilon Redon (1840-1916)
Musée d’Orsay
J. K. Huysmans (1848-1907) pays tribute in his 1884 novel À rebours to Redon and his own decadence in his reference to a series of Redon drawings, possibly including this one: “…a horrible spider with a human face lodged in the middle of its body.”
A silver gelatin print of dew on a spider web, ca. 1910
Wilson Alwyn Bentley (American – 1865-1931)
Metropolitan Museum of Art
You may not know Bentley’s name, but chances are, if you are of a certain semi-advanced and/or advanced age, you probably know his work. He is the man who perfected the technique of doing close-up photographs of snowflakes. It all started when he was 15 when his mother gave him a microscope. Did I mention they lived in Vermont? Below is just one example.
Silver gelatin print
Metropolitan Museum of Art
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AS USUAL, I WILL POST IMAGES FIRST
AND ADD TEXT LATER. THAT MEANS –
IF YOU CARE YOU SHOULD COME BACK SOON AND OFTEN!
BUT I WARN YOU, IT IS GOING TO GET A BIT CREEPY.
THANKS!
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https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/722614
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Sipán lords were buried with crescent-shaped regalia, perhaps a reference to the blade of a ritual knife known as a tumi. The backflap (a type of body armor, suspended from the waist) and rattle here both depict an anthropomorphized spider whose paired legs form an X that extends from its body. Known as the Spider Decapitator, this fearsome creature brandishes a knife and a severed human head (another is incised at the base of the headdress’s crescent). Spiders catch prey in their webs and drain vital fluids—much like Moche warriors who captured their enemies, tied them with ropes, and drained their blood.
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https://smarthistory.org/moche-royal-tomb-sipan/
https://gogeometry.com/Sipan.htm
https://imgur.com/gallery/spider-beads- ... 0-ad-C4m2G
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huaca_Rajada
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In February 1987, a man by the name of Ernil Bernal led a band of huaqueros (tomb looters) who tunneled into one of the pyramids located at Huaca Rajada. Over the next few nights, they took a large number of valuable metal objects, destroying hundreds of ceramics and human remains in the process. Untold numbers of artifacts were lost, sold for profit to private collections on the black market.[10] Alva arrived with the police a day or more later, after an exceedingly ornate mask had been confiscated from the huaqueros stash house and presented to the researcher.[11] There are a number of accounts from the events taking place upon the arrival of Alva and the police, however it is clear that they were able to drive the huaqueros away from the site, erect fences around the tombs, and begin excavation.[12] Thereafter Alva and his team excavated 12 more tombs while villagers and huaqueros threw rocks and taunted them in an attempt to get the researchers out of the site and allow the looting to continue. The villagers were unsuccessful, however, as Alva completed his work which became the foundation of the "Royal Tombs of Sipán" discussed below.[13][14]
"
Gosh, if that is true, what annoying pieces of sh*t they are made out to be lol.
I visited these places recently in a dream.
I think this was one of the areas I went to, since I think that this was the name mentioned in the dream and it looks similar, though the area I was around had a museum or tourist center for a nearby archeological site and the whole area was very dry.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cusco
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The indigenous name of this city is Qusqu. Although the name was used in Southern Quechua, its origin is found in the Aymara language. The word is derived from the phrase qusqu wanka ('rock of the owl'), related to the city's foundation myth of the Ayar siblings. According to this legend, Ayar Awqa (Ayar Auca) acquired wings and flew to the site of the future city; there he was transformed into a rock to mark the possession of the land by his ayllu ("lineage"):[4]
Then Ayar Oche stood up, displayed a pair of large wings, and said he should be the one to stay at Guanacaure as an idol in order to speak with their father the Sun. Then they went up on top of the hill. Now at the site where he was to remain as an idol, Ayar Oche raised up in flight toward the heavens so high that they could not see him. He returned and told Ayar Manco that from then on he was to be named Manco Capac. Ayar Oche came from where the Sun was and the Sun had ordered that Ayar Manco take that name and go to the town that they had seen. After this had been stated by the idol, Ayar Oche turned into a stone, just as he was, with his wings. Later Manco Capac went down with Ayar Auca to their settlement...he liked the place now occupied in this city Cuzco. Manco Capac and his companion, with the help of the four women, made a house. Having done this, Manco Capac and his companion, with the four women, planted some land with maize. It is said that they took the maize from the cave, which this lord Manco Capac named Pacaritambo, which means those of origin because...they came out of that cave.[5]: 15–16
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallku
Weird that they ended up with the same word with a similar meaning as the word used in the Middle East.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%91usta
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kFoyauextlH
- Posts: 742
- Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2025 3:53 pm
Re: Talpa: Nether Realm, (9) Nine Armors, (b) North Wind, and (P) North Star
https://lightinthecloudsblog.com/2018/1 ... oe-part-1/
https://lightinthecloudsblog.com/2018/1 ... oe-part-2/
That blog is full of cool stuff.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugaar
"
In Basque mythology, Sugaar (also Sugar, Sugoi, Suarra, Maju) is the male half of a pre-Christian Basque deity associated with storms and thunder. He is normally imagined as a dragon or serpent. Unlike his female consort, Mari, there are very few remaining legends about Sugaar. The basic purpose of his existence is to periodically join with Mari in the mountains to generate the storms.
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The name Suga(a)r is derived from suge (serpent) and -ar (male), thus "male serpent".[1] The suggestions of a formation based on su (fire) and gar (flame), thus yielding "flame of fire" are considered folk etymology.[1]
Sugoi, another name of the same deity, has two possible interpretations, either a suge + o[h]i (former, "old serpent") or su + goi ("high fire").[citation needed] There is no likely etymology for the third name of this god, Maju.
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In Ataun he is said to have two homes: in the caves of Amunda and Atarreta. He is said to have been witnessed crossing the sky in form of fire-sickle, what is considered presage of storms. In this area is also said that Sugaar punishes the children that disobey their parents.
In Azkoitia Sugaar is clearly identified with Maju. He meets Mari on Fridays (the day of the akelarre or sabbat), conceiving then the storms.
In Betelu Sugaar is known as Suarra and considered a demon. There they say that he travels through the sky in the shape of a fireball, between the mountains Balerdi and Elortalde.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herensuge
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jentil
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaueko
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In Basque mythology, Gaueko is the spirit of the night. He does not allow humans to do certain works outside the house during the night. He especially punishes all those who try to show off as brave in the night, boasting of not fearing the darkness. He is considered to be a devil in some accounts, a jentil or gentilic divinity in others. In some cases he makes his presence felt as a gust of wind, as he pronounces these words: Gaua Gauekoarentzat, eguna egunezkoarentzat ("the night for Gaueko (the one of the night), the day for the one of the day"). Sometimes he appears in the shape of a cow, sometimes in that of a monster.[1]
In Basque, Gaueko literally means "of the night".
"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basajaun
https://www.pyreneanexperience.com/basa ... mythology/
Wow, this really freaked me out to see, I happened upon this because of a comment under the video I placed in the end, but I returned up here to edit this in because it seems to depict this exact symbol, and it made my heart sink to see, as I clicked that song randomly as what came up as the first song from that band.
"
@plimsoul89
9 months ago
This...this sounds like early Genesis crossed with Big Star. Am I dreaming?!
1
@plimsoul89
9 months ago
And Super Furry Animals
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https://www.xareta.eus/en/descubre/basq ... _witches/1
Has sounds similar to this song:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orko_(deity)
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Orcus
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orc
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orcus
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The Romans sometimes conflated Orcus with other underworld gods such as Pluto, Hades, and Dis Pater. The name "Orcus" seems to have referred specifically to the malicious and punishing side of the ruler of the underworld, as the god who tormented evildoers in their afterlife. Like the name Hades, "Orcus" could refer both to the underworld itself, as well as its ruling deity. In the charitable interpretation for such a place, it was believed to be an abode for purification of the souls of the deceased.[1]
In Roman literature one encounters phrases such as Orcum morari (lit. "to make Orcus wait", i.e. to postpone death) and cum Orco rationem habere (lit. "to go reason with Orcus", i.e. to approach death).[2]
Orcus was chiefly worshipped in rural areas; he had no official cult in the cities.[3] This remoteness allowed for him to survive in the countryside long after the more prevalent gods had ceased to be worshipped. He survived as a folk figure into the Middle Ages, and aspects of his worship may have been transmuted into the wild man festivals held in rural parts of Europe through the modern era.[3] Indeed, much of what is known about the celebrations associated with Orcus come from medieval sources.[3]
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"
From Orcus's association with death and the underworld, his name came to be used for demons and other underworld monsters, particularly in Italian where orco refers to a kind of monster found in fairy-tales that feeds on human flesh.
The French word ogre (appearing first in Charles Perrault's fairy-tales) may have come from variant forms of this word, orgo or ogro; in any case, the French ogre and the Italian orco are exactly the same sort of creature.
Ariosto
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An early example of an orco appears in Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso (1516), as a bestial, blind, tusk-faced monster inspired by the Cyclops of the Odyssey.
Tolkien
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The orco from Orlando, along with the Old English word orc (in the sense of an ogre, like Grendel), was part of the inspiration for Tolkien's orcs in his The Lord of the Rings.[4] In other manuscripts Tolkien wrote a side-note on the word:
The word used in translation of Q[uenya] urko, S[indarin] orch, is orc. But that is because of the similarity of the ancient English word orc, 'evil spirit or bogey', to the Elvish words. There is possibly no connexion between them. The English word is now generally supposed to be derived from Latin Orcus.[5][page needed]
In an unpublished letter sent to Gene Wolfe, Tolkien also made this comment:
Orc I derived from Anglo-Saxon, a word meaning demon, usually supposed to be derived from the Latin Orcus – Hell. But I doubt this, though the matter is too involved to set out here.[6]
From this use, countless other fantasy games and works of fiction have borrowed the concept of the orc.
Other modern-era use
edit
The name "Orcus" appears in the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game as Orcus, Prince of the Undead.
"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%9Auri
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He was variously depicted as: a crowned young man wielding a spear or bow and arrows; an enthroned black-bearded man with a wolf-skin cap or wolf-like appearance; or even a winged humanoid monster, usually wielding a sledgehammer or a sword.
The Etruscan theonym[1] Śuri (Etruscan: 𐌉𐌛𐌖𐌑, from 𐌛𐌖𐌑, śur, 'black')[2][3][4][5][6][7] means both 'black' and 'from the black [place]', i.e. the underworld.[2][5][6][7]
Śuri was essentially a chthonic solar deity: the volcanic fire god of light and darkness, lord of the sun and the underworld, with powers over health and plague as well.[3][4][5] Furthermore, as god of volcanic lightning, he was considered to be among the Novensiles, the nine Etruscan thunder gods.[3][5][8][9]
He was also an oracular god. His sacred animals were wolves and goats.[a]
Because of his multiple attributes, the Etruscan fire god Śuri bore many epithets,[3][5] among them infernal theonyms – consistently associated with kingship over the Manes (underworld deities), infernal and volcanic attributes, fire, lightning, wolves and goats – like Manth (𐌈𐌍𐌀𐌌, Manθ, Latinized as Mantus),[10][3][5][c] Vetis (𐌔𐌉𐌕𐌄𐌅, also spelt 𐌔𐌉𐌅𐌉𐌄𐌅, Veivis, variously Latinized as Vēdius, Vēdiovis, Vēiovis or Vēive),[16][5] Calu (𐌖𐌋𐌀𐌂),[17][18][5] lit. 'dark' or 'darkness' or 'underworld',[19][20] and – by interpretatio graeca – the equivalent[21][22] foreignism Aita (𐌀𐌕𐌉𐌀, also spelt 𐌀𐌕𐌉𐌄, Eita),[23][24][25][3][5] from Epic Greek: Ἄϊδης, romanized: Áïdēs, lit. 'Hades' or 'underworld',[26] syncretised with Roman Dīs Pater;[27][23][5][17][18][28][7] as well as solar theonyms – consistently associated with solar and volcanic attributes, fire, lightning, wolves and goats – like Rath (𐌈𐌀𐌛, Raθ),[3][5][29][d] Usil[32] (𐌋𐌉𐌔𐌖, also spelt 𐌋𐌉𐌑𐌖, Uśil),[e] lit. 'light' or 'sun',[34][f] and the equivalent foreignism Apulu (𐌖𐌋𐌖𐌐𐌀, also spelt 𐌖𐌋𐌐𐌀, Aplu),[3][5] from the Greco-Roman Apollo,[35][36][37][g] identified with Śuri (Latin: Soranus)[3][4][40][28][26][5][6][41] and later syncretised by the Romans as Apollo Soranus[17][18][7] or Apollo Soractis.[42][23] These theonyms were also associated on Pyrgi inscriptions.[25][3]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manth
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Manth (Etruscan: 𐌈𐌍𐌀𐌌, romanized: Manth), latinized as Mantus, is an epithet of the Etruscan chthonic fire god Śuri[1][2][3] as god of the underworld; this name was primarily used in the Po Valley, as described by Servius,[4] but a dedication to the god manθ from the Archaic period was found in a sanctuary in Pontecagnano, Southern Italy. His name is thought to be the origin of Mantua (Italian: Mantova), the birthplace of Virgil.[1]
Elsewhere in Etruria, the god was called Śuri, latinized as Soranus, a cross-cultural deity associated with the underworld.[1]
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viewtopic.php?p=1495#p1495
The "Manth" mentioned above is part of the "Temple Of Mant" thread also. Each thread is meant to function as a repository for certain themes, similar to how temples may have been a place to deposit certain objects that were thought to relate to the overall themes that the Temple related to or the domain of that God or aspect of The God.
These are all Apollo, and these are all likewise Thor and Susanoo.
https://record-of-ragnarok.fandom.com/wiki/Thor
Weirdly, the Japanese artists who designed and approved of the design for Thor in this anime made him look a lot like Apollo might be depicted.
https://megamitensei.fandom.com/wiki/Susano-o
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sif
Even though people might like to pretend the Basque are really unique or something, they are dealing with the same themes as everyone else, like their "Thunder God" being associated with the fertility of the crops, the same as Thor is linked to Sif, and Sif to wheat.
https://mythus.fandom.com/wiki/Sugaar
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/mytho ... 0108214127
This art gets on my nerves, it is layer upon layer of insulting in my opinion, by someone who doesn't realize or care about what they are depicting, so they frankly made it demonic and ugly, where even an attempt to meet easily acknowledged standards of beauty might at least show a nicer intent, but this is practically defamation, and any sort of defamation like this can hint at a J*d**-Christian processing and post-production through such an influence, even if they themselves think that they have gone opposite or are not still being influenced by the tendency of those people to insult and tear down everything, which is a big part of the idea of "progress" too, as opposed to nostalgia, where there has, even before the modern movement, efforts to constantly tear down the past and past things as evil and dirty and that we're moving away from that, so old languages are lost, history is distorted, and people are pressured and coerced to join in on the new thing, the latest whim of the bully state. You're either with us or against us, "boomer".
