#taken from plini's story

[shunshuntaiga]

From instagram❤️

[themculibrary]

Daisy Johnson/Jemma Simmons (Skimmons) Masterlist

Addicted To You (ao3) - DeceitfulHonesty E, 26k

Summary: A raid at the SHIELD lab where she was working, leaves Jemma in the hands of her greatest enemies. As she tries to stay alive, Jemma finds herself drawn to someone who destroys all her expectations of Hydra: a specialist who calls herself Skye.

and i can go anywhere i want (anywhere i want just not home) (ao3) - autismboard G, 5k

Summary: She defined herself by the things that she loved: she was a scientist, a wife, a best friend.

At that moment, she was sure of only one of those things. So the only conclusion she could draw was that there was no more Jemma. --------

Jemma post 5x14 attempting to make sense of the situation at hand (aka girlie is struggling)

and if you're still breathing (you're the lucky ones) (ao3) - plinys M, 6k

Summary: She’s seen Groundhog Day and every other story about being stuck in a time loop. Though normally the people in these loops are unwilling participants, unable to change anything significantly, but needlessly repeating the same cycle until they learn some sort of moral of the story.

The thing is Jemma already knows the moral of this story. At least, she thinks she does.

can you see me using everything to hold back? (ao3) - midnightstrawberries T, 6k

Summary: Sometimes, late at night, unable to sleep and sprawled under bed sheets, head hanging upside down off the left side of the bed, Skye likes to imagine her parents. What they were like, who they were, how they lived. She dreams until her head starts hurting too much and she has to sit back up.

Skye is sixteen years old and she has never lived in the same place for more than a year at a time. (Something tells her she never will. Something else tells her to believe otherwise.)

~

Skye and Jemma meet in high school instead of at SHIELD.

Follow Me, I Know A Shortcut (ao3) - nerdwegian G, 1k

Summary: Jemma is acting weird around Skye.

I found love where it wasn't supposed to be (right in front of me) (ao3) - EB_FanficFan_1458 mack/yo yo, jemma/daisy, kate/bobbi, clint/natasha T, 24k

Summary: “Is this what gay stargazing is? Stars and confessions?” Nat whispered. Bobbi laughed silently. “Yes. Now you’ve experienced that, you’re officially with us. Welcome to the family.”

For the first time in years, Daisy and Bobbi feel safe at their home with Phil Coulson and Melinda May. But what happens when Phil and Mel decide to adopt Natasha as well? The demons of their pasts come back to haunt them. Can they stay safe and happy, or will everything fall apart?

I'll Be The Rock Star If You'll Be The Scientist (ao3) - nerdwegian T, 10k

Summary: "Wait, wait, wait! Sir, are you telling me the dinosaur escaped our plane in your flying car?"

It's All About Biochemistry (ao3) - Selenay

Summary: Jemma pulled in a calming breath. "Just. I'm not really used to this kind of thing yet."

"What kind of thing?"

"Post emotional crisis kissing," Jemma said. "It's new to me."

Love Me at the Corner Cafe (ao3) - Heylittleyahtzee (HeyYahtzee) T, 36k

Summary: Skye likes to keep an eye on her regulars, so when Jemma Simmons comes in entirely flustered one morning Skye can’t help but reach out to her. It turns out that Jemma Simmons can’t help but return the favor. Unsurprisingly there is no going back from this

Slytherin to My Heart (ao3) - happypugfics E, 82k

Summary: Skimmons Hogwarts AU Skye and Jemma find themselves in their sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry dealing with the same old issues it has to offer: homework, tests, quidditch, house points, their relationship...and oh, the Triwizard Tournament.

The Hydra Disaster (ao3) - Rhino (RhinoMouse) M, 39k

Summary: Jemma's time undercover at Hydra gets far more interesting and Important when she gets pulled into project World Killer. She is not prepared. But SHIELD needs her to succeed. Which would be easier if her boss's boss's boss, Agent Daisy Johnson hadn't taken an interest in her. It would also make Agent Morse's life easier if the scientist she's supposed to protect would stop breaking every rule of spy craft. Every. Single. Rule.

