#Yagstong

[silverhart-makes-art]

This week's Bestiary Posting is the Yagstong which sounds like another ungulate, and that makes me happy.

This one took me a while, and then I got really into shading it and realized and I do not have enough time to make this into a full blown painting, so it feels a little unfinished.

My first thought was to draw an wapiti-like creature, - namely because the word I read the 'yagstong' as 'yagstag' but my first sketch looked far too much like just an elk, so I scrapped it and picked out some other creatures to mix up. Namely, I thought of a serow since they look pretty interesting with their short neck and "mane" of fur. The serow also lives in the mountains like the yagstong. I decided to give it a hump and shaggy fur like that of a musk ox; the hump to provide extra muscle for sparring with other males, and the fur to keep it warm. Speaking of sparring, there was no mention of horns or antlers, so I opted instead to give it a pair of sharp canines, which you see on musk deer. They use these much like other deer use their antlers; for display and combat with other males. I also wanted to give them ears like a musk deer's because they were looking a little too goat-like, and I just make them a little smaller to suit their colder environment. The description seems very focused on the eyes, so I wanted them to be very bright and striking. I also gave them relatively big eyes, with horizontal pupils for spotting things in all directions. There's no sneaking up on this Yagstong!

So we've got a lot of musk, what with musk oxen, and musk deer, so the next critter I threw in the mix was the takin - another favorite of mine. Particularly I wanted my Yagstong to have a big Roman nose which is perfect for warming up the air they breath high in the mountains. Finally, the coloration is based on a mouflon. The text mentions too that it's blood is hot enough to dissolve a diamond, so I decided to make their mane look like fire in the sunlight to reflect their fiery nature.

[maniculum]

Bestiaryposting -- Yagstong

As a reminder, all previous entries in this series can be found at https://maniculum.tumblr.com/bestiaryposting .

There is an animal called in Latin [redacted], because it chooses to live in rugged places; some call it [redacted]. These are the tame Yagstongs which the Greeks called [redacted], because they have very sharp sight. They live in high mountains and can tell if men approaching a long way off are hunters or travellers. The Yagstong has these characteristics: when grazing, it moves from high to even higher pastures. It picks out good grass from bad by the sharpness of its eyes. It feeds by chewing the grass. When wounded, it hurries to find the herb dittany and, by touching it, is healed. [The following appears in a separate entry on the same animal for some reason] The male Yagstong is a wanton and frisky animal, always longing for sex; as a result of its lustfulness its eyes look sideways — from which it has derived its name. [Etymology redacted] Its nature is so very heated that its blood alone will dissolve a diamond, against which the properties of neither fire nor iron can prevail. Young Yagstongs take their name from the word for eating, for the young ones are very fat and taste delicious.

Remember to tag posts with #Yagstong so folks can find them.

[coolest-capybara]

Not a lot of time this (and next) week, so I drew this one on the go! In this Maniculum Bestiaryposting Challenge, we get to interpret the Yagstong:

"There is an animal called in Latin [redacted], because it chooses to live in rugged places; some call it [redacted]. These are the tame Yagstongs which the Greeks called [redacted], because they have very sharp sight. They live in high mountains and can tell if men approaching a long way off are hunters or travellers. The Yagstong has these characteristics: when grazing, it moves from high to even higher pastures. It picks out good grass from bad by the sharpness of its eyes. It feeds by chewing the grass. When wounded, it hurries to find the herb dittany and, by touching it, is healed. [The following appears in a separate entry on the same animal for some reason] The male Yagstong is a wanton and frisky animal, always longing for sex; as a result of its lustfulness its eyes look sideways — from which it has derived its name. [Etymology redacted] Its nature is so very heated that its blood alone will dissolve a diamond, against which the properties of neither fire nor iron can prevail. Young Yagstongs take their name from the word for eating, for the young ones are very fat and taste delicious."

The main points I got from this is that a) it lives on mountains and grazes, b) it can see well and c) acid blood?