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubblegum_Crisis
It is no coincidence though, that "booming" is associated with the sound of thunder accompanying the sight of lightning at times, and that such has long been associated with the Almighty God and points to praise of God.
https://www.islamawakened.com/quran/13/13/#gsc.tab=0
https://www.islamawakened.com/quran/Qur ... -1212.html
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Ibn Abbas about the lightning angels, while giving further commentary that hot light produced by lightning (Barq Arabic: برق) was the emitted light produced from a whip device used by those angels.[5][7]
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https://middle-earthcinematicuniverse.f ... any_thongs
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balrog
"
The company fled with him, but the Orcs and the Balrog, taking a different route, caught up with them at the Bridge of Khazad-dûm. The Elf Legolas instantly recognized the Balrog and Gandalf tried to hold the bridge against it. As Gandalf faced the Balrog, he proclaimed, "You cannot pass, flame of Udûn!", and broke the bridge beneath the Balrog. As it fell, the Balrog wrapped its whip about Gandalf's knees, dragging him to the brink. As the Fellowship looked on in horror, Gandalf cried "Fly, you fools!" and plunged into the darkness below.[T 14]
After a long fall, the two crashed into a deep subterranean lake, which extinguished the flames of the Balrog's body; however it remained "a thing of slime, stronger than a strangling snake". They fought in the water; the Balrog clutched at Gandalf to strangle him, and Gandalf hewed the Balrog with his sword, until finally the Balrog fled into the primordial tunnels of Moria's underworld. Gandalf pursued the monster for eight days, until they climbed to the peak of Zirakzigil, where the Balrog was forced to turn and fight, its body erupting into new flame. Here they fought for two days and nights. In the end, the Balrog was defeated and cast down, breaking the mountainside where it fell "in ruin".[T 18] Gandalf himself died shortly afterwards, but he returned to Middle-earth with greater powers, as Gandalf the White, "until his task was finished". Critics such as Jerram Barrs have recognised this as a transfiguration similar to that of Jesus Christ, suggesting Gandalf's prophet-like status.[3]
The critic Clive Tolley notes that the contest between Gandalf and the Balrog on Durin's bridge somewhat recalls a shamanistic contest, but that a far closer parallel is medieval vision literature, giving the example of St Patrick's Purgatory, and even Dante's Divine Comedy.[4]
In-universe origins
edit
The name "Balrog", but not the meaning, emerges early in Tolkien's work: it appears in The Fall of Gondolin, one of the earliest texts Tolkien wrote, around 1918. Tolkien began a poem in alliterative verse about the battle of Glorfindel with the Balrog in that text, where both were killed by falling into the abyss, just like Gandalf and the Balrog in The Lord of the Rings.[1]
An early list of names described Balrog as "an Orc-word with no pure equivalent in Tolkien's invented language of Quenya: 'borrowed Malaroko-' ".[T 38] In Gnomish (another of Tolkien's invented languages), Balrog is parsed as balc 'cruel' + graug 'demon', with a Quenya equivalent Malkarauke. Variant forms of the latter include Nalkarauke and Valkarauke.[T 39] By the 1940s, when Tolkien began writing The Lord of the Rings, he had come to think of Balrog as Noldorin balch 'cruel' + rhaug 'demon', with a Quenya equivalent Malarauko (from nwalya- 'to torture' + rauko 'demon').[T 40] The last etymology, appearing in the invented languages Quendi and Eldar, derives Balrog as the Sindarin translation of the Quenya form Valarauko (Demon of Might). This etymology was published in The Silmarillion.[T 41][T 42] Gandalf on the bridge of Khazad-dûm calls the Balrog "flame of Udûn" ( the Sindarin name of Morgoth's fortress Utumno).[T 14]
Real-world origins
edit
Sigelwara
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Imagemap with clickable links. Tolkien's Sigelwara etymologies, leading to major strands of his Legendarium including Balrogs and also the Silmarils and Haradrim.[T 43][5]
Tolkien was a professional philologist, a scholar of comparative and historical linguistics.[T 44] The Balrog and other concepts in his writings derived from the Old English word Sigelwara, used in texts such as the Codex Junius to mean "Aethiopian".[6][7] He wondered why the Anglo-Saxons would have had a word with this meaning, conjecturing that it had formerly had a different meaning. He emended the word to Sigelhearwan, and in his essay "Sigelwara Land",[T 43] explored in detail the two parts of the word. He stated that Sigel meant "both sun and jewel", the former as it was the name of the Sun rune *sowilō (ᛋ), the latter connotation from Latin sigillum, a seal.[5] He decided that Hearwa was related to Old English heorð, "hearth", and ultimately to Latin carbo, "soot". He suggested from all this that Sigelhearwan implied "rather the sons of Muspell than of Ham", a class of demons in Northern mythology "with red-hot eyes that emitted sparks and faces black as soot".[T 43] The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey states that this both "helped to naturalise the Balrog" and contributed to the Silmarils, which combined the nature of the sun and jewels.[8] The Aethiopians suggested to Tolkien the Haradrim, a dark southern race of men.[T 45][9]
Old Norse, Old English
edit
A real-world etymological counterpart for the word "Balrog" existed long before Tolkien's languages, in Norse mythology; an epithet of the Norse god Odin was Báleygr, "fire-eyed".[10]
Joe Abbott, writing in Mythlore, notes that the Old Norse Voluspa mentions that the fire-demon Surt carries both a sword and a sviga laevi, a deadly whipping-stick or switch; he suggests that it is "a short step" from that to the Balrog's flaming whip.[1] Abbott makes a connection, too, with the Beowulf poet's account of the monster Grendel: he notes that Tolkien wrote that Grendel was "physical enough in form and power, but vaguely felt as belonging to a different order of being, one allied to the malevolent 'ghosts' of the dead", and compares this with Aragorn's description of the Balrog as "both a shadow and a flame, strong and terrible".[1]
Moria and the Battle of Maldon
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Further information: The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son
Tolkien felt acutely the error made by the English commander, the ealdorman Byrhtnoth, at the Battle of Maldon, allowing the Vikings to step ashore and win the battle. Alexander Bruce, in Mythlore, comments that Tolkien may have used Gandalf's battle with the Balrog on the narrow bridge in Moria to "correct the behavior of the self-serving Byrhtnoth through the actions of the self-less Gandalf".[11] Bruce notes that the Tolkien scholar Janet Brennan Croft also contrasts the two leaders.[11][12]
Alexander Bruce's comparison of Gandalf's stand in Moria with Byrhtnoth's action in the Battle of Maldon[11]
Leader Encounter Action Result
Byrhtnoth Battle of Maldon Allows Viking enemy across causeway Army defeated, Byrhtnoth killed, English pay Danegeld tribute
Gandalf Bridge of Khazad-dûm Holds the bridge against the Balrog Both Gandalf and the Balrog fall into the abyss. The Fellowship escape.
The fall of Gondolin and the fall of Troy
edit
Further information: The Fall of Gondolin
There are multiple parallels between the Fall of Gondolin and the fall of Troy, as told in the Iliad, but again the tales differ. The Elf Ecthelion leads the charge against the Orcs, and fights Gothmog, the greatest Balrog; they wound each other and both fall into the king's fountain in Gondolin; both drown. Bruce compares this to how Aeneas rallies the Trojans, but fails, and sees king Priam perish.[13]
"
https://bhaktianandascollectedworks.wor ... -bhagavan/
https://blog.oup.com/2015/08/god-word-o ... gy-part-3/
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At present, many scholars share the etymology of god, as Watkins formulated it. But not too long ago, another but very similar Sanskrit root—it means “invoke”— was more often believed to be at the basis of the Germanic divine name. It sounds so much alike the one for “pour” that an attempt was once made to merge the two. However, modern researchers discovered insurmountable phonetic difficulties in connecting the verb for invoking with the word for god, though in this context “a being invoked by worshipers” makes better sense than “a libated one.” Among many other interpretations of this recalcitrant noun we find “purifier,” “the invisible, hidden,” “shining,” “apparition, something observed,” and “the one that is outside” (I am leaving out of account several nonsensical suggestions). A borrowing from Persian has been considered and refuted on excellent grounds. Finally, some people think that god is a loan from an unknown language. This of course may be true but dismisses rather than answers the question.
With some trepidation I would like to say that all the hypotheses mentioned above strike me as unconvincing. We know from the days of Scandinavian paganism that the Germanic word guð existed and that it referred to the highest beings in control of the world. However, they competed with other “multitudes,” and sacrifices were made to all supernatural forces. Consequently, “being invoked” or “being the recipient of offerings” did not characterize any group uniquely, and, in general, to call God “the libated one” is as strange as to coin a divine name (such names are called theonyms) cognate with incense, candle, or smoke. Also, the etymology of guð has to account for the universal use of such words in the plural. To Latin numen, mentioned earlier, Hebrew Elohim can be added. We need a group name. Watkins, it will be remembered, spoke about the spirit, not spirits, in a mound.
When converted Germanic clerics searched for the word corresponding to Latin Deus and Greek theós, they must have had enough to choose from in the native resources. For example, in Old Icelandic, the great gods (all together) were called not only guð but also regin, that is, “the governing, ruling forces,” not unexpectedly, a neuter plural. The regin were called holy; sometimes the epithet occurred with a reinforcing prefix. Germanic had two adjectives for “sacred.” One has come down to us as Engl. holy; the other is known from Gothic weihs and German words like Weihnachten “Christmas,” literally, “Holy Night.” Apparently, though the guð could be the holy ones and the governing ones, the word regin (assuming that some of its forms existed in the south) lacked the connotations important to the converted Christians or carried some connotations to be avoided. In practicing the new religion the Church tried to steer away from the vocabulary characteristic of pagan cults, and yet the learned missionaries decided to employ an old term for the most important word of the Christian faith.
It is hard to say boo, shoo, or even goo to a goose.
The neuter plural guð was probably free from the unwanted associations inherent in the other words for the holy ones. As early as 1889, the great Indo-European scholar Karl Brugmann suggested that god was allied to the Sanskrit adjective ghorás “horrible” and Old Engl. gryrn “sorrow.” His etymology, though supported by Evald Lidén, another distinguished linguist, did not win the day because Brugmann wanted both ghorás and guð to be related to Greek theós, and here he was mistaken. But taking theós out of the equation does not damage the credibility of guð. The root of gho–ra-s (o was long in it) may have been a sound-imitative complex, like boo, which some won’t dare say to a goose, or hoo– in Engl. hoot. We also shoo the cat. Guð meant “terror” and struck fear in the worshippers. So much for good God. If this is how the Germanic word for “God” came into existence, it was not a past participle, and d (ð) was not a verbal ending or suffix.
As a postscript, I’ll say something about the Slavic word bog “god.” Its etymology is believed to be certain because its alleged Sanskrit and Iranian cognates mean “dispenser of wealth” and “god.” Russian bogatyi (stress on ga) means “rich.” Yet, with regard to bogatyi, we may be dealing with a case of late folk etymology. Bog, I suspect, belongs with Engl. bogey, Russian buka (the same meaning), and Germanic gu-. I have risked defying the recognized etymologies of two heavily charged words in Germanic and Slavic and supplied this suicidal postscript, because, when all is said and done, it is better to be hanged for a sheep than for a lamb. I also remembered that those who were sacrificed to Othin were sometimes hanged.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perun
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Inherited from Old East Slavic Перунъ (Perunŭ), from Proto-Slavic *Perunъ. Cognate with перу́н (perún, “thunderbolt”).
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobog_and_Belobog
https://disney.fandom.com/wiki/Chernabog
Notice the noose.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasha_(Hinduism)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varuna
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walpurgis_Night
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The date of Walpurgis Night coincided with an older May Eve festival, celebrated in much of northern Europe with the lighting of bonfires at night.[7] A variety of festivals of pre-Christian origin had been celebrated at this time (halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice) to mark the beginning of summer, including Beltane in Ireland and Britain.[7] Folklorist Jack Santino says "Her day and its traditions almost certainly are traceable to pre-Christian celebrations that took place at this time, on the first of May".[23] Art historian Pamela Berger noted Walpurga's association with sheaves of grain, and suggested that her cult was adapted from pagan agrarian goddesses.[24]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagon
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In some documents from Syrian cities, for example Halab and Ugarit, the logogram dNISABA designates Dagan.[31] As noted by Alphonso Archi, in Western Semitic languages such as Ugaritic Dagan's name was homophonous with the word for grain (dgn in alphabetic Ugaritic texts), and the logographic writing of his name as dNISABA was likely a form of wordplay popular among scribes, relying on the fact that the name of Nisaba, the Mesopotamian goddess of writing, could simply be understood as "grain" too.[32]
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One of Dagan's best documented functions was guaranteeing abundant harvests of grain.[30] However, he was not an agricultural god but rather the source of prosperity in general.[31]
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According to texts from Ebla, Dagan's attributes were a chariot and a mace.[41]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phaethon
https://www.wisdomlib.org/concept/kaumodaki
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaumodaki
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mj%C3%B6lnir
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The etymology of the hammer's name, Mjǫllnir, is disputed among historical linguists. Old Norse Mjǫllnir developed from Proto-Norse *melluniaR and one proposed derivation connects this form to Old Church Slavonic mlunuji and Russian molnija meaning 'lightning' (either borrowed from a Slavic source or both stemming from a common source) and subsequently yielding the meaning 'lightning-maker'. Another proposal connects Mjǫllnir to Old Norse mjǫll meaning 'new snow' and modern Icelandic mjalli meaning 'the color white', rendering Mjǫllnir as 'shining lightning weapon'. Finally, another proposal connects Old Norse Mjǫllnir to Old Norse mala meaning 'to grind' and Gothic malwjan 'to grind', yielding Mjǫllnir as meaning 'the grinder'.[2]
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My name at some places was Dagon, Varuna, Mitra, Apollo, Zan (DVMAZ).
I expect my ancestors and those I connect to despite genetics have worshipped God in relation to wind, thunder, and lightning since very remote times:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oesho
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Connections to several contemporaneous deities worshipped by neighbouring cultures have been suggested.
During the Kushan era, Oesho was often linked to the Hindu concept of Ishvara, which was embodied by the god Shiva;[3] Oesho may share the same etymology as Ishvara and/or represent a variant of the word in the Bactrian language spoken by the Kushans.[4][5]
Similarities have retrospectively been identified with the Avestan Vayu.[6][7]
Some later representations, evidently influenced by Greco-Bactrian culture, depict Oesho with a trishula, the traditional implement of Shiva, similar to a trident that is part of Poseidon's iconography.[8]
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The consort of Oesho was Ommo ("ΟΜΜΟ", Umā), as shown on a coin type of Kushan ruler Huvishka with, on the reverse, the divine couple Ommo ("ΟΜΜΟ", Umā) holding a flower, and Oesho ("ΟΗϷΟ", Shiva) with four arms holding attributes.[9][10]
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Philosophically, Parvati is regarded as Shiva’s shakti (divine energy or power), the personification of the creative force that sustains the cosmos. In this role, she becomes not only a mother and nurturer but also the embodiment of cosmic energy and fertility. She is the source of power that energises Shiva, who without her is incomplete. Parvati's mythology, therefore, is not just about her role as a wife but also about her cosmic function as the force that activates and sustains life.[10] In various Shaiva traditions, Parvati is also regarded as a model devotee, and even viewed as the embodiment of Shiva's grace, playing a central role in the spiritual liberation of devotees.[10][15][16] She is also one of the central deities in the goddess-oriented sect of Shaktism, where she is regarded as a benevolent aspect of Mahadevi, the supreme deity,[17][18] and is closely associated with various manifestations of Mahadevi, including the ten Mahavidyas and the Navadurgas.[10] Parvati is found extensively in ancient Puranic literature, and her statues and iconography are present in Hindu temples all over South Asia and Southeast Asia.[19][20] In Hindu temples dedicated to her and Shiva, she is symbolically represented as the yoni.[10]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potnia
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The figure of a goddess of nature, of birth and death was dominant during the Bronze Age, in both Minoan and Mycenean cults. In the Mycenean cult she was known by the title Potnia.[9] The earliest references to the title are inscriptions in Linear B (Mycenean Greek) syllabic script found at Pylos and at Knossos, Crete, dated 1450-1300 BC. On a number of tablets from Pylos, we find po-ti-ni-ja (potnia) without any accompanying word. Chadwick suggests that she was the mother-goddess of the Mycenaeans. It seems that she had an important shrine at the site Pakijanes near Pylos.[10] Wanax (wa-na-ka) was her male companion in the Mycenean cult,[9] and this title was usually applied to the god Poseidon (po-se-da-o). Another epithet of Poseidon was e-ne-si-da-o-ne ("earth-shaker") and in the cave of Amnisos (Crete) Enesidaon is related to the cult of Eileithyia.[11] She was a goddess of nature concerned with the annual birth of the divine child.[12] Potnia and her male companion (paredros) survived in the Eleusinian cult, where the following words were uttered : "Mighty Potnia has born a strong son".[13]
An inscription from Knossos refers to the "potnia of the labyrinth", who probably presided over the palace of Knossos (da-pu2-ri-to-jo, po-ti-ni-ja).[14][15] A famous Minoan seal impression found by Arthur Evans shows a nameless goddess brandishing a spear and standing upon the representation of a mountain flanked by rampant lions, and the representation seems similar to the Homeric potnia theron (the mistress of the animals).
