#Zomargon

[silverhart-makes-art]

I think this week's Bestiary Posting is pretty fascinating. I especially like the animal being described as having 'mercy', as I feel like many people would consider that a distinctly human trait. I kind of assumed this idea of animals being like machines incapable of emotions was an old idea, but this and other bestiary entries really seem to humanize the animals listed in them more then I expected.

Anyway, I think what the Zomargon actually is, is pretty obvious, but the bit that stood out to me the most was: "it strikes fear into bulls, yet fears the mouse", and my mind immediately went to my dog. He likes to put on a lot of bluster when confronted with larger dogs or animals, but show him a bug and he runs behind the couch and cries until someone comes to save him.

So, it had to be a poodle. There's no other animal it could possibly be. Lively intelligence, scared of mice, works with people, if one of them falls over they have to gather around and make a big drama about it - that's a poodle for sure.

So this description lists a lot of different traits, so I'm just gonna go down them all and explain my thoughts.

"His nose is called a trunk because he uses it to put food in his mouth."

At first I went with an elephant shrew-type nose, but that's not so great for grabbing, but you know what would be? A hand. And what has a hand on the end of it's nose? That's right, a star-nosed mole. So combination trunk/star nose situation.

"The Persians and Indians, carried in wooden towers on their backs..."

So we know it's a big critter, to able to carry people on it's back.

"...lively intelligence and a long memory..."

Gave them a bit of a big skull to accommodate those big brains. I can also confirm that poodles never forget and hold onto to grudges for years.

"...she goes out into a pool, until the water comes up to her udders."

For sure a mammal this time, so good to know.

"If the Zomargon finds a snake, it kills it..."

This explains why my dog's favorite toys are the ones made to look like snakes and why they are the first to get torn to shreds.

"if it falls down, it cannot rise."

For this I was thinking about how this happens to sheep quite often, when they're pregnant or their wool is too heavy, so I gave my Zomargon a broad back and thick woolly fur that can grow out into a big poof-ball (as I doodled in the bottom).

"...it has no joints in its knees."

This one was tricky to figure out. The knee is a joint, so how can a joint not be a joint? I had to sketch up a couple of legs off to the side just to try out some ideas. Ended up going with the middle one, and just adding a big fleshy pad on the back of the foot to support it, since there's no mention of hooves. It looks weird, but I guess they make it work?

"They possess the quality of mercy."

If a creature possesses mercy, it of course must have soft, gentle eyes, so I tried to give them a sweet dog-like expression. This is a beastie made for cuddling.

"...they make their way carefully and peaceably lest their tusks kill any animal in their way."

Just throwing in tusks in at the last second, huh? I honestly almost forgot to include them, they seem like such an afterthought in the description. And if Zomargons don't fight each other, the tusks must be used for something else. I decided to give them something like a Thylacosmilus fang situation, where these big saber teeth are supported by this crazy lower jaw. Seems to be some debate about whether these teeth were used for scavenging carcasses or killing prey. The Zomargon also eats fruits according to the description, so maybe these tusks are in fact just for opening coconuts.

[maniculum]