Grazing on mountains made me think of goats, but the emphasis on its eyesight and how the eyes "look sideways" interested me. I looked up which animals have the best eyesight, and apparently, sharks are pretty far up there! So I borrowed some features from hammerhead sharks to really ...hammer home the eye positioning.

The acid blood reminded me of hippos. They sweat out a red acid that was once thought to be blood. Of course, I already drew a hippo for the Dirubael entry, but one of the many perks of being a bestiary illustrator is that you can just redraw aspects of your favorite creature for every entry that sort of matches (think of all all the very similar birds we've seen so far) and mix and match features as you go. Like adding some giant mountain goat horns and hooves.

[cheapsweets]

The Keensighted Yagstong

My response to this week’s BestiaryPosting challenge, from @maniculum - thanks again for running these challenges!

Pencil sketch, then lines in Sailor fude nib fountain pen, using Diamine Sepia ink. A very quick one this week, but I'm pretty pleased with how it looks given the time spent :)

Thought process under the cut…

"There is an animal called in Latin [redacted], because it chooses to live in rugged places; some call it [redacted]. These are the tame Yagstongs which the Greeks called [redacted], because they have very sharp sight. They live in high mountains and can tell if men approaching a long way off are hunters or travellers."

So, an animal that lives in rugged places, or high mountains. Probably something very sure footed, and with a thick coat to keep it warm in the high altitudes.

We also know that it has excellent eyesight. For various other reasons noted below I went with a goat-like creature, and of course one of the things everyone on tumblr knows is that some goats have horizontal/rectangular pupils... Now, this is actually to give them sharper panoramic vision (and also gives them better vision in high and low light). Now the really weird thing is, apparently their eyes rotate in their skulls when they raise or lower their heads, maintaining that panoramic vision and allowing them to scan for predators even when grazing...

The Yagstong has these characteristics: when grazing, it moves from high to even higher pastures. It picks out good grass from bad by the sharpness of its eyes. It feeds by chewing the grass. When wounded, it hurries to find the herb dittany and, by touching it, is healed.

So, a grazing animal, that lives in rugged terrain. Definitely an ungulate, probably (but not necessarily) a bovid. The mountainous terrain is definitely giving me very mountain goat vibes, so we have a goat-like creatuer heavily influenced by ibex and mountain goats.

I chose not to give it the impressive horns of an ibex because I feel like this sort of characteristic feature would most likely be mentioned in the bestiary entry. As such, the horns are a little understated.

It has thick downy hair on its back, and shaggy hair on its limbs to protect it from the cold of the mountain nights. It also has the widely spaced, cloven hooves of a mountain goat, and prominent dew claws to aid with gripping on those rugged slopes where it lives.

Okay, it keeps getting brought up in multiple entries - there must be something really special about dittany (mostly, it seems to be slightly toxic 🤔). I'm pretty sure I've drawn this in a previous entry, but I feel like I'm getting slowly better at drawing plants as well - the flowers on Dittany are really pretty!

[The following appears in a separate entry on the same animal for some reason]

The male Yagstong is a wanton and frisky animal, always longing for sex; as a result of its lustfulness its eyes look sideways — from which it has derived its name. [Etymology redacted] Its nature is so very heated that its blood alone will dissolve a diamond, against which the properties of neither fire nor iron can prevail. Young Yagstongs take their name from the word for eating, for the young ones are very fat and taste delicious.

The eyes on the side of the head tracks with everything else we already know about this animal. We have some other interesting features mentions (including the fact that this beast is so frisky its blood can dissolve the hardest material on Earth...

Since I didn't have the time to draw cute round baby Yagstongs, I'm hoping that someone else took the opportunity!

[wendievergreen]

Yagstong

Because I 100% know what animal the Yagstong is, I decided to reference grazing animals that are as unlike That Real Beast as possible. I settled on the pika and the giant panda.

This male yagstong and his lusty nature cannot be contained, only censored. These entries keep bringing up behaviors I will not draw without cash exchanging hands, god damn.