Several tablets in Linear B script found at Knossos and Pylos refer to the potnia. Potnia is almost always accompanied by an epithet characterizing a particular place or function of the mistress : po-ti-ni-ja,a-si-wi-ja (a-si-wi-ja = ethnic adjective, possibly "Asian (Lydian) woman"), si-to-po-ti-ni-ja (sitos = "grain", of wheat or barley; probably referring to Demeter or her predecessor), po-ti-ni-ja,i-qe-ja (Potnia Hippeia, "Horse Goddess"). At Knossos a tablet refers to a-ta-na-po-ti-ni-ja, "potnia Athana", a form similar to the later Homeric form.[10][16]
This divine title could be the translation of a similar title of Pre-Greek origin, just as the title "Our Lady" in Christianity is translated in several languages.[17] The Pre-Greek name may be related to a-sa-sa-ra , a possible interpretation of some Linear A texts.[18] Although Linear A is not yet deciphered, Palmer relates tentatively the word a-sa-sa-ra-me which seems to have accompanied goddesses, with the Hittite išhaššara, which means "lady or mistress", and especially with išhaššaramis (my lady).[19]
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The same thing, over and over and over, from all around the whole world.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kushinadahime
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The goddess is named 'Kushinadahime' (櫛名田比売) in the Kojiki, while the Nihon Shoki variously names her 'Kushiinadahime' (奇稲田姫), 'Inadahime' (稲田姫), and 'Makamifuru-Kushiinadahime' (真髪触奇稲田媛).
'Inadahime' may be translated either as "lady / princess (hime) of Inada", with "Inada" (稲田) here being understood as the name of a place in Izumo Province (part of what is now the town of Okuizumo (formerly Yokota) in Nita District, Shimane Prefecture),[2] or "lady / princess of the rice fields" (inada literally translated means "rice field" or "rice paddy").[3][4] The element kushi (Old Japanese: kusi) meanwhile is usually interpreted as the adjective meaning "wondrous"; it is homophonous with the word for "comb" (櫛), which features in her story in both the Kojiki and the Shoki.[5][6] The epithet makamifuru (lit. "true-hair-touching"), found in a variant account cited in the Shoki, is understood as a stock epithet or makurakotoba associated with the word "comb".[7]
The Fudoki of Izumo Province meanwhile gives the name of the goddess as 久志伊奈太美等与麻奴良比売命, commonly read as 'Kushiinada-Mitoyomanurahime-no-Mikoto'. One theory interprets the name to mean roughly "princess of the wondrous rice fields (kushi-inada) soaking wet (manura) [and] overflowing with water (mitoyo, here understood as an epithet meaning "water-abundant")".[8]
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This is Sif, they just didn't have wheat there.
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After defeating the serpent, Susanoo built a palace or shrine for Kushinadahime in a place called Suga - so named because Susanoo felt refreshed (sugasugashi) upon arriving there - and made her father Ashinazuchi its head (obito), giving him the title 'Inada-no-Miyanushi-Suga-no-Yatsumimi-no-Kami' (稲田宮主須賀之八耳神 "Master of the Palace of Inada, the Eight-Eared Deity of Suga"). On that occasion, he composed a song in tanka form later held to be the root of Japanese waka poetry:[11]
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A bit disturbing to see "Suga" again, like "Sugaar".
https://en.geneanet.org/surnames/SUGA
Hair-like water dependent vegetation.
https://lightinthecloudsblog.com/2018/1 ... oe-part-2/
That blog is full of cool stuff.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugaar
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In Basque mythology, Sugaar (also Sugar, Sugoi, Suarra, Maju) is the male half of a pre-Christian Basque deity associated with storms and thunder. He is normally imagined as a dragon or serpent. Unlike his female consort, Mari, there are very few remaining legends about Sugaar. The basic purpose of his existence is to periodically join with Mari in the mountains to generate the storms.
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The name Suga(a)r is derived from suge (serpent) and -ar (male), thus "male serpent".[1] The suggestions of a formation based on su (fire) and gar (flame), thus yielding "flame of fire" are considered folk etymology.[1]
Sugoi, another name of the same deity, has two possible interpretations, either a suge + o[h]i (former, "old serpent") or su + goi ("high fire").[citation needed] There is no likely etymology for the third name of this god, Maju.
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In Ataun he is said to have two homes: in the caves of Amunda and Atarreta. He is said to have been witnessed crossing the sky in form of fire-sickle, what is considered presage of storms. In this area is also said that Sugaar punishes the children that disobey their parents.
In Azkoitia Sugaar is clearly identified with Maju. He meets Mari on Fridays (the day of the akelarre or sabbat), conceiving then the storms.
In Betelu Sugaar is known as Suarra and considered a demon. There they say that he travels through the sky in the shape of a fireball, between the mountains Balerdi and Elortalde.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herensuge
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jentil
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaueko
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In Basque mythology, Gaueko is the spirit of the night. He does not allow humans to do certain works outside the house during the night. He especially punishes all those who try to show off as brave in the night, boasting of not fearing the darkness. He is considered to be a devil in some accounts, a jentil or gentilic divinity in others. In some cases he makes his presence felt as a gust of wind, as he pronounces these words: Gaua Gauekoarentzat, eguna egunezkoarentzat ("the night for Gaueko (the one of the night), the day for the one of the day"). Sometimes he appears in the shape of a cow, sometimes in that of a monster.[1]
In Basque, Gaueko literally means "of the night".
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basajaun
https://www.pyreneanexperience.com/basa ... mythology/
Wow, this really freaked me out to see, I happened upon this because of a comment under the video I placed in the end, but I returned up here to edit this in because it seems to depict this exact symbol, and it made my heart sink to see, as I clicked that song randomly as what came up as the first song from that band.
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@plimsoul89
9 months ago
This...this sounds like early Genesis crossed with Big Star. Am I dreaming?!
1
@plimsoul89
9 months ago
And Super Furry Animals
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https://www.xareta.eus/en/descubre/basq ... _witches/1
Has sounds similar to this song:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orko_(deity)
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Orcus
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orc
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orcus
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The Romans sometimes conflated Orcus with other underworld gods such as Pluto, Hades, and Dis Pater. The name "Orcus" seems to have referred specifically to the malicious and punishing side of the ruler of the underworld, as the god who tormented evildoers in their afterlife. Like the name Hades, "Orcus" could refer both to the underworld itself, as well as its ruling deity. In the charitable interpretation for such a place, it was believed to be an abode for purification of the souls of the deceased.[1]
In Roman literature one encounters phrases such as Orcum morari (lit. "to make Orcus wait", i.e. to postpone death) and cum Orco rationem habere (lit. "to go reason with Orcus", i.e. to approach death).[2]
Orcus was chiefly worshipped in rural areas; he had no official cult in the cities.[3] This remoteness allowed for him to survive in the countryside long after the more prevalent gods had ceased to be worshipped. He survived as a folk figure into the Middle Ages, and aspects of his worship may have been transmuted into the wild man festivals held in rural parts of Europe through the modern era.[3] Indeed, much of what is known about the celebrations associated with Orcus come from medieval sources.[3]
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From Orcus's association with death and the underworld, his name came to be used for demons and other underworld monsters, particularly in Italian where orco refers to a kind of monster found in fairy-tales that feeds on human flesh.
The French word ogre (appearing first in Charles Perrault's fairy-tales) may have come from variant forms of this word, orgo or ogro; in any case, the French ogre and the Italian orco are exactly the same sort of creature.
Ariosto
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An early example of an orco appears in Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso (1516), as a bestial, blind, tusk-faced monster inspired by the Cyclops of the Odyssey.
Tolkien
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The orco from Orlando, along with the Old English word orc (in the sense of an ogre, like Grendel), was part of the inspiration for Tolkien's orcs in his The Lord of the Rings.[4] In other manuscripts Tolkien wrote a side-note on the word:
The word used in translation of Q[uenya] urko, S[indarin] orch, is orc. But that is because of the similarity of the ancient English word orc, 'evil spirit or bogey', to the Elvish words. There is possibly no connexion between them. The English word is now generally supposed to be derived from Latin Orcus.[5][page needed]
In an unpublished letter sent to Gene Wolfe, Tolkien also made this comment:
Orc I derived from Anglo-Saxon, a word meaning demon, usually supposed to be derived from the Latin Orcus – Hell. But I doubt this, though the matter is too involved to set out here.[6]
From this use, countless other fantasy games and works of fiction have borrowed the concept of the orc.
Other modern-era use
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The name "Orcus" appears in the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game as Orcus, Prince of the Undead.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%9Auri
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He was variously depicted as: a crowned young man wielding a spear or bow and arrows; an enthroned black-bearded man with a wolf-skin cap or wolf-like appearance; or even a winged humanoid monster, usually wielding a sledgehammer or a sword.
The Etruscan theonym[1] Śuri (Etruscan: 𐌉𐌛𐌖𐌑, from 𐌛𐌖𐌑, śur, 'black')[2][3][4][5][6][7] means both 'black' and 'from the black [place]', i.e. the underworld.[2][5][6][7]
Śuri was essentially a chthonic solar deity: the volcanic fire god of light and darkness, lord of the sun and the underworld, with powers over health and plague as well.[3][4][5] Furthermore, as god of volcanic lightning, he was considered to be among the Novensiles, the nine Etruscan thunder gods.[3][5][8][9]
He was also an oracular god. His sacred animals were wolves and goats.[a]
Because of his multiple attributes, the Etruscan fire god Śuri bore many epithets,[3][5] among them infernal theonyms – consistently associated with kingship over the Manes (underworld deities), infernal and volcanic attributes, fire, lightning, wolves and goats – like Manth (𐌈𐌍𐌀𐌌, Manθ, Latinized as Mantus),[10][3][5][c] Vetis (𐌔𐌉𐌕𐌄𐌅, also spelt 𐌔𐌉𐌅𐌉𐌄𐌅, Veivis, variously Latinized as Vēdius, Vēdiovis, Vēiovis or Vēive),[16][5] Calu (𐌖𐌋𐌀𐌂),[17][18][5] lit. 'dark' or 'darkness' or 'underworld',[19][20] and – by interpretatio graeca – the equivalent[21][22] foreignism Aita (𐌀𐌕𐌉𐌀, also spelt 𐌀𐌕𐌉𐌄, Eita),[23][24][25][3][5] from Epic Greek: Ἄϊδης, romanized: Áïdēs, lit. 'Hades' or 'underworld',[26] syncretised with Roman Dīs Pater;[27][23][5][17][18][28][7] as well as solar theonyms – consistently associated with solar and volcanic attributes, fire, lightning, wolves and goats – like Rath (𐌈𐌀𐌛, Raθ),[3][5][29][d] Usil[32] (𐌋𐌉𐌔𐌖, also spelt 𐌋𐌉𐌑𐌖, Uśil),[e] lit. 'light' or 'sun',[34][f] and the equivalent foreignism Apulu (𐌖𐌋𐌖𐌐𐌀, also spelt 𐌖𐌋𐌐𐌀, Aplu),[3][5] from the Greco-Roman Apollo,[35][36][37][g] identified with Śuri (Latin: Soranus)[3][4][40][28][26][5][6][41] and later syncretised by the Romans as Apollo Soranus[17][18][7] or Apollo Soractis.[42][23] These theonyms were also associated on Pyrgi inscriptions.[25][3]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manth
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Manth (Etruscan: 𐌈𐌍𐌀𐌌, romanized: Manth), latinized as Mantus, is an epithet of the Etruscan chthonic fire god Śuri[1][2][3] as god of the underworld; this name was primarily used in the Po Valley, as described by Servius,[4] but a dedication to the god manθ from the Archaic period was found in a sanctuary in Pontecagnano, Southern Italy. His name is thought to be the origin of Mantua (Italian: Mantova), the birthplace of Virgil.[1]
Elsewhere in Etruria, the god was called Śuri, latinized as Soranus, a cross-cultural deity associated with the underworld.[1]
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viewtopic.php?p=1495#p1495
The "Manth" mentioned above is part of the "Temple Of Mant" thread also. Each thread is meant to function as a repository for certain themes, similar to how temples may have been a place to deposit certain objects that were thought to relate to the overall themes that the Temple related to or the domain of that God or aspect of The God.
These are all Apollo, and these are all likewise Thor and Susanoo.
https://record-of-ragnarok.fandom.com/wiki/Thor
Weirdly, the Japanese artists who designed and approved of the design for Thor in this anime made him look a lot like Apollo might be depicted.
https://megamitensei.fandom.com/wiki/Susano-o
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sif
Even though people might like to pretend the Basque are really unique or something, they are dealing with the same themes as everyone else, like their "Thunder God" being associated with the fertility of the crops, the same as Thor is linked to Sif, and Sif to wheat.
https://mythus.fandom.com/wiki/Sugaar
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/mytho ... 0108214127
This art gets on my nerves, it is layer upon layer of insulting in my opinion, by someone who doesn't realize or care about what they are depicting, so they frankly made it demonic and ugly, where even an attempt to meet easily acknowledged standards of beauty might at least show a nicer intent, but this is practically defamation, and any sort of defamation like this can hint at a J*d**-Christian processing and post-production through such an influence, even if they themselves think that they have gone opposite or are not still being influenced by the tendency of those people to insult and tear down everything, which is a big part of the idea of "progress" too, as opposed to nostalgia, where there has, even before the modern movement, efforts to constantly tear down the past and past things as evil and dirty and that we're moving away from that, so old languages are lost, history is distorted, and people are pressured and coerced to join in on the new thing, the latest whim of the bully state. You're either with us or against us, "boomer".