The Way Our Horizons Meet (ao3) - plinys M, 50k

Summary: Four years ago Skye married Jemma in order to keep her from being deported, now when the day has come to end things she can't help herself from wondering how they got here and how she can get her to stay.

Until We Get There (ao3) - Pitkin E, 275k

Summary: “I’ve got a tail,” Daisy announced, loud enough to hear through the phone as she watched the silver truck appear around the fourth corner, having made a successful square with the truck following. She made a left at the next possible road, deciding she would head back toward the highway to get to a better populated area.

Lily gasped. “You do??” She asked. “CAN I SEE IT!?!” She screeched in excitement.

Under normal circumstances, this reaction would have been more than enough for Daisy to roar with laughter and come up with an excuse for why Lily wasn’t allowed to see her non-existent tail. Today she was quiet as she glanced behind her in the rearview again.

wandering (ao3) - cardiganweather E, 4k

Summary: Jemma Simmons has survived an alien virus, jumped out of a plane without a parachute, and worked with an Asgardian to solve a murder mystery. She can handle sharing a bed with a girl she likes in a too hot hotel room.

Right?

Want to Annoy Your Family This Thanksgiving? Call Skye! (ao3) - DeceitfulHonesty T, 4k

Summary: "I’m a 25 year old, unemployed hacker with no high school degree who lives in a van that’s older than me. If you’d like to have me as your strictly platonic date for Thanksgiving, but pretend to be in a serious, committed relationship with you to irritate your family, I’m game. I require no pay but the free meal I’ll get as a guest and the joy of spending an evening with people I can aggravate! Call Skye." Based on the Craigslist ad that people love to share this time of year.

[tsaritiz]

All Identity V references (or easter eggs) to popular culture found.

Some are taken from theories of fandom others are found by me.

Martha Remington as the surname taken from the typewriter brand "remington" (also curious beacause in the game you have to decode typewriters)

Doctor, Emily Dyer is inspired by Amelia Dyer a british serial killer who killed lots of young children while beyond her cares.

Helena Adams references to Helen keller, a blind def woman who were a full-time activist.

Priestress (Fiona Gilman) references to HP Lovecraft's story "The dream in the witch's house."

The Magician references to Servais le roy, the creator of the illusion technic of levitation.

Naib Subedar, in his backstory makes reference to the british invasion of india.

Thief, Kreacher Pierson references George Müller, a Christian evangelist and the director of the Ashley Down orphanage in Bristol, England. He was one of the founders of the Plymouth Brethren movement. His surname is named after Arthur Tappan Pierson, a friend of George Müller who wrote his biography.

The explorer references to Gulliver's Travels.

William Ellis references William Webb Ellis, the alleged inventor of rugby. He also shares the exact same name as him

Norton Campbell's background story references the author H.P Lovecraft's short story titled The Transition of Juan Romero.

Enchantress, Patricia Dorval's adoptive mother references Marie Laveau a Louisiana Creole practitioner of Vodou, herbalist and midwife who was renowned in New Orleans.

Wilding, Murro's Deductions mentions Kasper Hauser, a German youth who claimed to have grown up in the total isolation of a darkened cell.

Female Dancer, Margaretha Zelle references both Mata Hari, a Dutch exotic dancer and courtesan who was convicted of being a spy for Germany during World War I and Natalia from The Last Circus.

Acrobat, Mike Morton's appearance references both Arlecchino from Commedia dell'arte and Vander Clyde Broadway an American female impersonator, high-wire performer, and trapeze artist born in Texas.

"Prisoner", Luca Balsa references Nikola Tesla a Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist best known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current (AC) electricity supply system.

Entomologist, Melly Plinius references Pliny the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus) the Roman author/naturalist/natural philosopher.

Batter, Ganji Gupta's background story references the British Colonization of Indian Subcontinent (1858-1947).

"Psychologist", Ada Mesmer's Surname references Franz Anton Mesmer, a German physician who developed the theory of animal magnetism. She may also be inspired in Ada Lovelace the matematician

Soul Weaver, Violetta references Aloisia 'Violetta' Wagner, a famous German freak show performer from the early 20th century. She was renowned for having tetra-amelia syndrome.