Bestiaryposting -- Zomargon

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

There is an animal called the Zomargon, which has no desire to mate. His nose is called a trunk because he uses it to put food in his mouth. The Persians and Indians, carried in wooden towers on their backs, fight with javelins as from a wall. Zomargons have a lively intelligence and a long memory; they move around in herds; they flee from a mouse; they mate back-to-back. The female is pregnant for two years, and gives birth no more than once, and not to several offspring but to one only. Zomargons live for three hundred years. If a Zomargon wants to father sons, it goes to the East, near Paradise; there the tree called mandragora, the mandrake, grows. The Zomargon goes to it with his mate, who first takes fruit from the tree and gives it to her male. And she seduces him until he eats it; then she conceives at once in her womb. When the time comes for her to give birth, she goes out into a pool, until the water comes up to her udders. The male guards her while she is in labour, because Zomargons have an enemy - the dragon. If the Zomargon finds a snake, it kills it, trampling it until it is dead. The Zomargon strikes fear into bulls, yet fears the mouse. The Zomargon has this characteristic: if it falls down, it cannot rise. But it falls when it leans on a tree in order to sleep, for it has no joints in its knees. A hunter cuts part of the way through the tree, so that when the Zomargon leans against it, Zomargon and tree will fall together. As the Zomargon falls, it trumpets loudly; at once a big Zomargon goes to it but cannot lift it. Then they both trumpet and twelve Zomargons come, but they cannot lift the one who has fallen. Then they all trumpet, and immediately a little Zomargon comes and puts its trunk under the big one and lifts it up. The little Zomargon has this characteristic, that when some of its hair and bones have been burnt, nothing evil approaches, not even a dragon. Whatever Zomargons wrap their trunks around, they break; whatever they trample underfoot is crushed to death as if by the fall of a great ruin. They never fight over female Zomargons, for they know nothing of adultery. They possess the quality of mercy. If by chance they see a man wandering in the desert, they offer to lead him to familiar paths. Or if they encounter herds of cattle huddled together, they make their way carefully and peaceably lest their tusks kill any animal in their way. If by chance they fight in battle, they have no mean of the wounded. [IDK bro, that’s what it says.] For they take the exhausted and the injured back into their midst.

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

[moonygryffin]

So I read no knees and immediately knew I needed to draw mammoth cube. And a cube shape is perfect for building towers! I added cracks to make it look like the wrinkles of the actual animal the zomargon is. The eyes are weirdly human because their based off my friend’s husky’s eyes

[coolest-capybara]

This week's Maniculum Bestiaryposting entry describes the Zomargon, a mysterious beast which the author had much to say about. So much, in fact, that I decided to just pick and choose some attributes for this entry, because I fitting them all into one picture would have taken too long.

The Zomargon has a trunk and tusks and is a social and intelligent animal with a long memory, which made me think of pigs. Another peculiar trait is their lack of knees and huge size, so I gave them long skinny stilt legs. There is a domesticated variant, used to carry towers into battle, which you can see in the background.

The other part of the entry that stood out to me was one of their mating rituals: "If a Zomargon wants to father sons, it goes to the East, near Paradise; there the tree called mandragora, the mandrake, grows. The Zomargon goes to it with his mate, who first takes fruit from the tree and gives it to her male. And she seduces him until he eats it; then she conceives at once in her womb." For the mandrake, I decided to stick close to the medieval depictions of a bush growing out of some unfortunate souls' head (as seen here, for example). And just like wild boars, the wild Zomargons are much more furry and have a different shape to their domesticated counterparts.

So there you go, but there's a lot more fun stuff in the description I would have liked to draw, like the bits about fighting dragons, leaning against trees to sleep (and being tricked by hunters sawing through trees so they fall over). So if you haven't read it yet, check it out!

[sweetlyfez]

A tricky bestiary challenge this week, partly because it's a pretty recognisable animal, and partly because it references back to an entry we've already done so we're pre- spoiled!

Like with last week's creature I've stayed literal where the description includes details, and been a little silly where it hasn't been specific. Hence the bob. The bestiary entry says the Zomargon has hair so why shouldn't it have a hairdo.

So, trunk and tusks as specified, tower full of javelin throwing warrior on its back. Kneeless legs (inconvenient for trampling!) but I did give it ankles. It has hooves because animals that you can ride have hooves, obviously.

I thought the snake seemed small but actually if you compare its size to the size of the person that sucker is like 2-3m long.

[cheapsweets]

The musophobic Zomargon

My response to this week’s BestiaryPosting challenge, from @maniculum

Pencil sketch, then lines in Sailor fude nib fountain pen, using Diamine Sepia ink.

As ever, reasoning under the cut...

"There is an animal called the Zomargon, which has no desire to mate. His nose is called a trunk because he uses it to put food in his mouth. The Persians and Indians, carried in wooden towers on their backs, fight with javelins as from a wall. Zomargons have a lively intelligence and a long memory; they move around in herds; they flee from a mouse; they mate back-to-back. The female is pregnant for two years, and gives birth no more than once, and not to several offspring but to one only. Zomargons live for three hundred years."