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubblegum_Crisis
It is no coincidence though, that "booming" is associated with the sound of thunder accompanying the sight of lightning at times, and that such has long been associated with the Almighty God and points to praise of God.
https://www.islamawakened.com/quran/13/13/#gsc.tab=0
https://www.islamawakened.com/quran/Qur ... -1212.html
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Ibn Abbas about the lightning angels, while giving further commentary that hot light produced by lightning (Barq Arabic: برق) was the emitted light produced from a whip device used by those angels.[5][7]
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https://middle-earthcinematicuniverse.f ... any_thongs
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balrog
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The company fled with him, but the Orcs and the Balrog, taking a different route, caught up with them at the Bridge of Khazad-dûm. The Elf Legolas instantly recognized the Balrog and Gandalf tried to hold the bridge against it. As Gandalf faced the Balrog, he proclaimed, "You cannot pass, flame of Udûn!", and broke the bridge beneath the Balrog. As it fell, the Balrog wrapped its whip about Gandalf's knees, dragging him to the brink. As the Fellowship looked on in horror, Gandalf cried "Fly, you fools!" and plunged into the darkness below.[T 14]
After a long fall, the two crashed into a deep subterranean lake, which extinguished the flames of the Balrog's body; however it remained "a thing of slime, stronger than a strangling snake". They fought in the water; the Balrog clutched at Gandalf to strangle him, and Gandalf hewed the Balrog with his sword, until finally the Balrog fled into the primordial tunnels of Moria's underworld. Gandalf pursued the monster for eight days, until they climbed to the peak of Zirakzigil, where the Balrog was forced to turn and fight, its body erupting into new flame. Here they fought for two days and nights. In the end, the Balrog was defeated and cast down, breaking the mountainside where it fell "in ruin".[T 18] Gandalf himself died shortly afterwards, but he returned to Middle-earth with greater powers, as Gandalf the White, "until his task was finished". Critics such as Jerram Barrs have recognised this as a transfiguration similar to that of Jesus Christ, suggesting Gandalf's prophet-like status.[3]
The critic Clive Tolley notes that the contest between Gandalf and the Balrog on Durin's bridge somewhat recalls a shamanistic contest, but that a far closer parallel is medieval vision literature, giving the example of St Patrick's Purgatory, and even Dante's Divine Comedy.[4]
In-universe origins
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The name "Balrog", but not the meaning, emerges early in Tolkien's work: it appears in The Fall of Gondolin, one of the earliest texts Tolkien wrote, around 1918. Tolkien began a poem in alliterative verse about the battle of Glorfindel with the Balrog in that text, where both were killed by falling into the abyss, just like Gandalf and the Balrog in The Lord of the Rings.[1]
An early list of names described Balrog as "an Orc-word with no pure equivalent in Tolkien's invented language of Quenya: 'borrowed Malaroko-' ".[T 38] In Gnomish (another of Tolkien's invented languages), Balrog is parsed as balc 'cruel' + graug 'demon', with a Quenya equivalent Malkarauke. Variant forms of the latter include Nalkarauke and Valkarauke.[T 39] By the 1940s, when Tolkien began writing The Lord of the Rings, he had come to think of Balrog as Noldorin balch 'cruel' + rhaug 'demon', with a Quenya equivalent Malarauko (from nwalya- 'to torture' + rauko 'demon').[T 40] The last etymology, appearing in the invented languages Quendi and Eldar, derives Balrog as the Sindarin translation of the Quenya form Valarauko (Demon of Might). This etymology was published in The Silmarillion.[T 41][T 42] Gandalf on the bridge of Khazad-dûm calls the Balrog "flame of Udûn" ( the Sindarin name of Morgoth's fortress Utumno).[T 14]
Real-world origins
edit
Sigelwara
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Imagemap with clickable links. Tolkien's Sigelwara etymologies, leading to major strands of his Legendarium including Balrogs and also the Silmarils and Haradrim.[T 43][5]
Tolkien was a professional philologist, a scholar of comparative and historical linguistics.[T 44] The Balrog and other concepts in his writings derived from the Old English word Sigelwara, used in texts such as the Codex Junius to mean "Aethiopian".[6][7] He wondered why the Anglo-Saxons would have had a word with this meaning, conjecturing that it had formerly had a different meaning. He emended the word to Sigelhearwan, and in his essay "Sigelwara Land",[T 43] explored in detail the two parts of the word. He stated that Sigel meant "both sun and jewel", the former as it was the name of the Sun rune *sowilō (ᛋ), the latter connotation from Latin sigillum, a seal.[5] He decided that Hearwa was related to Old English heorð, "hearth", and ultimately to Latin carbo, "soot". He suggested from all this that Sigelhearwan implied "rather the sons of Muspell than of Ham", a class of demons in Northern mythology "with red-hot eyes that emitted sparks and faces black as soot".[T 43] The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey states that this both "helped to naturalise the Balrog" and contributed to the Silmarils, which combined the nature of the sun and jewels.[8] The Aethiopians suggested to Tolkien the Haradrim, a dark southern race of men.[T 45][9]
Old Norse, Old English
edit
A real-world etymological counterpart for the word "Balrog" existed long before Tolkien's languages, in Norse mythology; an epithet of the Norse god Odin was Báleygr, "fire-eyed".[10]
Joe Abbott, writing in Mythlore, notes that the Old Norse Voluspa mentions that the fire-demon Surt carries both a sword and a sviga laevi, a deadly whipping-stick or switch; he suggests that it is "a short step" from that to the Balrog's flaming whip.[1] Abbott makes a connection, too, with the Beowulf poet's account of the monster Grendel: he notes that Tolkien wrote that Grendel was "physical enough in form and power, but vaguely felt as belonging to a different order of being, one allied to the malevolent 'ghosts' of the dead", and compares this with Aragorn's description of the Balrog as "both a shadow and a flame, strong and terrible".[1]
Moria and the Battle of Maldon
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Further information: The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son
Tolkien felt acutely the error made by the English commander, the ealdorman Byrhtnoth, at the Battle of Maldon, allowing the Vikings to step ashore and win the battle. Alexander Bruce, in Mythlore, comments that Tolkien may have used Gandalf's battle with the Balrog on the narrow bridge in Moria to "correct the behavior of the self-serving Byrhtnoth through the actions of the self-less Gandalf".[11] Bruce notes that the Tolkien scholar Janet Brennan Croft also contrasts the two leaders.[11][12]
Alexander Bruce's comparison of Gandalf's stand in Moria with Byrhtnoth's action in the Battle of Maldon[11]
Leader Encounter Action Result
Byrhtnoth Battle of Maldon Allows Viking enemy across causeway Army defeated, Byrhtnoth killed, English pay Danegeld tribute
Gandalf Bridge of Khazad-dûm Holds the bridge against the Balrog Both Gandalf and the Balrog fall into the abyss. The Fellowship escape.
The fall of Gondolin and the fall of Troy
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Further information: The Fall of Gondolin
There are multiple parallels between the Fall of Gondolin and the fall of Troy, as told in the Iliad, but again the tales differ. The Elf Ecthelion leads the charge against the Orcs, and fights Gothmog, the greatest Balrog; they wound each other and both fall into the king's fountain in Gondolin; both drown. Bruce compares this to how Aeneas rallies the Trojans, but fails, and sees king Priam perish.[13]
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https://bhaktianandascollectedworks.wor ... -bhagavan/
https://blog.oup.com/2015/08/god-word-o ... gy-part-3/
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At present, many scholars share the etymology of god, as Watkins formulated it. But not too long ago, another but very similar Sanskrit root—it means “invoke”— was more often believed to be at the basis of the Germanic divine name. It sounds so much alike the one for “pour” that an attempt was once made to merge the two. However, modern researchers discovered insurmountable phonetic difficulties in connecting the verb for invoking with the word for god, though in this context “a being invoked by worshipers” makes better sense than “a libated one.” Among many other interpretations of this recalcitrant noun we find “purifier,” “the invisible, hidden,” “shining,” “apparition, something observed,” and “the one that is outside” (I am leaving out of account several nonsensical suggestions). A borrowing from Persian has been considered and refuted on excellent grounds. Finally, some people think that god is a loan from an unknown language. This of course may be true but dismisses rather than answers the question.
With some trepidation I would like to say that all the hypotheses mentioned above strike me as unconvincing. We know from the days of Scandinavian paganism that the Germanic word guð existed and that it referred to the highest beings in control of the world. However, they competed with other “multitudes,” and sacrifices were made to all supernatural forces. Consequently, “being invoked” or “being the recipient of offerings” did not characterize any group uniquely, and, in general, to call God “the libated one” is as strange as to coin a divine name (such names are called theonyms) cognate with incense, candle, or smoke. Also, the etymology of guð has to account for the universal use of such words in the plural. To Latin numen, mentioned earlier, Hebrew Elohim can be added. We need a group name. Watkins, it will be remembered, spoke about the spirit, not spirits, in a mound.
When converted Germanic clerics searched for the word corresponding to Latin Deus and Greek theós, they must have had enough to choose from in the native resources. For example, in Old Icelandic, the great gods (all together) were called not only guð but also regin, that is, “the governing, ruling forces,” not unexpectedly, a neuter plural. The regin were called holy; sometimes the epithet occurred with a reinforcing prefix. Germanic had two adjectives for “sacred.” One has come down to us as Engl. holy; the other is known from Gothic weihs and German words like Weihnachten “Christmas,” literally, “Holy Night.” Apparently, though the guð could be the holy ones and the governing ones, the word regin (assuming that some of its forms existed in the south) lacked the connotations important to the converted Christians or carried some connotations to be avoided. In practicing the new religion the Church tried to steer away from the vocabulary characteristic of pagan cults, and yet the learned missionaries decided to employ an old term for the most important word of the Christian faith.
It is hard to say boo, shoo, or even goo to a goose.
The neuter plural guð was probably free from the unwanted associations inherent in the other words for the holy ones. As early as 1889, the great Indo-European scholar Karl Brugmann suggested that god was allied to the Sanskrit adjective ghorás “horrible” and Old Engl. gryrn “sorrow.” His etymology, though supported by Evald Lidén, another distinguished linguist, did not win the day because Brugmann wanted both ghorás and guð to be related to Greek theós, and here he was mistaken. But taking theós out of the equation does not damage the credibility of guð. The root of gho–ra-s (o was long in it) may have been a sound-imitative complex, like boo, which some won’t dare say to a goose, or hoo– in Engl. hoot. We also shoo the cat. Guð meant “terror” and struck fear in the worshippers. So much for good God. If this is how the Germanic word for “God” came into existence, it was not a past participle, and d (ð) was not a verbal ending or suffix.
As a postscript, I’ll say something about the Slavic word bog “god.” Its etymology is believed to be certain because its alleged Sanskrit and Iranian cognates mean “dispenser of wealth” and “god.” Russian bogatyi (stress on ga) means “rich.” Yet, with regard to bogatyi, we may be dealing with a case of late folk etymology. Bog, I suspect, belongs with Engl. bogey, Russian buka (the same meaning), and Germanic gu-. I have risked defying the recognized etymologies of two heavily charged words in Germanic and Slavic and supplied this suicidal postscript, because, when all is said and done, it is better to be hanged for a sheep than for a lamb. I also remembered that those who were sacrificed to Othin were sometimes hanged.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perun
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Inherited from Old East Slavic Перунъ (Perunŭ), from Proto-Slavic *Perunъ. Cognate with перу́н (perún, “thunderbolt”).
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobog_and_Belobog
https://disney.fandom.com/wiki/Chernabog
Notice the noose.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasha_(Hinduism)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varuna
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walpurgis_Night
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The date of Walpurgis Night coincided with an older May Eve festival, celebrated in much of northern Europe with the lighting of bonfires at night.[7] A variety of festivals of pre-Christian origin had been celebrated at this time (halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice) to mark the beginning of summer, including Beltane in Ireland and Britain.[7] Folklorist Jack Santino says "Her day and its traditions almost certainly are traceable to pre-Christian celebrations that took place at this time, on the first of May".[23] Art historian Pamela Berger noted Walpurga's association with sheaves of grain, and suggested that her cult was adapted from pagan agrarian goddesses.[24]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagon
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In some documents from Syrian cities, for example Halab and Ugarit, the logogram dNISABA designates Dagan.[31] As noted by Alphonso Archi, in Western Semitic languages such as Ugaritic Dagan's name was homophonous with the word for grain (dgn in alphabetic Ugaritic texts), and the logographic writing of his name as dNISABA was likely a form of wordplay popular among scribes, relying on the fact that the name of Nisaba, the Mesopotamian goddess of writing, could simply be understood as "grain" too.[32]
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One of Dagan's best documented functions was guaranteeing abundant harvests of grain.[30] However, he was not an agricultural god but rather the source of prosperity in general.[31]
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According to texts from Ebla, Dagan's attributes were a chariot and a mace.[41]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phaethon
https://www.wisdomlib.org/concept/kaumodaki
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaumodaki
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mj%C3%B6lnir
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The etymology of the hammer's name, Mjǫllnir, is disputed among historical linguists. Old Norse Mjǫllnir developed from Proto-Norse *melluniaR and one proposed derivation connects this form to Old Church Slavonic mlunuji and Russian molnija meaning 'lightning' (either borrowed from a Slavic source or both stemming from a common source) and subsequently yielding the meaning 'lightning-maker'. Another proposal connects Mjǫllnir to Old Norse mjǫll meaning 'new snow' and modern Icelandic mjalli meaning 'the color white', rendering Mjǫllnir as 'shining lightning weapon'. Finally, another proposal connects Old Norse Mjǫllnir to Old Norse mala meaning 'to grind' and Gothic malwjan 'to grind', yielding Mjǫllnir as meaning 'the grinder'.[2]
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My name at some places was Dagon, Varuna, Mitra, Apollo, Zan (DVMAZ).
I expect my ancestors and those I connect to despite genetics have worshipped God in relation to wind, thunder, and lightning since very remote times:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oesho
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Connections to several contemporaneous deities worshipped by neighbouring cultures have been suggested.
During the Kushan era, Oesho was often linked to the Hindu concept of Ishvara, which was embodied by the god Shiva;[3] Oesho may share the same etymology as Ishvara and/or represent a variant of the word in the Bactrian language spoken by the Kushans.[4][5]
Similarities have retrospectively been identified with the Avestan Vayu.[6][7]
Some later representations, evidently influenced by Greco-Bactrian culture, depict Oesho with a trishula, the traditional implement of Shiva, similar to a trident that is part of Poseidon's iconography.[8]
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The consort of Oesho was Ommo ("ΟΜΜΟ", Umā), as shown on a coin type of Kushan ruler Huvishka with, on the reverse, the divine couple Ommo ("ΟΜΜΟ", Umā) holding a flower, and Oesho ("ΟΗϷΟ", Shiva) with four arms holding attributes.[9][10]
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Philosophically, Parvati is regarded as Shiva’s shakti (divine energy or power), the personification of the creative force that sustains the cosmos. In this role, she becomes not only a mother and nurturer but also the embodiment of cosmic energy and fertility. She is the source of power that energises Shiva, who without her is incomplete. Parvati's mythology, therefore, is not just about her role as a wife but also about her cosmic function as the force that activates and sustains life.[10] In various Shaiva traditions, Parvati is also regarded as a model devotee, and even viewed as the embodiment of Shiva's grace, playing a central role in the spiritual liberation of devotees.[10][15][16] She is also one of the central deities in the goddess-oriented sect of Shaktism, where she is regarded as a benevolent aspect of Mahadevi, the supreme deity,[17][18] and is closely associated with various manifestations of Mahadevi, including the ten Mahavidyas and the Navadurgas.[10] Parvati is found extensively in ancient Puranic literature, and her statues and iconography are present in Hindu temples all over South Asia and Southeast Asia.[19][20] In Hindu temples dedicated to her and Shiva, she is symbolically represented as the yoni.[10]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potnia
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The figure of a goddess of nature, of birth and death was dominant during the Bronze Age, in both Minoan and Mycenean cults. In the Mycenean cult she was known by the title Potnia.[9] The earliest references to the title are inscriptions in Linear B (Mycenean Greek) syllabic script found at Pylos and at Knossos, Crete, dated 1450-1300 BC. On a number of tablets from Pylos, we find po-ti-ni-ja (potnia) without any accompanying word. Chadwick suggests that she was the mother-goddess of the Mycenaeans. It seems that she had an important shrine at the site Pakijanes near Pylos.[10] Wanax (wa-na-ka) was her male companion in the Mycenean cult,[9] and this title was usually applied to the god Poseidon (po-se-da-o). Another epithet of Poseidon was e-ne-si-da-o-ne ("earth-shaker") and in the cave of Amnisos (Crete) Enesidaon is related to the cult of Eileithyia.[11] She was a goddess of nature concerned with the annual birth of the divine child.[12] Potnia and her male companion (paredros) survived in the Eleusinian cult, where the following words were uttered : "Mighty Potnia has born a strong son".[13]
An inscription from Knossos refers to the "potnia of the labyrinth", who probably presided over the palace of Knossos (da-pu2-ri-to-jo, po-ti-ni-ja).[14][15] A famous Minoan seal impression found by Arthur Evans shows a nameless goddess brandishing a spear and standing upon the representation of a mountain flanked by rampant lions, and the representation seems similar to the Homeric potnia theron (the mistress of the animals).