The Ripper, Jack references Jack the Ripper an unidentified serial killer active in the impoverished districts in and around Whitechapel in the East End of London in 1888. His background story references Walter Sickert, a German-born British painter and print maker who was a member of the Camden Town Group of Post-Impressionist artists in early 20th-century London and was suspected of being Jack the Ripper.

Geisha, Michiko references Chōchō-San from Madame Butterfly. She may also reference Yosano Akiko or Higuchi Ichiyo, both famous writers and geishas. But not only, she may reference the play of Fukuchi Ochi "Mirror Lion" .

Hastur is based on The King in Yellow from H.P. Lovecraft novels (Cthulhu Mythos Franchise).

Wu Chang, Xie Bi'an and Fan Wujiu references Heibai Wuchang (黑白无常, Black and White Impermanence) the two Deities in Chinese folk religion in charge of escorting the spirits of the dead to the underworld.

Photographer, Joseph Desaulniers references both Nicéphore Niépce a French inventor, usually credited as the inventor of photography and a pioneer in that field and Dorian Gray from The Picture of Dorian Gray. His background story also mentions the French Revolution.

Mad Eyes, Burke Lapadura references Edmund Burke, a highly regarded Canadian architect best known for building Toronto's Prince Edward Viaduct or "Bloor Street Viaduct" and Toronto's Robert Simpson store.

Dream Witch, Yidhra references Yidhra from the H.P. Lovecraft novels (Cthulhu Mythos Franchise).

Bloody Queen, Mary references both Marie Antoinette the last queen of France and a controversal figure during the French Revolution and the abilities based on Bloody Mary.

"Disciple", Ann's background story references the Salem witch trials.

Violinist, Antonio references Niccolò Paganini an Italian violinist and composer. He was the most celebrated violin virtuoso of his time, and left his mark as one of the pillars of modern violin technique.

Sculptor, Galatea Claude possibly references Camille Claudel a French sculptor known for her figurative works in bronze and marble and her name references to the statue carved of ivory by Pygmalion of Cyprus of the same name from Greek Mythology.

"Undead", Percy references Victor Frankenstein from the author Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein.

The Breaking Wheel, Will Brothers references the Breaking wheel with their trailer also referencing the Execution of St Catherine.

Naiad, Grace references Naiads, fresh water nymphs presiding over fountains, wells, springs, streams, brooks and other bodies of fresh water from Greek Mythology. She also appears to reference H.P. Lovecraft's novella The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

Wax Artist, Philippe is based on Philippe Curtius a Swiss physician and wax modeller who taught Marie Tussaud the art of wax modelling.

Hermit, Alva Lorenz references Thomas Edison, a famous inventor.

Night Watch, Ithaqua is based on Ithaqua from H.P. Lovecraft novels (Cthulhu Mythos Franchise).

"Big Daddy" is likely a reference to "Big Brother" from 1984 by George Orwell, the leader who keeps all citizens under constant surveillance and controls them.

Allen, while little is currently known about him, is likely based off Zadok Allen from The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

Andrea may be based on Antonia Bianchi, a singer and the long term lover of Niccolo Paganini.

Arthur Byers is likely based on Ambrose Bierce, the author of “Haïta the Shepherd” in which Hastur first appeared.[1]

Catherine is based on St. Catherine of Alexandria who was executed using a breaking wheel.

Christina's death scene in Philipe's character trailer is an allusion to The Death of Marat by French painter Jacques-Louis David.

Claude Desaulniers is based on Claude Niépce, the older brother of French inventor Nicéphore Niépce.

Damballa is based on the benevolent spiritual intermediary in Haitian Voodoo of the same name.

James Reichenbach's last name is a reference to Reichenbach Falls, the name of the location where Arthur Conan Doyle's character Sherlock Holmes had his fight to the death with his greatest foe Professor Moriarty.

James Whistler is based on the real life painter James Abbott McNeill Whistler who was the mentor of Walter Sickert.

Papa Legba is based on trickster spiritual intermediary in Haitian Vodou of the same name.

Princess Lamballe is based on Marie Thérèse Louise of Savoy (Princesse de Lamballe) who was one of Marie Antoinette's closest friends.

Robert is likely based off Robert Olmstead, the main character and narrator of The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

Sullivan is based on Anne Sullivan Macy, an American teacher and lifelong friend of Helen Keller.