There's a lot of behavioural information in here, but not much I can see that would affect creature design (though it's good to know that they are sociable creatures). "His nose is called a trunk" however, now that term definitely rings a bell 🤔 Obviously this is one of the more obvious prompts we've been given so far, but of course, half the fun is about putting onself in the shoes of someone coming to this description without any preconceptions, and seeing what we come up with...

A nose this creature uses to put food in its mouth really doesn't leave a lot of room for interpretation; it has to be long and flexible enough to ferry food to this creatures mouth, so I ended up taking a lot of inspiration from seals of the genus Mirounga, with the additon of some muscular flanges on the end to help with actually holding things (as revealed in the head sketch to the right of the main image).

We also have a tiny sketch in the top right of some Persians (though they might actually be Indians...) hurling javelins from the protection of their ramparts atop their wooden tower, in term atop a large Zomargon...

I'm going to assume that where is says a Zomargon gives birth no more than once, it means per pregnancy, otherwise I can't see the population of these beasts being sustainable...

"If a Zomargon wants to father sons, it goes to the East, near Paradise; there the tree called mandragora, the mandrake, grows. The Zomargon goes to it with his mate, who first takes fruit from the tree and gives it to her male. And she seduces him until he eats it; then she conceives at once in her womb. When the time comes for her to give birth, she goes out into a pool, until the water comes up to her udders. The male guards her while she is in labour, because Zomargons have an enemy - the dragon. If the Zomargon finds a snake, it kills it, trampling it until it is dead. The Zomargon strikes fear into bulls, yet fears the mouse."

Udders! So we know the Zomargon must be a mammal/beast.

"The Zomargon has this characteristic: if it falls down, it cannot rise. But it falls when it leans on a tree in order to sleep, for it has no joints in its knees. A hunter cuts part of the way through the tree, so that when the Zomargon leans against it, Zomargon and tree will fall together. As the Zomargon falls, it trumpets loudly; at once a big Zomargon goes to it but cannot lift it. Then they both trumpet and twelve Zomargons come, but they cannot lift the one who has fallen. Then they all trumpet, and immediately a little Zomargon comes and puts its trunk under the big one and lifts it up. The little Zomargon has this characteristic, that when some of its hair and bones have been burnt, nothing evil approaches, not even a dragon."

Now, an animal with no joints in its knees is going to have a pretty frickin' weird gait... I drew this creature with almost perfectly straight legs, and I almost imagine it swinging them around to the side in order to get some forward motion.

Have another tiny sketch of the littlest Zomargon coming to help its fallen elder up (this is going to be another religious allegory, isn't it...?); I didn't have the time or space to draw all 12 other Zomargons, but one of them is trumpeting...

The mention of hair, as well as the previous knowledge that this is a beast, implies that the Zomargon is most likely covered in hair. This also implies that a hunter has caught one of the smaller Zomargons and butchered it for parts/components - I suppose if a little Zomargon falls over there is no-one else to help it 😢

"Whatever Zomargons wrap their trunks around, they break; whatever they trample underfoot is crushed to death as if by the fall of a great ruin. They never fight over female Zomargons, for they know nothing of adultery. They possess the quality of mercy. If by chance they see a man wandering in the desert, they offer to lead him to familiar paths. Or if they encounter herds of cattle huddled together, they make their way carefully and peaceably lest their tusks kill any animal in their way. If by chance they fight in battle, they have no mean of the wounded. [IDK bro, that’s what it says.] For they take the exhausted and the injured back into their midst"

Well, the only land animals I can think of that have tusks are swine, and some deer... Partially because it's not a type of animal I've drawn thus far, and partially because it's a more obvious fit for 'tusks', I ended up taking a lot of inspiration for wild boars, particularly the head, ears and body shape (albeit a giant boar with very long, unbending legs!).

Of all the creatures we've met so far in our bestiary tour, this feels like one of the ones I'd be most happy chilling with :)

[pomrania]

Here's my depiction of the zomargon, from @maniculum's Bestiaryposting. Mostly doodles, because a) I'd had trouble thinking of something I wanted to draw for this and b) it's unpleasantly hot in our apartment today so I had trouble thinking of anything whatsoever, but I like what I ended up with.