Several tablets in Linear B script found at Knossos and Pylos refer to the potnia. Potnia is almost always accompanied by an epithet characterizing a particular place or function of the mistress : po-ti-ni-ja,a-si-wi-ja (a-si-wi-ja = ethnic adjective, possibly "Asian (Lydian) woman"), si-to-po-ti-ni-ja (sitos = "grain", of wheat or barley; probably referring to Demeter or her predecessor), po-ti-ni-ja,i-qe-ja (Potnia Hippeia, "Horse Goddess"). At Knossos a tablet refers to a-ta-na-po-ti-ni-ja, "potnia Athana", a form similar to the later Homeric form.[10][16]
This divine title could be the translation of a similar title of Pre-Greek origin, just as the title "Our Lady" in Christianity is translated in several languages.[17] The Pre-Greek name may be related to a-sa-sa-ra , a possible interpretation of some Linear A texts.[18] Although Linear A is not yet deciphered, Palmer relates tentatively the word a-sa-sa-ra-me which seems to have accompanied goddesses, with the Hittite išhaššara, which means "lady or mistress", and especially with išhaššaramis (my lady).[19]
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The same thing, over and over and over, from all around the whole world.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kushinadahime
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The goddess is named 'Kushinadahime' (櫛名田比売) in the Kojiki, while the Nihon Shoki variously names her 'Kushiinadahime' (奇稲田姫), 'Inadahime' (稲田姫), and 'Makamifuru-Kushiinadahime' (真髪触奇稲田媛).
'Inadahime' may be translated either as "lady / princess (hime) of Inada", with "Inada" (稲田) here being understood as the name of a place in Izumo Province (part of what is now the town of Okuizumo (formerly Yokota) in Nita District, Shimane Prefecture),[2] or "lady / princess of the rice fields" (inada literally translated means "rice field" or "rice paddy").[3][4] The element kushi (Old Japanese: kusi) meanwhile is usually interpreted as the adjective meaning "wondrous"; it is homophonous with the word for "comb" (櫛), which features in her story in both the Kojiki and the Shoki.[5][6] The epithet makamifuru (lit. "true-hair-touching"), found in a variant account cited in the Shoki, is understood as a stock epithet or makurakotoba associated with the word "comb".[7]
The Fudoki of Izumo Province meanwhile gives the name of the goddess as 久志伊奈太美等与麻奴良比売命, commonly read as 'Kushiinada-Mitoyomanurahime-no-Mikoto'. One theory interprets the name to mean roughly "princess of the wondrous rice fields (kushi-inada) soaking wet (manura) [and] overflowing with water (mitoyo, here understood as an epithet meaning "water-abundant")".[8]
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This is Sif, they just didn't have wheat there.
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After defeating the serpent, Susanoo built a palace or shrine for Kushinadahime in a place called Suga - so named because Susanoo felt refreshed (sugasugashi) upon arriving there - and made her father Ashinazuchi its head (obito), giving him the title 'Inada-no-Miyanushi-Suga-no-Yatsumimi-no-Kami' (稲田宮主須賀之八耳神 "Master of the Palace of Inada, the Eight-Eared Deity of Suga"). On that occasion, he composed a song in tanka form later held to be the root of Japanese waka poetry:[11]
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A bit disturbing to see "Suga" again, like "Sugaar".
https://en.geneanet.org/surnames/SUGA
Hair-like water dependent vegetation.
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kFoyauextlH
- Posts: 742
- Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2025 3:53 pm
Re: Talos: Storm North
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki ... demipower)
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Malyk was an aspect of Talos created in the wake of the Time of Troubles of 1358 DR to take advantage of areas of wild magic, created after Mystra's death at the hands of Helm.[1] Originally a drow lich,[1] the Dark Mage represented wild and evil magic viewed as mysterious and threatening to authority,[4] and embodied rebellion and chaos. He was particularly associated with the rebellion prompted by an uncovered wild mage given no recourse but to openly attack, and the chaos that then ensued.[2]
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Wild mages of various races were known to take up the worship of Malyk, ranging from the mad dwarven offshoots known as the derro to the renegade arcane mind flayers called alhoon. Most of his cultists however were drawn from young drow spellcasters who had been experimenting with wild magic.[1] The drow knew of the Dark Mage's existence through the appearance of wild mages among them, individuals with seemingly random sorcerous powers.[2]
Unfortunately such individuals were often seen as threats to the established order, and most other drow competed to receive Lolth's blessing by capturing the wild mage. Most who were discovered would be put to death unless they could escape and survive as outcasts; for such a wild mage to survive they would have to defeat or elude their assailants and somehow find a party that could be threatened or bribed into providing sanctuary.[2]
Drow of low position, especially males, made sacrifices in secret to attract Malyk's attention, but even some house matrons and others steeped in the Lolthite faith made prayers to him for power even as they attempted to purge his worship from their society. Among those wild mages who were found out, a rare few managed to rise to positions of status, declaring their allegiance to Lolth even if they were simply pretending.[2]
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The Cult of Malyk around the borders of Sshamath, a drow city where wizards were in power and priests of Lolth held a minor role, had been deemed terrorists by the ruling authorities. The Conclave of Sshamath had long banned wild magic, with wild magic practitioners chafing under their rule since. Several years after Malyk's ascension the Cult attempted a coup using an artifact known as the Guardian's Tear, an item of raw magic from which bubbles of wild and dead magic spun off. It was for this act that the Conclave, in a rare move of concordance, banished Malyk's cultists along with their venerated artifact. Even so the effects of their plan to ruin the city's economy could still be felt there as wild and dead magic zones drifted undetected and sometimes ruined years of research and effort.[7][8]
The Cult of Malyk was known to be led by a mysterious and incredibly powerful male drow, a wild mage known only as the Wildstorm. At least seventeen clergy members were known to have been part of the sect.[7]
Malyk was also known to be worshiped by the drow of the Undermountain.[9]
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Malyk and Zinzerena were in some ways reflections of each other; each for example was a god of arcane magic, but while Malyk was the patron of wild magic, Zinzerena was the goddess of illusionists and allowed for magical study. Interpretations of ancient legends suggested that the two were either lovers or siblings.[2][12]
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https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Zinzerena
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susanoo-no-Mikoto
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaterasu
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto
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Susanoo's name is variously given in the Kojiki as 'Takehaya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (建速須佐之男命), 'Haya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (速須佐之男命), or simply as 'Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (須佐之男命). -no-Mikoto is a common honorific appended to the names of Japanese gods; it may be understood as similar to the English honorific 'the Great'. He is meanwhile named in the Nihon Shoki as 'Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (素戔嗚尊), 'Kamu-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (神素戔嗚尊), 'Haya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (速素戔嗚尊), and 'Take-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (武素戔嗚尊). The Fudoki of Izumo Province renders his name both as 'Kamu-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (神須佐能袁命) and 'Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (須佐能乎命). In these texts the following honorific prefixes are attached to his name: take- (建/武, "brave"), haya- (速, "swift"), and kamu- (神, "divine").
The susa in Susanoo's name has been variously explained as being derived from either of the following words:
The verb susabu or susamu meaning 'to be impetuous,' 'to be violent,' or 'to go wild'[3][4][5][6]
The verb susumu, 'to advance'[3]
The township of Susa (須佐郷) in Iishi District, Izumo Province (modern Shimane Prefecture)[7]
A word related to the Middle Korean 'susung', meaning 'master' or 'shaman'[8][9][10]
Mythology
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Parentage
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The Kojiki (c. 712 CE) and the Nihon Shoki (720 CE) both agree in their description of Susanoo as the son of the god Izanagi and the younger brother of Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun, and of Tsukuyomi, the god of the moon. The circumstances surrounding the birth of these three deities, collectively known as the "Three Precious Children" (三貴子, Mihashira-no-Uzunomiko, Sankishi), however, vary between sources.
In the Kojiki, Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, and Susanoo came into existence when Izanagi bathed in a river to purify himself after visiting Yomi, the underworld, in a failed attempt to rescue his deceased wife, Izanami. Amaterasu was born when Izanagi washed his left eye, Tsukuyomi was born when he washed his right eye, and Susanoo was born when he washed his nose. Izanagi then appoints Amaterasu to rule Takamagahara (高天原, the "Plain of High Heaven"), Tsukuyomi the night, and Susanoo the seas. Susanoo, who missed his mother, kept crying and howling incessantly until his beard grew long, causing the mountains to wither and the rivers to dry up. An angry Izanagi then "expelled him with a divine expulsion."[11][12][13]
The main narrative of the Nihon Shoki has Izanagi and Izanami procreating after creating the Japanese archipelago; to them were born (in the following order) Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, the 'leech-child' Hiruko, and Susanoo. Amaterasu and Tsukuyomi were sent up to heaven to govern it, while Hiruko – who even at the age of three could not stand upright – was placed on the 'Rock-Camphor Boat of Heaven' (天磐櫲樟船, Ame-no-Iwakusufune) and set adrift. Susanoo, whose wailing laid waste to the land, was expelled and sent to the netherworld (Ne-no-Kuni).[14] (In the Kojiki, Hiruko is the couple's very first offspring, born before the islands of Japan and the other deities were created; there he is set afloat on a boat of reeds.)
A variant legend recorded in the Shoki has Izanagi begetting Amaterasu by holding a bronze mirror in his left hand, Tsukuyomi by holding another mirror in his right hand, and Susanoo by turning his head and looking sideways. Susanoo is here also said to be banished by Izanagi due to his destructive nature.[15]
A third variant in the Shoki has Izanagi and Izanami begetting Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, Hiruko, and Susanoo, as in the main narrative. This version specifies the Rock-Camphor Boat on which Hiruko was placed in to be the couple's fourth offspring. The fifth child, the fire god Kagutsuchi, caused the death of Izanami (as in the Kojiki). As in other versions, Susanoo – who "was of a wicked nature, and was always fond of wailing and wrath" – is here expelled by his parents.[15]
Susanoo and Amaterasu
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Sword guard (tsuba) depicting Susanoo meeting Amaterasu in Takamagahara
Before Susanoo leaves, he ascends to Takamagahara, wishing to say farewell to his sister Amaterasu. As he did so, the mountains and rivers shook and the land quaked. Amaterasu, suspicious of his motives, went out to meet him dressed in male clothing and clad in armor, but when Susanoo proposed a trial by pledge (ukehi) to prove his sincerity, she accepted. In the ritual, the two gods each chewed and spat out an object carried by the other (in some variants, an item they each possessed).
Both the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki's main account relate that Amaterasu broke Susanoo's ten-span sword (十拳剣 / 十握剣, totsuka no tsurugi) into three, chewed them and then spat them out. Three goddesses – Takiribime (Tagorihime), Ichikishimahime, and Tagitsuhime – were thus born. Susanoo then took the strings of magatama beads Amaterasu entwined in her hair and round her wrists, likewise chewed the beads and spat them out. Five male deities – Ame-no-Oshihomimi, Ame-no-Hohi, Amatsuhikone, Ikutsuhikone, and Kumano-no-Kusubi – then came into existence.[16][17]
A variant account in the Nihon Shoki has Amaterasu chew three different swords she bore with her – a ten-span sword, a nine-span sword (九握剣, kokonotsuka no tsurugi), and an eight-span sword (八握剣, yatsuka no tsurugi) – while Susanoo chewed the magatama necklace that hung on his neck.[18]
Another variant account in the Shoki has Susanoo meet a kami named Ha'akarutama (羽明玉) on his way to heaven. This deity presented him with the magatama beads used in the ritual. In this version, Amaterasu begets the three goddesses after chewing the magatama beads Susanoo obtained earlier, while Susanoo begets the five gods after biting off the edge of Amaterasu's sword.[19]
A third variant has Amaterasu chewing three different swords to beget the three goddesses as in the first variant. Susanoo, in turn, begat six male deities after chewing the magatama beads on his hair bunches and necklace and spitting them on his hands, forearms, and legs.[20]
Necklace of magatama beads
Amaterasu emerges from the Heavenly Rock Cave (Shunsai Toshimasa, 1887)
Amaterasu declares that the male deities were hers because they were born of her necklace, and that the three goddesses were Susanoo's.[21] Susanoo, announcing that he had won the trial,[a] thus signifying the purity of his intentions, "raged with victory" and proceeded to wreak havoc by destroying his sister's rice fields, defecating in her palace and flaying the 'heavenly piebald horse' (天斑駒, ame-no-fuchikoma), which he then hurled at Amaterasu's loom, killing one of her weaving maidens.[22][23][24] A furious Amaterasu in response hid inside the Ama-no-Iwato ("Heavenly Rock Cave"), plunging heaven and earth into total darkness. The gods, led by Omoikane-no-Kami (思金神), eventually persuade her to come out of the cave, restoring light to the world.[25][26] As punishment for his misdeeds, Susanoo is thrown out of Takamagahara:[27][28]
6th century (Kofun period) Haniwa depicting a warrior wearing the male mizura hairstyle, in which the hair is parted into two bunches or loops
At this time the eight-hundred myriad deities deliberated together, imposed upon Haya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto a fine of a thousand tables of restitutive gifts, and also, cutting off his beard and the nails of his hands and feet, had him exorcised and expelled him with a divine expulsion.[29]
A fourth variant of the story in the Shoki reverses the order of the two events. This version relates that Susanoo and Amaterasu each owned three rice fields; Amaterasu's fields were fertile, while Susanoo's were dry and barren. Driven by jealousy, Susanoo ruins his sister's rice fields, causing her to hide in the Ama-no-Iwato and him to be expelled from heaven (as above). During his banishment, Susanoo, wearing a hat and a raincoat made of straw, sought shelter from the heavy rains, but the other gods refused to give him lodging. He then ascends to heaven once more to say farewell to Amaterasu.
After this, Sosa no wo no Mikoto said:—'All the Gods have banished me, and I am now about to depart for ever. Why should I not see my elder sister face to face; and why take it on me of my own accord to depart without more ado?' So he again ascended to Heaven, disturbing Heaven and disturbing Earth. Now Ame no Uzume, seeing this, reported it to the Sun-Goddess. The Sun-Goddess said:—'My younger brother has no good purpose in coming up. It is surely because he wishes to rob me of my kingdom. Though I am a woman, why should I shrink?' So she arrayed herself in martial garb, etc., etc.