The currently Unnamed Cat God is likely based on the short stories Nyarlathotep and Cats of Ulthar by H.P. Lovecraft.

Blue Aladdin references to Aladdin from Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp.

Violet Peacock's Chinese description references to The Peacocks Fly Southeast.

Both Poseidon's Crown and Poseidon references to Poseidon the god of the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses from Greek Mythology.

Caged Butterfly's description mentions Madame Butterfly.

The 1st Essence of Season 2 is based on several Fairy Tale Stories on each Costumes.

King's Tailor references to one of the Swindler from The Emperor's New Clothes.

Both Lazy Mr. Bunny and Mr. Turtle references to The Hare and The Tortoise from The Tortoise and the Hare.

King Arthur references to the character of the same name

Merlin references to the character of the same name.

Black Swan is based on Odile (The Black Swan) from Swan Lake.

Anubis is based on the god of the same name who is the god of death, mummification, embalming, the afterlife, cemeteries, tombs, and the Underworld in Egyptian Mythology.

Ancient Soul references to the Ankh an ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic symbol used in Egyptian art and writing to represent the word for "life" and, by extension, as a symbol of life itself.

Soul Catcher references to Day of the Dead a holiday traditionally celebrated on November 1 and 2, though other days, such as October 31 or November 6 from Mexica.

Golden Touch is based on King Midas a king of Phrygia who is known to turn everything he touched into gold from Greek Mythology.

The 1st Essence of Season 6 has several references to Greek Mythology.

Icarus is named after and based on the hero of the same name who is the son of the master craftsman Daedalus, the creator of the Labyrinth on Greek Mythology.

Apollo is named after and based on the God of the same name who is the god of oracles, healing, archery, music and arts, sunlight, knowledge, herds and flocks, protection of the young and the Member of Twelve Olympians.

Leonidas is named after Leonidas I a king of the Greek city-state of Sparta.

Pam possibly is based on Pan the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks, rustic music and impromptus, and companion of the nymphs.

Captain Hook is based on Captain James Hook.

Eversleeping Girl is based on Wendy Darling.

Forgotten Boy is possibly based on Peter Pan or one of the Lost Boys.

Siren is possibly based on the Mermaids from Mermaids' Lagoon.

March Hare is based on the Character of the Same Name.

Alice is based on the Protagonist of the Same Name.

Mr. Bunny is based on The White Rabbit.

Bill is based on Bill The Lizard.

Caterpillar is based on Hookah-Smoking Caterpillar.

Knave of Hearts is based on the character of the same name.

Executioner is based on one of the Queen of Hearts' Card Soldiers.

The Mad Hatter is based on the character of the same name.

Queen of Hearts is based on the character of the same name.

Serpent is based on Quetzalcoatl the god of life, light and wisdom, lord of the day and the winds from Aztec Mythology.

Lady Thirteen is based on Yu Mo from The Flowers of War, portrayed by the actress Ni Ni.

Sophia is based on Sophia Palaiologina a Byzantine princess, member of the Imperial Palaiologos family, Grand Princess of Moscow as the second wife of Grand Prince Ivan III.

Ivan is possibly based on Ivan III of Russia a Grand Prince of Moscow and Grand Prince of all Rus'.

Maroon Crystal is based on Dorothy Gale.

Princess Ozma is based on the character of the same name.

The Wicked Witch is based on both Wicked Witch of the West and Dorothy Gale.

Emerald City Coachman is based on the Coachman.

Oz, the Wizard is based on Wizard of Oz.

The Tin Man is based on Tin Woodman.

The Spookcrow is based on Scarecrow.

The Toothless Lion is based on Cowardly Lion.

Golden Ratio references to the Philosopher's Stone a mythic alchemical substance capable of turning base metals such as mercury into gold.

Electrolysis references to the technique of the same name that uses direct electric current (DC) to drive an otherwise non-spontaneous chemical reaction.

Ouroboros references to the ancient symbol of the same name that depicts a snake or dragon eating it's own tail.

Choir Boy has a The squared circle symbol an alchemical symbol (17th century) illustrating the interplay of the four elements of matter symbolising the philosopher's stone on his back.