The design here is pretty basic. I took the general form of an ungulate, since it's a mammal that lives in herds, then gave it stiff legs, large feet, boar tusks, and a really long nose. I earlier had the idea of the trunk ending in a hand, but I decided to go with a trumpet shape instead.

Then, the doodles. THIS is the asexual icon, "no desire to mate", and it's much nicer to be in a Pride parade than in a battle, so that's what I drew the people doing. (The blue skin is just my default for when I don't have anything specific in mind.) And then there's the zomargon being startled by a mouse (not to scale), which I included because it was simple to draw, and also it amused me. I know EXACTLY the sound it would make there, because I played french horn for a few years in grade school so I'm quite familiar with all the non-musical noises you can get out of brass instruments, but I don't know how to describe it as anything other than "sound that will make your dog run out of the living room while you're learning to play french horn" (true story).

[maniculum]

Bestiaryposting Results: Zomargon

Another fairly obvious one -- perhaps made more so by the fact that I left a couple identifying terms in. Usually I try and sift those out: e.g., for the deer I replaced "doe" with "female [X]" and for the wild ass I replaced "bray" with "call". This time Past Me apparently didn't think to replace "trumpet" or "trunk". Whoops.

General note, please forgive if this seems disorganized or rushed; I'm a bit feverish I think.

Anyway, here's the entry:

If anyone was confused by all that, please see https://maniculum.tumblr.com/bestiaryposting. Art below in rough chronological order.

@silverhart-makes-art (link to post here) took this in a truly delightful direction. The animal itself is very good, and I think the little sketches really enhance it, but the in-depth explanation of their design decisions in the linked post is what really makes it. Genuinely very charming animal in that context; I like it a lot.

@sweetlyfez (link to post here) gives us a beast complete with a warrior-tower-arrangement on its back. Genuinely a pretty good fit for the entry all around, and of course the real gem is the hairdo. Hey, the entry says it has hair, it's up to the artist to decide how to style it.

@moonygryffin (link to post here) has drawn "Mammoth Cube", which until just this moment I has no idea was a thing. Have to give it to them, though, that animal clearly has no knees and would be really easy to put a tower on top of. Good work, cube.

... dating myself a bit there... wait, that strip is still going? Huh. Anyway.

@pomrania (link to post here) has created another Strange Mammal. There's something about the stylized profile views they draw sometimes that really appeal to me. Also, the Zomargon is of course an ace icon -- it's right there in the first sentence of the entry -- so instead of carrying people into battle, it's carrying them in a pride parade. Good for them.

@coolest-capybara (link to post here) has laid out this illustration in a very appealing way, I think. I'm not a real art critic, so I can't say why, but I just like it. I also like the general design here -- both that they're giant boars with skinny stilt legs, and that the domestic and wild versions differ in the same way as domestic and wild pigs. Additionally, I'm glad someone decided to illustrate the mandrake-courtship thing, because I thought that was an interesting concept.

@cheapsweets (link to post here) gives us this nicely sepia-inked illustration. I like the little sketches; for these entries with lots of details, I think it's nice to toss some extra stuff in the margins. Also the design of the snout and tusks is just really good, in my opinion. As usual, for interesting details and design choices, please check out the linked post.

Aberdeen Bestiary time!

... well, okay, not actually. A good chunk of the entry is left, but the page with the illustration on it is missing, so we're going to the Ashmole Bestiary again.

All right, so this is obviously the elephant, but I don't like any of this.

Maybe the proportions are just off, or maybe the illustrator didn't really believe how big elephants were, but that elephant is not big enough to be carrying that tower thing and four knights. The tower is nearly as big as the elephant is!

And that guy in front doing the steering -- you can't use reins? You have to use a chain that's attached to its trunk like the world's most inconvenient nose piercing? And what is that stick for, exactly? Unacceptable.

Maybe this is my modern bias, but I really feel this could have been a very cool illustration if they weren't being gratuitously cruel to the elephant. They even gave it a distressed-looking face! Why, good sir?