Thereupon Sosa no wo no Mikoto swore to her, and said:—'If I have come up again cherishing evil feelings, the children which I shall now produce by chewing jewels will certainly be females, and in that case they must be sent down to the Central Land of Reed-Plains. But if my intentions are pure, then I shall produce male children, and in that case they must be made to rule the Heavens. The same oath will also hold good as to the children produced by my elder sister.'[30]
The two then perform the ukehi ritual; Susanoo produces six male deities from the magatama beads on his hair knots. Declaring that his intentions were indeed pure, Susanoo gives the six gods to Amaterasu's care and departs.[31]
Kojiki Nihon Shoki
(main text) Nihon Shoki
(variant 1) Nihon Shoki
(variant 2) Nihon Shoki
(variant 3) Nihon Shoki
(variant 4)
Goddesses
(in order) 1. Takiribime-no-Mikoto
(多紀理毘売命)
2. Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
(市寸島比売命)
3. Tagitsuhime-no-Mikoto
(多岐都比売命) 1. Tagorihime
(田心姫)
2. Tagitsuhime
(湍津姫)
3. Ichikishimahime
(市杵嶋姫) 1. Okitsushimahime
(瀛津島姫)
2. Tagitsuhime
3. Tagorihime 1. Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
2. Tagorihime-no-Mikoto
3. Tagitsuhime-no-Mikoto 1. Okitsushimahime-no-Mikoto, a.k.a. Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
2. Tagitsuhime-no-Mikoto
3. Tagirihime-no-Mikoto
(田霧姫命) -
Born when Amaterasu Broke Susanoo's ten-span sword into three and chewed them Broke Susanoo's ten-span sword into three and chewed them 1. Ate her ten-span sword
2. Ate her nine-span sword
3. Ate her eight-span sword 1. Bit off the upper part of Susanoo's magatama beads
2. Bit off the middle part of the beads
3. Bit off the lower part of the beads 1. Ate her ten-span sword
2. Ate her nine-span sword
4. Ate her eight-span sword Ate her ten-span sword
Gods
(in order) 1. Masakatsu-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihomimi-no-Mikoto
(正勝吾勝勝速日天之忍穂耳命)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
(天之菩卑能命)
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(天津日子根命)
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(活津日子根命)
5. Kumano-no-Kusubi-no-Mikoto
(熊野久須毘命) 1. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihomimi-no-Mikoto
(正哉吾勝勝速日天忍穂耳尊)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
(天穂日命)
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(天津彦根命)
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(活津彦根命)
5. Kumano-no-Kusuhi-no-Mikoto
(熊野櫲樟日命) 1. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihone-no-Mikoto
(正哉吾勝勝速日天忍骨尊)
2. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
3. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
5. Kumano-no-Oshihomi-no-Mikoto
(熊野忍蹈命) 1. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
2. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihone-no-Mikoto
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
5. Kumano-no-Kusuhi-no-Mikoto 1. Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihomimi-no-Mikoto
(勝速日天忍穂耳尊)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
5. Hi-no-Hayahi-no-Mikoto
(熯之速日命)
6. Kumano-no-Oshihomi-no-Mikoto, a.k.a. Kumano-no-Oshikuma-no-Mikoto
(熊野忍蹈命, 熊野忍隅命) 1. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihone-no-Mikoto
(正哉吾勝勝速日天忍穂根尊)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ikumetsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(活目津彥根命)
5. Hihayahi-no-Mikoto
(熯速日命)
6. Kumano-no-Ōsumi-no-Mikoto
(熊野大角命)
Born when Susanoo 1. Chewed the strings of magatama beads entwined in Amaterasu's left hair bunch
2. Chewed the beads entwined in Amaterasu's right hair bunch
3. Chewed the beads on the vine securing her hair
4. Chewed the beads wrapped around Amaterasu's left wrist
5. Chewed the beads wrapped around Amaterasu's right wrist Chewed the strings of magatama beads entwined in Amaterasu's hair and wrists Chewed his necklace of magatama beads Bit off the end of Amaterasu's sword 1. Chewed the magatama beads entwined in his left hair bunch and spat them on the palm of his left hand
2. Chewed the beads entwined in his right hair bunch and spat them on the palm of his right hand
3. Chewed the beads of his necklace and laid them on his left forearm
4. Laid the beads on his right forearm
5. Laid the beads on his left foot
6. Laid the beads on his right foot 1. Chewed the magatama beads entwined in his right hair bunch and laid them on the palm of his left hand
2. Chewed the beads entwined in his right hair bunch and laid them on the palm of his right hand
Susanoo and Ōgetsuhime
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The Kojiki relates that during his banishment, Susanoo asked the goddess of food, Ōgetsuhime-no-Kami (大気都比売神), to give him something to eat. Upon finding out that the goddess produced foodstuffs from her mouth, nose, and rectum, a disgusted Susanoo killed her, at which various crops, plants and seeds spring from her dead body.[27] This account is not found in the Nihon Shoki, where a similar story is told of Tsukuyomi and the goddess Ukemochi.[32]
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In the Kojiki, a sixth-generation descendant of Susanoo, Ōnamuji-no-Kami (大穴牟遅神), ends up in Ne-no-Kuni to escape his wicked elder brothers who make repeated attempts on his life. There he meets and falls in love with Susanoo's daughter Suseribime (須勢理毘売). Upon learning of their affair, Susanoo imposes four trials on Ōnamuji:
Susanoo, upon inviting Ōnamuji to his dwelling, had him sleep in a chamber filled with snakes. Suseribime aided Ōnamuji by giving him a scarf that repelled the snakes.
The following night, Susanoo had Ōnamuji sleep in another room full of centipedes and bees. Once again, Suseribime gave Ōnamuji a scarf that kept the insects at bay.
Susanoo shot an arrow into a large plain and had Ōnamuji fetch it. As Ōnamuji was busy looking for the arrow, Susanoo set the field on fire. A field mouse showed Ōnamuji how to hide from the flames and gave him the arrow he was searching for.
Susanoo, upon discovering that Ōnamuji had survived, summoned him back to his palace and had him pick the lice and centipedes from his hair. Using a mixture of red clay and nuts given to him by Suseribime, Ōnamuji pretended to chew and spit out the insects he was picking.
After Susanoo was lulled to sleep, Ōnamuji tied Susanoo's hair to the hall's rafters and blocked the door with an enormous boulder. Taking his new wife Suseribime as well as Susanoo's sword, koto, and bow and arrows with him, Ōnamuji thus fled the palace. The koto brushed against a tree as the two were fleeing; the sound awakens Susanoo, who, rising with a start, knocks his palace down around him. Susanoo then pursued them as far as the slopes of Yomotsu Hirasaka (黄泉比良坂, the 'Flat Slope of Yomi'). As the two departed, Susanoo grudgingly gave his blessing to Ōnamuji, advising him to change his name to Ōkuninushi-no-Kami (大国主神, "Master of the Great Land"). Using the weapons he obtained from Susanoo, Ōkuninushi defeats his brothers and becomes the undisputed ruler of Ashihara-no-Nakatsukuni.[46]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koto_(instrument)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gozu_Tenn%C5%8D
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The syncretic deity Gozu Tennō (牛頭天王, "Ox-Headed Heavenly King"), originally worshiped at Yasaka Shrine in Kyoto and at other shrines such as Tsushima Shrine in Aichi Prefecture, was historically conflated with Susanoo. Originally a deity of foreign import (India and Korea have all been suggested as possible origins), Gozu Tennō was widely revered since the Heian period as a god of pestilence, who both caused disease and cured them.[67][68][69][70]
Gozu Tennō became associated with another deity called Mutō-no-Kami (武塔神) or Mutō Tenjin (武塔天神), who appears in the legend of Somin Shōrai (蘇民将来). This legend relates that Mutō, a god from the northern sea, embarked on a long journey to court the daughter of the god of the southern seas. On his way he sought lodging from a wealthy man, but was turned down. He then went to the home of a poor man (sometimes identified as the rich man's brother) named Somin Shōrai, who gave him food and shelter. Years later, Mutō returned and slew the rich man and his family but spared Somin Shōrai's house. Some versions of the story have Mutō repaying Somin Shōrai for his hospitality by giving the poor man's daughter a wreath of susuki (Miscanthus sinensis) reeds that she is to wear while declaring, " the descendant of Somin Shōrai" (蘇民将来之子孫也, Somin Shōrai no shison nari). By doing so, she and her descendants would be spared from pestilence.[71][72][73][74] The deity in this story, Mutō, is often conflated with Gozu Tennō (who, as his name implies, was born with the head of an ox) in later retellings, though one version identifies Gozu Tennō as Mutō Tenjin's son.[71]
The earliest known version of this legend, found in the Fudoki of Bingo Province (modern eastern Hiroshima Prefecture) compiled during the Nara period (preserved in an extract quoted by scholar and Shinto priest Urabe Kanekata in the Shaku Nihongi), has Mutō explicitly identify himself as Susanoo.[74] This suggests that Susanoo and Mutō Tenjin were already conflated in the Nara period, if not earlier. Sources that equate Gozu Tennō with Susanoo only first appear during the Kamakura period (1185–1333), although one theory supposes that these three gods and various other disease-related deities were already loosely coalesced around the 9th century, probably around the year 877 when a major epidemic swept through Japan.[71]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somin_Sh%C5%8Drai
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According to the story, a god from the northern sea named, Mutō-no-Kami (武塔神), who was embarking on a long journey to court the daughter of his counterpart, the god of the southern sea, asked for a place to stay for the night from two brothers. While the wealthy, younger brother refused the deity any hospitality, the elder brother, named Somin Shōrai, though extremely poor, took him in as a guest and shared all that he had: a bed of millet-straw and a simple meal of cooked millet seeds. Years later, Mutō (who had since married the southern sea god's daughter and had eight children with her) returned to Somin Shōrai's old house and gave to Somin Shōrai's daughter a wreath of entwined miscanthus reeds (a Shimenawa wreath) as a reward for the hospitality shown to him by her late father, telling her to wear it around her waist from then-on. At that same night, the god exterminated all the inhabitants of the area, sparing only Somin Shōrai's daughter. Mutō then revealed himself to have actually been the god, Susanoo, and promised to her that, in the future, all those who would wear miscanthus wreaths around their waists while declaring themselves to be Somin Shōrai's descendants, in times of epidemics, would remain unharmed.[1][2]
In some later versions of the legend, the rich younger brother is given the name Kotan Shōrai (巨旦将来), while the god who stayed in Somin Shōrai's house is identified, instead of Susanoo, as Gozu Tennō (牛頭天王 'Ox-Headed Heavenly King'), a pestilence deity conflated with both Mutō and Susanoo (though one version instead identifies Gozu Tennō as Mutō's son).[2][3][4][5] In the version of the story found in the Hoki Naiden, an Onmyōdō text on divination attributed to Abe no Seimei, Kotan Shōrai (portrayed here as the king of an Indian kingdom), who was slain by Gozu Tennō as punishment for his lack of generosity, is identified with the evil deity, Konjin.[3] In other variants, the divine traveller gives Somin Shōrai's family a talisman with the inscription " the descendant of Somin Shōrai" (蘇民将来之子孫也, Somin Shōrai no shison nari) as protection against pestilence.[4]
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Various types of amulets (omamori) bearing Somin Shōrai's name is distributed by a number of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples across Japan.
In Kyoto, a talisman resembling a chimaki (a rice dumpling wrapped in bamboo leaves) on which is attached a slip of paper with the words "The descendant(s) of Somin Shōrai" (蘇民将来之子孫也, Somin Shōrai no shison nari) is traditionally hung on doorways to ward off misfortune.[14][15][16][17] A similar custom, involving a shimenawa with a wooden plaque on which is written "The house of Somin Shōrai's descendants" (蘇民将来子孫家門, Somin Shōrai shison kamon), is practiced in the Ise and Shima areas of Mie Prefecture.[18]
In Ueda, Nagano Prefecture, hexagonal wooden charms inscribed with the words "Wealthy [and] prosperous [are] Somin Shōrai's descendant(s)" (大福長者蘇民将来子孫人也, Daifuku chōja Somin Shōrai shison no hito nari) traditionally handmade by members of the local Somin Confraternity (蘇民講 Somin-kō) are distributed by Shinano Kokubun-ji temple during the Yōkadō Festival (八日堂縁日 Yōkadō Ennichi) held every 7th-8 January.[19][20][21]
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A prayer or norito originally recited by the priestly Nakatomi clan in the presence of the court during the Great Exorcism (大祓, Ōharae) ritual of the last day of the sixth month, more commonly known today as the Ōharae no Kotoba (大祓詞, 'Words of the Great Exorcism'),[90][91] lists eight "heavenly sins" (Japanese: 天つ罪, amatsu-tsumi), most of which are agricultural in nature:
Breaking down the ridges
Covering up the ditches
Releasing the irrigation sluices
Double planting
Setting up stakes
Skinning alive
Skinning backward
Defecation
1, 2, 6, 7 and 8 are committed by Susanoo in the Kojiki, while 3, 4, 5 are attributed to him in the Shoki. In ancient Japanese society, offenses related to agriculture were regarded as being as abhorrent as those which caused ritual impurity.[92]
One of the offensive acts Susanoo committed during his rampage was 'skinning backward' (逆剥, sakahagi) the Ame-no-Fuchikoma (Japanese: 天の斑駒, "Heavenly-Piebald Horse"). Regarding this, William George Aston observed, "Indian myth has a piebald or spotted deer or cow among celestial objects. The idea is probably suggested by the appearance of the stars."[93] Nelly Naumann (1982) meanwhile interpreted the spotted horse as a lunar symbol, with Susanoo's action being equivalent to the devouring or killing of the moon. To Naumann, the act of flaying itself, because it is performed in reverse, is intended to be a magical act that caused death.[94] Indeed, in the Kojiki when Susanoo throws the flayed horse (or its hide) to Amaterasu's weaving hall, one of the weaving maidens injures herself and dies. (In the Shoki, it is Amaterasu herself who is alarmed and injured.) Emilia Gadeleva meanwhile connects Susanoo's act of skinning and flinging the horse with ancient Korean rainmaking rituals, which involved animal sacrifice.[95]
The gods punish Susanoo for his rampages by cutting off his beard, fingernails, and toenails. One textual tradition in which the relevant passage is read as "cutting off his beard and causing the nails of his hands and feet to be extracted" (亦切鬚及手足爪令拔而) suggests that this was something along the lines of corporal punishment. Another tradition which reads the passage as "cutting off his beard and the nails of his hands and feet, had him exorcised" (亦切鬚及手足爪令祓而) meanwhile suggests that this was an act of purification, in which the sins and pollution that adhered to Susanoo are removed, thus turning him from a destroyer of life into a giver of life.[96][97]
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In the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, Susanoo is repeatedly associated with Ne-no-Kuni (Japanese: 根の国; the "Land of Roots"). While sometimes seemingly considered to be more or less identical to Yomi, the Land of the Dead (the Kojiki speaks of Ne-no-Kuni as the land of Susanoo's deceased mother Izanami, who is stated earlier in the narrative to have become the ruler of Yomi, and calls the slope serving at its exit the Yomotsu Hirasaka, the 'Flat Slope of Yomi'), it would seem that the two were originally considered to be different locations.