Mutation represents Chrysopoeia an artificial production of gold, most commonly by the alleged transmutation of base metals such as lead.

Sulfuric Acid has a tattoo on chest resembling the symbol of the same name based on Dalton's Law of Atomic Weights.

Vine references to the Elixir of life a potion that supposedly grants the drinker eternal life and/or eternal youth.

Philofelist possibly references to Necromancy a practice of magic or black magic involving communication with the dead – either by summoning their spirits as apparitions, visions or raising them bodily – for the purpose of divination, imparting the means to foretell future events, discover hidden knowledge, to bring someone back from the dead, or to use the dead as a weapon.

Judge represents Pride.

Deputy represents Greed.

Clerk represents Envy.

Court 3 Commissioner represents Wrath.

Court 5 Commissioner represents Sloth.

Court 6 Commissioner represents Gluttony.

Court 7 Commissioner represents Lust.

Narcissus is named after the character of the same name who rejected all romantic advances, eventually falling in love with his own reflection in a pool of water, staring at it for the remainder of his life, his name is the origin of Narcissism.

Clio is named after the goddess of the same name who is the goddess of history, lyre playing and a member of the Muses.

Talia is named after Thalia who is the goddess of comedy and a member of the Muses.

Hebe is named after the goddess of the same name who is the goddess of eternal youth, prime of life, forgiveness

"Succubus" is named after a demon of the same name they are female demons that appears in dreams to seduce men, usually through sexual activity.

Rainmaker's Beauty Form is based on both Lady Shizuka, one of the most famous women in Japanese history and literature and Ameonna, a yōkai thought to call forth rain while the Prajna Form is based on Kuchisake-onna, that appears as a malicious spirit, or onryō, of a woman, that partially covers her face with a mask or other item and carries some sort of sharp object.

"The Prince" is based on the titular character of the The Happy Prince.

Feathered Cloak is based on Freyja, a goddess associated with love, beauty, fertility, sex, war, gold, and seiðr (magic for seeing and influencing the future) from Norse Mythology.

The 3rd Essence of Season 17 is based on The Masque of the Red Death.

Man in Red is based on The Red Death.

Runaway is based on Prince Prospero.

The 1st Essence of Season 18 is based on The Marriage of Figaro.

Fury is based on both Count Almaviva (Philippe) and Countess Rosina (Christina).

"Susanna" is based on the character of the same name.

The 1st Essence of Season 20 is based on And Then There Were None.

The 2nd Essence of Season 20 takes place on The Crystal Palace on a fictional setting.

Lockheart is shown to be a fictional daughter of the in real life historical figure Joseph Paxton an English gardener, architect, engineer and Member of Parliament, best known for designing the Crystal Palace.

The 1st Essence of Season 21 is based on Bacchanalia, an unofficial, privately funded popular Roman festivals of Bacchus, based on various ecstatic elements of the Greek Dionysia.

Spring Heated Wine is based on Dionysus, the god of the grape-harvest, wine making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, festivity, and theatre and a Member of the Twelve Olympians from Greek Mythology.

Bai Ze is based on Bai Ze itself, a mystical Chinese beast connected with spirits.

The 3rd Essence of Season 22 is based on insects and also the seven virtues.

Winter Cicada represents Humility.

Frozen Butterfly represents Chastity.

Ant represents Charity.

Scorpion represents Kindness.

Mayfly represents Diligence.

Centipede represents Temperance.

Worker Bee represents Patience.

Boudoir Dream is based on Child Jane Hudson from What Ever Happened to Baby Jane which is a film adaptation of a novel of the same name, portrayed by the child actress Julie Allred

Iron Lady is based on Harriet Craig from the film of the same name which is a film adaptation of Craig's Wife, portrayed by the actress Joan Crawford.

Samara is based on Samarra from The Prodigal which is a film adaptation of Parable of the Prodigal Son, portrayed by the actress Lana Turner.

Rhythm of the Rain is based on Kathy Selden from Singin' in the Rain, portrayed by the actress Debbie Reynolds.

Recluse is based on Jef Costello from Le Samouraï, portrayed by the actor and filmmaker Alain Delon.