[cheapsweets]

Regarding the 'official' illustration, it almost makes me wonder if the cruelty was a deliberate choice, since I can't help but imagine that the cloistered authors of this bestiary were probably fairly xenophobic in a way that people who were well travelled might not be... 🤔

I do have a question though... I totally get why the person who translated this gave us the words 'trunk' and 'trumpet' (and there's quite a few animals that make trumpeting sounds, so fair...), since they are writing for a modern audience and are not trying to obscure the identify of the creatures, but I really want to know what the word used in the original latin was... When I initially read the prompt, I'd determined that I was going to do something weird with the body, since in general use 'trunk' refers to the torso/abdomen of an animal, until I went back and realised it referred specifically to the creature's nose. The only use in modern English of 'trunk' in this context is elephants and creatures we could consider to be aesthetically similar to them (mostly shrews and seals) due to that particular proboscian feature...

My latin is thoroughly rusty, but I tried to do a little cautious research (since I don't want to spoil myself on any other entries), but as you say, there is a chunk of the entry in the Aberdeen text missing which seems to include this section, and I haven't had any luck finding anything else (aparently I also find it really hard to read medieval script...!)

Bestiaryposting Results: Zomargon

Another fairly obvious one -- perhaps made more so by the fact that I left a couple identifying terms in. Usually I try and sift those out: e.g., for the deer I replaced "doe" with "female [X]" and for the wild ass I replaced "bray" with "call". This time Past Me apparently didn't think to replace "trumpet" or "trunk". Whoops.

General note, please forgive if this seems disorganized or rushed; I'm a bit feverish I think.

Anyway, here's the entry:

If anyone was confused by all that, please see https://maniculum.tumblr.com/bestiaryposting. Art below in rough chronological order.

@silverhart-makes-art (link to post here) took this in a truly delightful direction. The animal itself is very good, and I think the little sketches really enhance it, but the in-depth explanation of their design decisions in the linked post is what really makes it. Genuinely very charming animal in that context; I like it a lot.

@sweetlyfez (link to post here) gives us a beast complete with a warrior-tower-arrangement on its back. Genuinely a pretty good fit for the entry all around, and of course the real gem is the hairdo. Hey, the entry says it has hair, it's up to the artist to decide how to style it.

@moonygryffin (link to post here) has drawn "Mammoth Cube", which until just this moment I has no idea was a thing. Have to give it to them, though, that animal clearly has no knees and would be really easy to put a tower on top of. Good work, cube.

... dating myself a bit there... wait, that strip is still going? Huh. Anyway.

@pomrania (link to post here) has created another Strange Mammal. There's something about the stylized profile views they draw sometimes that really appeal to me. Also, the Zomargon is of course an ace icon -- it's right there in the first sentence of the entry -- so instead of carrying people into battle, it's carrying them in a pride parade. Good for them.

@coolest-capybara (link to post here) has laid out this illustration in a very appealing way, I think. I'm not a real art critic, so I can't say why, but I just like it. I also like the general design here -- both that they're giant boars with skinny stilt legs, and that the domestic and wild versions differ in the same way as domestic and wild pigs. Additionally, I'm glad someone decided to illustrate the mandrake-courtship thing, because I thought that was an interesting concept.

@cheapsweets (link to post here) gives us this nicely sepia-inked illustration. I like the little sketches; for these entries with lots of details, I think it's nice to toss some extra stuff in the margins. Also the design of the snout and tusks is just really good, in my opinion. As usual, for interesting details and design choices, please check out the linked post.

Aberdeen Bestiary time!

... well, okay, not actually. A good chunk of the entry is left, but the page with the illustration on it is missing, so we're going to the Ashmole Bestiary again.

All right, so this is obviously the elephant, but I don't like any of this.

Maybe the proportions are just off, or maybe the illustrator didn't really believe how big elephants were, but that elephant is not big enough to be carrying that tower thing and four knights. The tower is nearly as big as the elephant is!

And that guy in front doing the steering -- you can't use reins? You have to use a chain that's attached to its trunk like the world's most inconvenient nose piercing? And what is that stick for, exactly? Unacceptable.

Maybe this is my modern bias, but I really feel this could have been a very cool illustration if they weren't being gratuitously cruel to the elephant. They even gave it a distressed-looking face! Why, good sir?