While Matsumura Takeo suggested that Ne-no-Kuni originally referred to the dimly remembered original homeland of the Japanese people,[75] Emilia Gadeleva instead proposes that the two locales, while similar in that both were subterranean realms associated with darkness, differed from each other in that Yomi was associated with death, while Ne-no-Kuni, as implied by the myth about Ōnamuji, was seemingly associated with rebirth. Ne-no-Kuni being a land of revival, as per Gadeleva's theory, is why Susanoo was connected to it: Susanoo, as the god that brought rain and with it, the harvest, was needed in Ne-no-Kuni to secure the rebirth of crops. In time, however, the two locations were confused with each other, so that by the time the Kojiki and the Shoki were written Ne-no-Kuni came to be seen like Yomi as an unclean realm of the dead. Gadeleva argues that this new image of Ne-no-Kuni as a place of evil and impurity contributed to Susanoo becoming more and more associated with calamity and violence.[86]
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A few myths, such as that of Susanoo's descent in Soshimori in Silla, seem to suggest a connection between the god and the Korean Peninsula. Indeed, some scholars have hypothesized that the deities who were eventually conflated with Susanoo, Mutō Tenjin, and Gozu Tennō, may have had Korean origins as well, with the name 'Mutō' (武塔, historical orthography: mutau) being linked with the Korean word mudang "shamaness," and 'Gozu' being explained as a calque of 'Soshimori', here interpreted as being derived from a Korean toponym meaning 'Bull's (so) Head (mari)'.[83] The name 'Susanoo' itself has been interpreted as being related to the Middle Korean title susung (transliterated as 次次雄 or 慈充), meaning 'master' or 'shaman', notably applied to Namhae, the second king of Silla, in the Samguk Sagi.[8] Susanoo is thus supposed in this view to have originally been a foreign god (蕃神, banshin), perhaps a deified shaman, whose origins may be traced back to Korea.[84]
Emilia Gadeleva (2000) sees Susanoo's original character as being that of a rain god – more precisely, a god associated with rainmaking – with his association with the harvest and a number of other elements from his myths ultimately springing from his connection with rainwater. He thus serves as a contrast and a parallel to Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. Gadeleva also acknowledges the foreign elements in the god's character by supposing that rainmaking rituals and concepts were brought to Japan in ancient times from the continent, with the figure of the Korean shaman (susung) who magically controlled the abundance of rain eventually morphing into the Japanese Susanoo, but at the same time stresses that Susanoo is not completely a foreign import but must have had Japanese roots at his core. In Gadeleva's view, while the god certainly underwent drastic changes upon his introduction in the imperial myth cycle, Susanoo's character already bore positive and negative features since the beginning, with both elements stemming from his association with rain. As the right quantity of rainwater was vital for ensuring a rich harvest, calamities caused by too much or too little rainfall (i.e. floods, drought, or epidemics) would have been blamed on the rain god for not doing his job properly. This, according to Gadeleva, underlies the occasional portrayal of Susanoo in a negative light.[85]
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Malyk was an aspect of Talos created in the wake of the Time of Troubles of 1358 DR to take advantage of areas of wild magic, created after Mystra's death at the hands of Helm.[1] Originally a drow lich,[1] the Dark Mage represented wild and evil magic viewed as mysterious and threatening to authority,[4] and embodied rebellion and chaos. He was particularly associated with the rebellion prompted by an uncovered wild mage given no recourse but to openly attack, and the chaos that then ensued.[2]
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Wild mages of various races were known to take up the worship of Malyk, ranging from the mad dwarven offshoots known as the derro to the renegade arcane mind flayers called alhoon. Most of his cultists however were drawn from young drow spellcasters who had been experimenting with wild magic.[1] The drow knew of the Dark Mage's existence through the appearance of wild mages among them, individuals with seemingly random sorcerous powers.[2]
Unfortunately such individuals were often seen as threats to the established order, and most other drow competed to receive Lolth's blessing by capturing the wild mage. Most who were discovered would be put to death unless they could escape and survive as outcasts; for such a wild mage to survive they would have to defeat or elude their assailants and somehow find a party that could be threatened or bribed into providing sanctuary.[2]
Drow of low position, especially males, made sacrifices in secret to attract Malyk's attention, but even some house matrons and others steeped in the Lolthite faith made prayers to him for power even as they attempted to purge his worship from their society. Among those wild mages who were found out, a rare few managed to rise to positions of status, declaring their allegiance to Lolth even if they were simply pretending.[2]
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The Cult of Malyk around the borders of Sshamath, a drow city where wizards were in power and priests of Lolth held a minor role, had been deemed terrorists by the ruling authorities. The Conclave of Sshamath had long banned wild magic, with wild magic practitioners chafing under their rule since. Several years after Malyk's ascension the Cult attempted a coup using an artifact known as the Guardian's Tear, an item of raw magic from which bubbles of wild and dead magic spun off. It was for this act that the Conclave, in a rare move of concordance, banished Malyk's cultists along with their venerated artifact. Even so the effects of their plan to ruin the city's economy could still be felt there as wild and dead magic zones drifted undetected and sometimes ruined years of research and effort.[7][8]
The Cult of Malyk was known to be led by a mysterious and incredibly powerful male drow, a wild mage known only as the Wildstorm. At least seventeen clergy members were known to have been part of the sect.[7]
Malyk was also known to be worshiped by the drow of the Undermountain.[9]
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Malyk and Zinzerena were in some ways reflections of each other; each for example was a god of arcane magic, but while Malyk was the patron of wild magic, Zinzerena was the goddess of illusionists and allowed for magical study. Interpretations of ancient legends suggested that the two were either lovers or siblings.[2][12]
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https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Zinzerena
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susanoo-no-Mikoto
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaterasu
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto
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Susanoo's name is variously given in the Kojiki as 'Takehaya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (建速須佐之男命), 'Haya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (速須佐之男命), or simply as 'Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (須佐之男命). -no-Mikoto is a common honorific appended to the names of Japanese gods; it may be understood as similar to the English honorific 'the Great'. He is meanwhile named in the Nihon Shoki as 'Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (素戔嗚尊), 'Kamu-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (神素戔嗚尊), 'Haya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (速素戔嗚尊), and 'Take-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (武素戔嗚尊). The Fudoki of Izumo Province renders his name both as 'Kamu-Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (神須佐能袁命) and 'Susanoo-no-Mikoto' (須佐能乎命). In these texts the following honorific prefixes are attached to his name: take- (建/武, "brave"), haya- (速, "swift"), and kamu- (神, "divine").
The susa in Susanoo's name has been variously explained as being derived from either of the following words:
The verb susabu or susamu meaning 'to be impetuous,' 'to be violent,' or 'to go wild'[3][4][5][6]
The verb susumu, 'to advance'[3]
The township of Susa (須佐郷) in Iishi District, Izumo Province (modern Shimane Prefecture)[7]
A word related to the Middle Korean 'susung', meaning 'master' or 'shaman'[8][9][10]
Mythology
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Parentage
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The Kojiki (c. 712 CE) and the Nihon Shoki (720 CE) both agree in their description of Susanoo as the son of the god Izanagi and the younger brother of Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun, and of Tsukuyomi, the god of the moon. The circumstances surrounding the birth of these three deities, collectively known as the "Three Precious Children" (三貴子, Mihashira-no-Uzunomiko, Sankishi), however, vary between sources.
In the Kojiki, Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, and Susanoo came into existence when Izanagi bathed in a river to purify himself after visiting Yomi, the underworld, in a failed attempt to rescue his deceased wife, Izanami. Amaterasu was born when Izanagi washed his left eye, Tsukuyomi was born when he washed his right eye, and Susanoo was born when he washed his nose. Izanagi then appoints Amaterasu to rule Takamagahara (高天原, the "Plain of High Heaven"), Tsukuyomi the night, and Susanoo the seas. Susanoo, who missed his mother, kept crying and howling incessantly until his beard grew long, causing the mountains to wither and the rivers to dry up. An angry Izanagi then "expelled him with a divine expulsion."[11][12][13]
The main narrative of the Nihon Shoki has Izanagi and Izanami procreating after creating the Japanese archipelago; to them were born (in the following order) Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, the 'leech-child' Hiruko, and Susanoo. Amaterasu and Tsukuyomi were sent up to heaven to govern it, while Hiruko – who even at the age of three could not stand upright – was placed on the 'Rock-Camphor Boat of Heaven' (天磐櫲樟船, Ame-no-Iwakusufune) and set adrift. Susanoo, whose wailing laid waste to the land, was expelled and sent to the netherworld (Ne-no-Kuni).[14] (In the Kojiki, Hiruko is the couple's very first offspring, born before the islands of Japan and the other deities were created; there he is set afloat on a boat of reeds.)
A variant legend recorded in the Shoki has Izanagi begetting Amaterasu by holding a bronze mirror in his left hand, Tsukuyomi by holding another mirror in his right hand, and Susanoo by turning his head and looking sideways. Susanoo is here also said to be banished by Izanagi due to his destructive nature.[15]
A third variant in the Shoki has Izanagi and Izanami begetting Amaterasu, Tsukuyomi, Hiruko, and Susanoo, as in the main narrative. This version specifies the Rock-Camphor Boat on which Hiruko was placed in to be the couple's fourth offspring. The fifth child, the fire god Kagutsuchi, caused the death of Izanami (as in the Kojiki). As in other versions, Susanoo – who "was of a wicked nature, and was always fond of wailing and wrath" – is here expelled by his parents.[15]
Susanoo and Amaterasu
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Sword guard (tsuba) depicting Susanoo meeting Amaterasu in Takamagahara
Before Susanoo leaves, he ascends to Takamagahara, wishing to say farewell to his sister Amaterasu. As he did so, the mountains and rivers shook and the land quaked. Amaterasu, suspicious of his motives, went out to meet him dressed in male clothing and clad in armor, but when Susanoo proposed a trial by pledge (ukehi) to prove his sincerity, she accepted. In the ritual, the two gods each chewed and spat out an object carried by the other (in some variants, an item they each possessed).
Both the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki's main account relate that Amaterasu broke Susanoo's ten-span sword (十拳剣 / 十握剣, totsuka no tsurugi) into three, chewed them and then spat them out. Three goddesses – Takiribime (Tagorihime), Ichikishimahime, and Tagitsuhime – were thus born. Susanoo then took the strings of magatama beads Amaterasu entwined in her hair and round her wrists, likewise chewed the beads and spat them out. Five male deities – Ame-no-Oshihomimi, Ame-no-Hohi, Amatsuhikone, Ikutsuhikone, and Kumano-no-Kusubi – then came into existence.[16][17]
A variant account in the Nihon Shoki has Amaterasu chew three different swords she bore with her – a ten-span sword, a nine-span sword (九握剣, kokonotsuka no tsurugi), and an eight-span sword (八握剣, yatsuka no tsurugi) – while Susanoo chewed the magatama necklace that hung on his neck.[18]
Another variant account in the Shoki has Susanoo meet a kami named Ha'akarutama (羽明玉) on his way to heaven. This deity presented him with the magatama beads used in the ritual. In this version, Amaterasu begets the three goddesses after chewing the magatama beads Susanoo obtained earlier, while Susanoo begets the five gods after biting off the edge of Amaterasu's sword.[19]
A third variant has Amaterasu chewing three different swords to beget the three goddesses as in the first variant. Susanoo, in turn, begat six male deities after chewing the magatama beads on his hair bunches and necklace and spitting them on his hands, forearms, and legs.[20]
Necklace of magatama beads
Amaterasu emerges from the Heavenly Rock Cave (Shunsai Toshimasa, 1887)
Amaterasu declares that the male deities were hers because they were born of her necklace, and that the three goddesses were Susanoo's.[21] Susanoo, announcing that he had won the trial,[a] thus signifying the purity of his intentions, "raged with victory" and proceeded to wreak havoc by destroying his sister's rice fields, defecating in her palace and flaying the 'heavenly piebald horse' (天斑駒, ame-no-fuchikoma), which he then hurled at Amaterasu's loom, killing one of her weaving maidens.[22][23][24] A furious Amaterasu in response hid inside the Ama-no-Iwato ("Heavenly Rock Cave"), plunging heaven and earth into total darkness. The gods, led by Omoikane-no-Kami (思金神), eventually persuade her to come out of the cave, restoring light to the world.[25][26] As punishment for his misdeeds, Susanoo is thrown out of Takamagahara:[27][28]
6th century (Kofun period) Haniwa depicting a warrior wearing the male mizura hairstyle, in which the hair is parted into two bunches or loops
At this time the eight-hundred myriad deities deliberated together, imposed upon Haya-Susanoo-no-Mikoto a fine of a thousand tables of restitutive gifts, and also, cutting off his beard and the nails of his hands and feet, had him exorcised and expelled him with a divine expulsion.[29]
A fourth variant of the story in the Shoki reverses the order of the two events. This version relates that Susanoo and Amaterasu each owned three rice fields; Amaterasu's fields were fertile, while Susanoo's were dry and barren. Driven by jealousy, Susanoo ruins his sister's rice fields, causing her to hide in the Ama-no-Iwato and him to be expelled from heaven (as above). During his banishment, Susanoo, wearing a hat and a raincoat made of straw, sought shelter from the heavy rains, but the other gods refused to give him lodging. He then ascends to heaven once more to say farewell to Amaterasu.
After this, Sosa no wo no Mikoto said:—'All the Gods have banished me, and I am now about to depart for ever. Why should I not see my elder sister face to face; and why take it on me of my own accord to depart without more ado?' So he again ascended to Heaven, disturbing Heaven and disturbing Earth. Now Ame no Uzume, seeing this, reported it to the Sun-Goddess. The Sun-Goddess said:—'My younger brother has no good purpose in coming up. It is surely because he wishes to rob me of my kingdom. Though I am a woman, why should I shrink?' So she arrayed herself in martial garb, etc., etc.
