#bc solstice

[worshippin]

It’s not unusual for her to watch him as he flies away– always away–, into the dark storm and dodging lightning. A bright purple strike of a lightning bolt cuts the sky, then the air and land beneath.

She feels it all, the static, the buzzing of electricity. But he’s too far away to touch. He’s too far away to hear her prayers; and far too focused on his task to realize she can feel him flying, through every raindrop, every breeze.

Keyleth usually wakes up abruptly, with black feathers under her pillows and sharp thuds on the window. This time, however, he flies around and then floats closer as he suddenly turns from a murder of ravens into a pale-skinned half-elf, a curious look of recognition on his face.

Her chest aches and she gasps as she’s caught there, reaching for him with her whole soul just as he reached for her through the decades, sending her flocks of black birds (well, mostly ravens) to simultaneously haunt and brighten her every waking moment.

“Vax?” She calls out, her voice hoarse like the echoes she hears are different versions of herself screaming and singing  his name.

He doesn’t answer, though he stays there, unmoving, the puzzled expression never leaving his face.

“Vax, can you hear me?”

She holds a hand against her chest, realizing her own heavy breathing. The storm gets heavier. 

“I hope you can hear me,” she adds in a hushed tone. Her face is wet, but she holds onto the fire she carries inside to keep talking, keep seeing him. “I hope you remember… I still haven’t forgotten. You promised me Zephrah. ”

There’s a spark of something for a brief moment, a glint in his eye for a fraction of a second and Keyleth’s entire body fills with hope. But then it flickers, and a mask covers Vax’ildan’s beautiful face, inky dark mist spilling from the slits where the eyes sit as it turns white.

It’s not his voice she hears when the figure speaks. [[MORE]]

“It is not yet your time, child.” 

Pure fury rises inside her as she answers without thinking, “I made the last being who called me that regret it. Were you not there to catch her soul?”

Suddenly, the mask rushes in her direction and stops inches from her face, triplicating in size, imposing with the rest of its form revealing: the long dark veils, pointy hands, swirls of magical threads.

Vax remains at a distance; untouchable.

“You are trespassing, Tempest,” the Matron says, her voice somehow gentle and echoing. “It is not yet your time.”

Keyleth tries to take a deep breath. The raindrops are now suspended in the air, halfway through falling, and she can no longer smell petrichor. Maybe it’s why she feels repulsion and not hatred: she is a druid, after all, one who not only worships but is the elements and life itself and here is the presence of her antithesis, plain death and no rebirth.

“No, it’s not,” she says, voice cracking. “I know that.”

The masked figure leans down, its massive form still towering over her and still growing, trying to encompass the horizon.

“But here you are nonetheless.”

“I can’t help it. I won’t ever stop dreaming of him.”

There’s a pause.

“Careful, Archdruid. You may yet live for a very long time, but you are not actually immortal. Do not disrespect me.”

Keyleth frowns in confusion.

Vax, still out of reach, takes a step closer. And immediately gets pulled back by an invisible force. He shifts, from raven feathers to floating pools of blood to the sharp sound of knives clashing to cloaked humanoid to naked angelic omen and over and over and over again. 

Keyleth forces herself to see and in her mind’s eye it shows itself: a singular thread of pulsating light pulled taught, more evident than the sea of threads all around him, connecting Vax’ildan to something far beyond. Like a ley line or a bridge rope or a leash .

She breathes in and out. 

So it is not just a dream.

“I respect you, Matron,” she affirms, doing her best to ignore the massive masked head nearly blocking her vision now. She keeps her gaze on Vax in the distance, back to shifting from mist to feathers to person-shaped, moving through time and space, occasionally searching her eyes and faintly grinning. “But I can’t pretend to believe to be beneath you. You were once a mortal too so maybe I understand your loneliness, since the other gods probably have their qualms with you.”

"If you wish to honor me… and him," the Matron interrupts, roiling smoke and loose bright strings more clearly pulsating around her now. "You shall leave this place, Tempest, and seek to never return until fate makes it so."

Keyleth clenches her jaw, her heart beating loud in her chest and something boiling around it, spreading through her body like rage. Her fury has no place in Exandria and all the planes together wouldn't be able to contain it. It's been so long and she's still so goddamn angry , so deeply wounded. How dare– ? How cruel .

She holds her hand to her chest in a fist.

Fate.

The word reverberates inside her heart as she doesn't look away from Vax. Her hand opens like a flower blossoming, reaching for the sun.

Fate…

“No," she says, voice stern and composed, as she feels herself tremble not out of fear but as a testament to her control, to her power and her prowess. "I can't do that. It’s been many long years. He won't stop visiting me. So I won't stop reaching back."

The storm starts over, big raindrops falling and twirling in the harsh wind. It nourishes the soil, sprouts roots and vines and trees, tall as mountains, flowers and fruit luscious and ripe. This is not a dream, yet it flows through Keyleth like anything in nature does.

Vax tries to take a step forward once more, but he’s still so, so far away. Still so beautiful, and frozen in time like her. 

Keyleth feels flames licking up her shoulders, her head, the side of her face, her eyes. At her feet the rich wet earth dries and cracks and a pillar grows to propel her upwards, closer to the deity. She hovers in dissipating fog, under the brightest moonlight of Catha with the red hue of Ruidus on her back. 

"I hope you understand that I really do respect you, goddess," she continues. "But I can only treat you as an equal, because…”

Facing the Matron of Death but watching the lost love of her life, feeling in her element perhaps more than she's ever felt, Keyleth promises:

“Because it’s as an equal that I will take back what you stole.”