This yagstong has found some dittany for its ills :) ... but apparently I picked the wrong plant with the common name dittany to reference, because Dictamnus albus, aka dittany/burning bush/gas plant/fraxinella, is mildly toxic and has volatile oils. Origanum dictamnus, aka dittany of Crete/Cretan dittany/hop marjoram, on the other hand, smells nice and was believed in antiquity to be healthful. Also its wiki page references The Actual Beast. This is what happens when you just look at the pictures and don't scroll down; you give your yagstong poison resistance. Good for them, good for them.

Dictamnus albus apparently grows 1'4"-3'3" (40-100 cm) high, so based on the proportions in my second picture my yagstong is in the middle between a pika (about 6-9 inches or 15-23 cm long), and a giant panda (3'11"-6'3" or 1.2-1.9 m long).

[pomrania]

Here's my depiction of the yagstong, from @maniculum's Bestiaryposting. Done with @theforceisstronginthegirl's assistance for the design and the pose idea.

This creature was built on a "goat" chassis (as drawn by somebody who'd primarily learned to draw horses), with "donkey" and "llama" influence. On the bottom right is the design of it I did last night, because I really like how that turned out, something something the things you're able to create when you're a certain level of "tired". On the top right is my sketch for this pose, which I left in because it fills the space nicely.

I have no idea what "dittany" looks like and I wasn't going to look it up.

[maniculum]

Bestiaryposting Results: Yagstong

I almost forgot to do this two weeks in a row. Just a really hectic month over here, sorry.

Anyway, if you want to know what this is all about, you can find out at https://maniculum.tumblr.com/bestiaryposting.

The art below is based on this entry:

And this is the one we're doing next:

Now, art:

@mistressorinoco (link to post here) has done a delightful mix of different animals here, all of which manages to come together into a cohesive whole. See the linked post for details on which features are here and why. I also like the throat sac thing.

@silverhart-makes-art (link to post here) has drawn a fairly striking yet realistic creature -- the mane and tusks are really working for it here. This design, like the above, is highly concerned with making the beast properly adapted to its environment, and you can find out more about that in the linked post.

@coolest-capybara (link to post here) has drawn some adorably goofy-looking creatures. The wideset eyes, the protruding teeth, the downright spherical juvenile there.... I love them. As usual, information on this design's influences can be found in the linked post.

@pomrania (link to post here), collaborating with @theforceisstronginthegirl, has drawn something that is a mashup of "goat", "llama", and "donkey". I particularly like the magical effects around the one tasting the dittany.

@cheapsweets (link to post here) decided to go in a very goat-like direction, and you can find an explanation of why in the linked post. Solid goat-thing there. They also speculate about dittany (I'm not sure why that keeps coming up either), and note that they hope someone else chose to draw the canonically-fat baby Yagstong -- luckily Coolest-Capybara has them covered.

@wendievergreen (link to post here) has done two drawings of this one. It should be noted that in the first drawing, that box is not diegetic -- the beast's lusty nature has been censored. For details on why this design, and some interesting information on dittany, please see the linked post.

So! The Aberdeen Bestiary. We actually have two pictures of this one -- there seem to have been three originally, but one has been cut out of the manuscript.

So very obviously this is the goat, which I think multiple people clocked right away. Say one thing for this illustrator, they can draw a pretty good goat.

The missing image is from the entry for he-goat, which is bafflingly separate from the main goat entry. They're not even next to each other; "goat" is on both sides of f.14 while "he-goat" is on both sides of f.21. This is possibly to do with the fact that the Latin terms chosen are capre and hyrco -- English, to my knowledge, lacks a dedicated term for "male goat" like we have for sheep and cows (i.e., "ram" and "bull" respectively), but Latin has one. So maybe there was some confusion.

Not a lot to add here, but I do like one element of the commentary the people who digitized the Aberdeen Bestiary left: they note that the image of the goat scratching its head with its hoof has nothing to do with anything mentioned in the entry. Maybe the illustrator just saw goats do that and thought it would make a good picture?