Thereupon Sosa no wo no Mikoto swore to her, and said:—'If I have come up again cherishing evil feelings, the children which I shall now produce by chewing jewels will certainly be females, and in that case they must be sent down to the Central Land of Reed-Plains. But if my intentions are pure, then I shall produce male children, and in that case they must be made to rule the Heavens. The same oath will also hold good as to the children produced by my elder sister.'[30]
The two then perform the ukehi ritual; Susanoo produces six male deities from the magatama beads on his hair knots. Declaring that his intentions were indeed pure, Susanoo gives the six gods to Amaterasu's care and departs.[31]
Kojiki Nihon Shoki
(main text) Nihon Shoki
(variant 1) Nihon Shoki
(variant 2) Nihon Shoki
(variant 3) Nihon Shoki
(variant 4)
Goddesses
(in order) 1. Takiribime-no-Mikoto
(多紀理毘売命)
2. Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
(市寸島比売命)
3. Tagitsuhime-no-Mikoto
(多岐都比売命) 1. Tagorihime
(田心姫)
2. Tagitsuhime
(湍津姫)
3. Ichikishimahime
(市杵嶋姫) 1. Okitsushimahime
(瀛津島姫)
2. Tagitsuhime
3. Tagorihime 1. Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
2. Tagorihime-no-Mikoto
3. Tagitsuhime-no-Mikoto 1. Okitsushimahime-no-Mikoto, a.k.a. Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
2. Tagitsuhime-no-Mikoto
3. Tagirihime-no-Mikoto
(田霧姫命) -
Born when Amaterasu Broke Susanoo's ten-span sword into three and chewed them Broke Susanoo's ten-span sword into three and chewed them 1. Ate her ten-span sword
2. Ate her nine-span sword
3. Ate her eight-span sword 1. Bit off the upper part of Susanoo's magatama beads
2. Bit off the middle part of the beads
3. Bit off the lower part of the beads 1. Ate her ten-span sword
2. Ate her nine-span sword
4. Ate her eight-span sword Ate her ten-span sword
Gods
(in order) 1. Masakatsu-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihomimi-no-Mikoto
(正勝吾勝勝速日天之忍穂耳命)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
(天之菩卑能命)
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(天津日子根命)
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(活津日子根命)
5. Kumano-no-Kusubi-no-Mikoto
(熊野久須毘命) 1. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihomimi-no-Mikoto
(正哉吾勝勝速日天忍穂耳尊)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
(天穂日命)
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(天津彦根命)
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(活津彦根命)
5. Kumano-no-Kusuhi-no-Mikoto
(熊野櫲樟日命) 1. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihone-no-Mikoto
(正哉吾勝勝速日天忍骨尊)
2. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
3. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
5. Kumano-no-Oshihomi-no-Mikoto
(熊野忍蹈命) 1. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
2. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihone-no-Mikoto
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
5. Kumano-no-Kusuhi-no-Mikoto 1. Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihomimi-no-Mikoto
(勝速日天忍穂耳尊)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ikutsuhikone-no-Mikoto
5. Hi-no-Hayahi-no-Mikoto
(熯之速日命)
6. Kumano-no-Oshihomi-no-Mikoto, a.k.a. Kumano-no-Oshikuma-no-Mikoto
(熊野忍蹈命, 熊野忍隅命) 1. Masaka-Akatsu-Kachihayahi-Ame-no-Oshihone-no-Mikoto
(正哉吾勝勝速日天忍穂根尊)
2. Ame-no-Hohi-no-Mikoto
3. Amatsuhikone-no-Mikoto
4. Ikumetsuhikone-no-Mikoto
(活目津彥根命)
5. Hihayahi-no-Mikoto
(熯速日命)
6. Kumano-no-Ōsumi-no-Mikoto
(熊野大角命)
Born when Susanoo 1. Chewed the strings of magatama beads entwined in Amaterasu's left hair bunch
2. Chewed the beads entwined in Amaterasu's right hair bunch
3. Chewed the beads on the vine securing her hair
4. Chewed the beads wrapped around Amaterasu's left wrist
5. Chewed the beads wrapped around Amaterasu's right wrist Chewed the strings of magatama beads entwined in Amaterasu's hair and wrists Chewed his necklace of magatama beads Bit off the end of Amaterasu's sword 1. Chewed the magatama beads entwined in his left hair bunch and spat them on the palm of his left hand
2. Chewed the beads entwined in his right hair bunch and spat them on the palm of his right hand
3. Chewed the beads of his necklace and laid them on his left forearm
4. Laid the beads on his right forearm
5. Laid the beads on his left foot
6. Laid the beads on his right foot 1. Chewed the magatama beads entwined in his right hair bunch and laid them on the palm of his left hand
2. Chewed the beads entwined in his right hair bunch and laid them on the palm of his right hand
Susanoo and Ōgetsuhime
edit
The Kojiki relates that during his banishment, Susanoo asked the goddess of food, Ōgetsuhime-no-Kami (大気都比売神), to give him something to eat. Upon finding out that the goddess produced foodstuffs from her mouth, nose, and rectum, a disgusted Susanoo killed her, at which various crops, plants and seeds spring from her dead body.[27] This account is not found in the Nihon Shoki, where a similar story is told of Tsukuyomi and the goddess Ukemochi.[32]
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In the Kojiki, a sixth-generation descendant of Susanoo, Ōnamuji-no-Kami (大穴牟遅神), ends up in Ne-no-Kuni to escape his wicked elder brothers who make repeated attempts on his life. There he meets and falls in love with Susanoo's daughter Suseribime (須勢理毘売). Upon learning of their affair, Susanoo imposes four trials on Ōnamuji:
Susanoo, upon inviting Ōnamuji to his dwelling, had him sleep in a chamber filled with snakes. Suseribime aided Ōnamuji by giving him a scarf that repelled the snakes.
The following night, Susanoo had Ōnamuji sleep in another room full of centipedes and bees. Once again, Suseribime gave Ōnamuji a scarf that kept the insects at bay.
Susanoo shot an arrow into a large plain and had Ōnamuji fetch it. As Ōnamuji was busy looking for the arrow, Susanoo set the field on fire. A field mouse showed Ōnamuji how to hide from the flames and gave him the arrow he was searching for.
Susanoo, upon discovering that Ōnamuji had survived, summoned him back to his palace and had him pick the lice and centipedes from his hair. Using a mixture of red clay and nuts given to him by Suseribime, Ōnamuji pretended to chew and spit out the insects he was picking.
After Susanoo was lulled to sleep, Ōnamuji tied Susanoo's hair to the hall's rafters and blocked the door with an enormous boulder. Taking his new wife Suseribime as well as Susanoo's sword, koto, and bow and arrows with him, Ōnamuji thus fled the palace. The koto brushed against a tree as the two were fleeing; the sound awakens Susanoo, who, rising with a start, knocks his palace down around him. Susanoo then pursued them as far as the slopes of Yomotsu Hirasaka (黄泉比良坂, the 'Flat Slope of Yomi'). As the two departed, Susanoo grudgingly gave his blessing to Ōnamuji, advising him to change his name to Ōkuninushi-no-Kami (大国主神, "Master of the Great Land"). Using the weapons he obtained from Susanoo, Ōkuninushi defeats his brothers and becomes the undisputed ruler of Ashihara-no-Nakatsukuni.[46]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koto_(instrument)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gozu_Tenn%C5%8D
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The syncretic deity Gozu Tennō (牛頭天王, "Ox-Headed Heavenly King"), originally worshiped at Yasaka Shrine in Kyoto and at other shrines such as Tsushima Shrine in Aichi Prefecture, was historically conflated with Susanoo. Originally a deity of foreign import (India and Korea have all been suggested as possible origins), Gozu Tennō was widely revered since the Heian period as a god of pestilence, who both caused disease and cured them.[67][68][69][70]
Gozu Tennō became associated with another deity called Mutō-no-Kami (武塔神) or Mutō Tenjin (武塔天神), who appears in the legend of Somin Shōrai (蘇民将来). This legend relates that Mutō, a god from the northern sea, embarked on a long journey to court the daughter of the god of the southern seas. On his way he sought lodging from a wealthy man, but was turned down. He then went to the home of a poor man (sometimes identified as the rich man's brother) named Somin Shōrai, who gave him food and shelter. Years later, Mutō returned and slew the rich man and his family but spared Somin Shōrai's house. Some versions of the story have Mutō repaying Somin Shōrai for his hospitality by giving the poor man's daughter a wreath of susuki (Miscanthus sinensis) reeds that she is to wear while declaring, " the descendant of Somin Shōrai" (蘇民将来之子孫也, Somin Shōrai no shison nari). By doing so, she and her descendants would be spared from pestilence.[71][72][73][74] The deity in this story, Mutō, is often conflated with Gozu Tennō (who, as his name implies, was born with the head of an ox) in later retellings, though one version identifies Gozu Tennō as Mutō Tenjin's son.[71]
The earliest known version of this legend, found in the Fudoki of Bingo Province (modern eastern Hiroshima Prefecture) compiled during the Nara period (preserved in an extract quoted by scholar and Shinto priest Urabe Kanekata in the Shaku Nihongi), has Mutō explicitly identify himself as Susanoo.[74] This suggests that Susanoo and Mutō Tenjin were already conflated in the Nara period, if not earlier. Sources that equate Gozu Tennō with Susanoo only first appear during the Kamakura period (1185–1333), although one theory supposes that these three gods and various other disease-related deities were already loosely coalesced around the 9th century, probably around the year 877 when a major epidemic swept through Japan.[71]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somin_Sh%C5%8Drai
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According to the story, a god from the northern sea named, Mutō-no-Kami (武塔神), who was embarking on a long journey to court the daughter of his counterpart, the god of the southern sea, asked for a place to stay for the night from two brothers. While the wealthy, younger brother refused the deity any hospitality, the elder brother, named Somin Shōrai, though extremely poor, took him in as a guest and shared all that he had: a bed of millet-straw and a simple meal of cooked millet seeds. Years later, Mutō (who had since married the southern sea god's daughter and had eight children with her) returned to Somin Shōrai's old house and gave to Somin Shōrai's daughter a wreath of entwined miscanthus reeds (a Shimenawa wreath) as a reward for the hospitality shown to him by her late father, telling her to wear it around her waist from then-on. At that same night, the god exterminated all the inhabitants of the area, sparing only Somin Shōrai's daughter. Mutō then revealed himself to have actually been the god, Susanoo, and promised to her that, in the future, all those who would wear miscanthus wreaths around their waists while declaring themselves to be Somin Shōrai's descendants, in times of epidemics, would remain unharmed.[1][2]
In some later versions of the legend, the rich younger brother is given the name Kotan Shōrai (巨旦将来), while the god who stayed in Somin Shōrai's house is identified, instead of Susanoo, as Gozu Tennō (牛頭天王 'Ox-Headed Heavenly King'), a pestilence deity conflated with both Mutō and Susanoo (though one version instead identifies Gozu Tennō as Mutō's son).[2][3][4][5] In the version of the story found in the Hoki Naiden, an Onmyōdō text on divination attributed to Abe no Seimei, Kotan Shōrai (portrayed here as the king of an Indian kingdom), who was slain by Gozu Tennō as punishment for his lack of generosity, is identified with the evil deity, Konjin.[3] In other variants, the divine traveller gives Somin Shōrai's family a talisman with the inscription " the descendant of Somin Shōrai" (蘇民将来之子孫也, Somin Shōrai no shison nari) as protection against pestilence.[4]
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Various types of amulets (omamori) bearing Somin Shōrai's name is distributed by a number of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples across Japan.
In Kyoto, a talisman resembling a chimaki (a rice dumpling wrapped in bamboo leaves) on which is attached a slip of paper with the words "The descendant(s) of Somin Shōrai" (蘇民将来之子孫也, Somin Shōrai no shison nari) is traditionally hung on doorways to ward off misfortune.[14][15][16][17] A similar custom, involving a shimenawa with a wooden plaque on which is written "The house of Somin Shōrai's descendants" (蘇民将来子孫家門, Somin Shōrai shison kamon), is practiced in the Ise and Shima areas of Mie Prefecture.[18]
In Ueda, Nagano Prefecture, hexagonal wooden charms inscribed with the words "Wealthy [and] prosperous [are] Somin Shōrai's descendant(s)" (大福長者蘇民将来子孫人也, Daifuku chōja Somin Shōrai shison no hito nari) traditionally handmade by members of the local Somin Confraternity (蘇民講 Somin-kō) are distributed by Shinano Kokubun-ji temple during the Yōkadō Festival (八日堂縁日 Yōkadō Ennichi) held every 7th-8 January.[19][20][21]
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A prayer or norito originally recited by the priestly Nakatomi clan in the presence of the court during the Great Exorcism (大祓, Ōharae) ritual of the last day of the sixth month, more commonly known today as the Ōharae no Kotoba (大祓詞, 'Words of the Great Exorcism'),[90][91] lists eight "heavenly sins" (Japanese: 天つ罪, amatsu-tsumi), most of which are agricultural in nature:
Breaking down the ridges
Covering up the ditches
Releasing the irrigation sluices
Double planting
Setting up stakes
Skinning alive
Skinning backward
Defecation
1, 2, 6, 7 and 8 are committed by Susanoo in the Kojiki, while 3, 4, 5 are attributed to him in the Shoki. In ancient Japanese society, offenses related to agriculture were regarded as being as abhorrent as those which caused ritual impurity.[92]
One of the offensive acts Susanoo committed during his rampage was 'skinning backward' (逆剥, sakahagi) the Ame-no-Fuchikoma (Japanese: 天の斑駒, "Heavenly-Piebald Horse"). Regarding this, William George Aston observed, "Indian myth has a piebald or spotted deer or cow among celestial objects. The idea is probably suggested by the appearance of the stars."[93] Nelly Naumann (1982) meanwhile interpreted the spotted horse as a lunar symbol, with Susanoo's action being equivalent to the devouring or killing of the moon. To Naumann, the act of flaying itself, because it is performed in reverse, is intended to be a magical act that caused death.[94] Indeed, in the Kojiki when Susanoo throws the flayed horse (or its hide) to Amaterasu's weaving hall, one of the weaving maidens injures herself and dies. (In the Shoki, it is Amaterasu herself who is alarmed and injured.) Emilia Gadeleva meanwhile connects Susanoo's act of skinning and flinging the horse with ancient Korean rainmaking rituals, which involved animal sacrifice.[95]
The gods punish Susanoo for his rampages by cutting off his beard, fingernails, and toenails. One textual tradition in which the relevant passage is read as "cutting off his beard and causing the nails of his hands and feet to be extracted" (亦切鬚及手足爪令拔而) suggests that this was something along the lines of corporal punishment. Another tradition which reads the passage as "cutting off his beard and the nails of his hands and feet, had him exorcised" (亦切鬚及手足爪令祓而) meanwhile suggests that this was an act of purification, in which the sins and pollution that adhered to Susanoo are removed, thus turning him from a destroyer of life into a giver of life.[96][97]
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In the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, Susanoo is repeatedly associated with Ne-no-Kuni (Japanese: 根の国; the "Land of Roots"). While sometimes seemingly considered to be more or less identical to Yomi, the Land of the Dead (the Kojiki speaks of Ne-no-Kuni as the land of Susanoo's deceased mother Izanami, who is stated earlier in the narrative to have become the ruler of Yomi, and calls the slope serving at its exit the Yomotsu Hirasaka, the 'Flat Slope of Yomi'), it would seem that the two were originally considered to be different locations.
While Matsumura Takeo suggested that Ne-no-Kuni originally referred to the dimly remembered original homeland of the Japanese people,[75] Emilia Gadeleva instead proposes that the two locales, while similar in that both were subterranean realms associated with darkness, differed from each other in that Yomi was associated with death, while Ne-no-Kuni, as implied by the myth about Ōnamuji, was seemingly associated with rebirth. Ne-no-Kuni being a land of revival, as per Gadeleva's theory, is why Susanoo was connected to it: Susanoo, as the god that brought rain and with it, the harvest, was needed in Ne-no-Kuni to secure the rebirth of crops. In time, however, the two locations were confused with each other, so that by the time the Kojiki and the Shoki were written Ne-no-Kuni came to be seen like Yomi as an unclean realm of the dead. Gadeleva argues that this new image of Ne-no-Kuni as a place of evil and impurity contributed to Susanoo becoming more and more associated with calamity and violence.[86]
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A few myths, such as that of Susanoo's descent in Soshimori in Silla, seem to suggest a connection between the god and the Korean Peninsula. Indeed, some scholars have hypothesized that the deities who were eventually conflated with Susanoo, Mutō Tenjin, and Gozu Tennō, may have had Korean origins as well, with the name 'Mutō' (武塔, historical orthography: mutau) being linked with the Korean word mudang "shamaness," and 'Gozu' being explained as a calque of 'Soshimori', here interpreted as being derived from a Korean toponym meaning 'Bull's (so) Head (mari)'.[83] The name 'Susanoo' itself has been interpreted as being related to the Middle Korean title susung (transliterated as 次次雄 or 慈充), meaning 'master' or 'shaman', notably applied to Namhae, the second king of Silla, in the Samguk Sagi.[8] Susanoo is thus supposed in this view to have originally been a foreign god (蕃神, banshin), perhaps a deified shaman, whose origins may be traced back to Korea.[84]
Emilia Gadeleva (2000) sees Susanoo's original character as being that of a rain god – more precisely, a god associated with rainmaking – with his association with the harvest and a number of other elements from his myths ultimately springing from his connection with rainwater. He thus serves as a contrast and a parallel to Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. Gadeleva also acknowledges the foreign elements in the god's character by supposing that rainmaking rituals and concepts were brought to Japan in ancient times from the continent, with the figure of the Korean shaman (susung) who magically controlled the abundance of rain eventually morphing into the Japanese Susanoo, but at the same time stresses that Susanoo is not completely a foreign import but must have had Japanese roots at his core. In Gadeleva's view, while the god certainly underwent drastic changes upon his introduction in the imperial myth cycle, Susanoo's character already bore positive and negative features since the beginning, with both elements stemming from his association with rain. As the right quantity of rainwater was vital for ensuring a rich harvest, calamities caused by too much or too little rainfall (i.e. floods, drought, or epidemics) would have been blamed on the rain god for not doing his job properly. This, according to Gadeleva, underlies the occasional portrayal of Susanoo in a negative light.[85]
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