[renaissanceousia]

i think poseidon surrendering the war for percy explains why percy choose the gods' side in the future. because percy actually saw that his father is willing to give up glory for him, and he knows that glory is a big deal for the greeks. that's why despite understanding that luke's argument makes sense to some extent, he's still on the gods' side. his father's side.

[myokk]

Eloise at her debut ball during the winter solstice🥺🤲

[captainenjolras]

☀️Summer Solstice at the Ministry☀️

All of the congregation is invited to watch the sunrise and attended an outdoor mass honoring the solar demons and Satan’s love for nature

Newlyweds, engaged couples, and people with new children are given special blessings

Family friendly events are held throughout the day, including a maypole, flower crown weaving, a small bonfire to burn petitions, live music, lots of dancing, and face painting

Clergy (including ghouls) and congregation are encouraged to mingle

Primo decorates the place with flowers from his garden and greenhouse with them help of the earth ghouls

Food is provided, but members are encouraged to bring something to share as well

Family events end an hour before sunset. Once the sun is down, it becomes a 21+ event.

Another mass is held honoring fertility, love, sensuality, autonomy, and lust

A large bonfire is lit, another maypole is danced, and drinks are served

It’s not uncommon for some clothes to be lost in the celebration process

A lucky Solstice Couple is chosen to represent the sun and the earth

After midnight, the party winds down and people retire for the night (usually paired up)

Hope you all had a wonderful summer solstice/winter solstice depending on where you live! All love ❤️❤️❤️

[anatomical-puppet]

once again thinking about winter solstice roommates and eira having nightmares. i’m sure we’re all shocked by this development 🙂‍↕️

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

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

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

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: No

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

So, the answer everyone is looking for is NO.

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

Happy Yule! Happy Winter Solstice!

Further readings:

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

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

Chi Rho - Wikipedia

History of Christianity - Wikipedia

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

Constantine the Great - Wikipedia

Maxentius - Wikipedia

Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus - Wikipedia

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

Smarthistory – Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius

Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire - Wikipedia

Equestrian statuette of Charlemagne - Wikipedia

Smarthistory – San Vitale and the Justinian and Theodora Mosaics

ARH1000 Early Christian & Byzantine Art.pdf | Free Download

The image of Christ in Late Antiquity | Semantic Scholar

mosaic floor | British Museum

[scalpho]

The great and terrible catch of joining the Society of Shadows - the paragraph that makes you hesitate, pen in hand, over the dotted line of your contract - is this: you leave behind the world as you know it, and it, in turn, ceases to know you. Your loved ones forget you; you're supposed to forget them. Riz remembers anyway. (Or: several years after the Bad Kids fall to pieces midway through their Junior Year, an agent of the shadows keeps tabs on them in the prelude to Solstice.)

my solstice gift to d20fandom is a jumbled (kind of) epistolary glimpse into a world where the bad kids failed out of junior year and riz joined the society of shadows. enjoy <3

[crazy-ache]

After Elain ripped off the rose necklace on that dreadful Solstice, tossing it into a pile of Azriel’s gifts, she immediately ran off to her room. She was able to hold the tears at bay, at least for now, at the sting of rejection that brought back memories of an older wound. On that night, she sat at her vanity, and something deep inside her urged her to open the drawer to her left. Inside was a small velvet box. Very carefully, Elain opened it and put on the pearl earrings—the same ones she had received earlier from her mate.

With a deep breath, she tucked her hair behind her ears. She hadn’t thanked him. Hadn’t told him that pearls had been her favorite. Elain stared at her reflection, at the way the pearl glimmered beautifully against her pointed ears, at the swirling brown of her eyes desperate to find recognition in the mirror. It felt as if she was about to crack wide open. Would he have found her to be what every other man or male regarded her—a mistake?

No, the bond inside her chest strummed. No, he wouldn’t have. He wouldn’t ever.

It terrified her how certain she was of that fact.

Tears streamed down her cheeks.

[hystericmuse]

Sun, sun, sun, here it comes…

[puma-pines]

WELCOME TO SUNNY BEAST SUMMER ★

[july-19th-club]

one thing about being in too much pain to uphold social niceties (period and it's a bad one) is that i did spend all day at work not only doubled over and moving at a pace the ninety year old library ladies were lapping but i was even worse than usual at tasks like Looking At People Who Are Chewing Gum and "not edging away bugeyed when a coworker stands close next to me" and of course the perennial favorite "keeping track of more than three words spoken to me in a row and responding to that" and we'll let me merely say. it is just me and that murderbot. nobody else in this whole damn library understands

[lesbianwithchainsaws]

Socialising must be so fun if you're not constantly hiding at least 80% of who you are

[themuseumofwitchcraftandpaganism]

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

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

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: No

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

So, the answer everyone is looking for is NO.

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

Happy Yule! Happy Winter Solstice!

Further reading:

Smarthistory – Art of the Viking Age

BBC - History - Ancient History in depth: Viking Religion

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

Treaty of Wedmore - Wikipedia

Manx runestones - Wikipedia

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

Ancient Viking Art - Medievalists.net

Gamla Uppsala - Wikipedia

[vitalicion]

HEHEHEH 9im finally working on it bear with me

I love evil lunar sm💖🌷🌸🌺💥❤️💓🎉🎉💐 (rvknuhiin,wrhubiuhnbmgerihjnegrmb)

so fun things about this… I started making it like 4 months ago then I gave up on the sketch. Then I went back like 2 months ago and did some lineart. Then I’m back again now and I redid the lineart and now I’m coloring. I’m going to hate the background. 💖

[mariemariemaria]

is easter a very nothing holiday to anybody else

[moonlit-dreamers]

ship dynamics r very silly to me

reference under cut

REBLOGS APPRECIATED