Hamlet is based on the titular character of the 1948 film which is the film adaptation of the play of the same name, portrayed by the actor and director Laurence Olivier.

Colonel Dax is based on the character of the same name from Paths of Glory which is a film adaptation of the novel of the same name, portrayed by the actor and filmmaker Kirk Douglas.

The Red Shoes is based on Victoria Page from The Red Shoes which is a film adaptation of a fairy tale of the same name, portrayed by the actress ballet dancer and actress Moira Shearer.

The Black Tulip is based on both Guillaume de Saint Preux and Julien de Saint Preux from The Black Tulip which is a film adaptation of the novel of the same name, both portrayed by the actor and filmmaker Alain Delon.

Just Around the Corner is based on Penny Hale from Just Around the Corner which is a film adaptation of Lucky Penny, portrayed by former child actress, singer, dancer, and diplomat and diplomat Shirley Temple.

Zouzou is based on the titular character of the 1934 film, portrayed by actress, French Resistance agent, and Civil Rights Activist Josephine Baker.

Ben-Hur is based on Judah Ben-Hur from Ben-Hur which is a film adaptation of Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, portrayed by the actor and political activist Charlton Heston.

Dorothy is based on Dorothy Gale from The Wizard of Oz which is a film adaptation of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, portrayed by actress and singer Judy Garland.

Salome is based on the titular character from the movie of the same name, portrayed by actress, dancer, and producer Rita Hayworth.

Da Vinci is based on Leonardo da Vinci from The Life of Leonardo da Vinci which is a miniseries about the real life artist, portrayed by actor Philippe Leroy.

Svengali is based on the titular character of the 1931 film which is a film adaptation of Trilby, portrayed by the actor on radio, stage and radio John Barrymore.

Rashomon is based on the Samurai's wife from Rashomon which is a film adaptation of two Ryūnosuke Akutagawa novels "In a Grove" and "Rashōmon", portrayed by the actress Machiko Kyō.

Broken Blossoms are based on Cheng Huan from Broken Blossoms which is a film adaptation of The C**** and the Child, portrayed by the actor Richard Barthelmess.

Scarlet is based on Scarlett O'Hara from Gone with the Wind which is a film adaptation of the novel of the same name, portrayed by the actress Vivien Leigh.

Faust is based on the titular character of the 1927 film which is a film adaptation of the play of the same name, portrayed by the actor, director and singer Gösta Ekman.

Million Dollar Mermaid is based on Annette Kellerman from the film of the same name which is a biography about the real life swimmer, portrayed by swimmer and actress Esther Williams.

[ccohanlon]

from my bookshelf

Pytheas of Massalia was a Greek geographer, explorer and astronomer from the ancient Greek colony of Massalia — modern-day Marseille, France. In the late 4th century BC, he voyaged from there to northwestern Europe, but his detailed account of it, On The Ocean, survives only in fragments, quoted — and disputed — by later authors such as Strabo, Pliny and Diodorus of Sicily. The Extraordinary Voyage Of Pytheas the Greek by the noted British historian of ancient maritime Europe, Barry Cunliffe, attempts to draw out the reality of what was an extraordinary sea journey, from the Western Mediterranean north along the Atlantic coast of Europe to the British Isles, then even further north, to the near-mythic land of Thule. Cunliffe makes a strong case for Pytheas being “the first European explorer”, while identifying the most likely locations of Thule, sought so avidly by 19th and early 20th century adventurers and artists.

James Hamilton-Paterson’s Seven-Tenths: The Sea And Its Thresholds, published in 1992, more than two thousand years after Pytheas’s On The Ocean, is an ambitious, expressive exploration of the vast aqueous wilderness that covers three-quarters of our planet by a writer of remarkable literary accomplishment (he was one of Martin Amis’s professors at Oxford). Plumbing humanity’s complex, multi-faceted relationship with the sea, Hamilton-Paterson writes vivid, meditative passages about, well, everything — fishing, piracy, oceanography, cartography, exploration, ecology, the ritual of a burial at sea, poetry, and even his own experiences living for extended periods on a small island in the Philippines.

Tom Neale’s autobiography, An Island To Oneself: Six Years On A Desert Island, describes an altogether smaller, more solitary world: the island of Anchorage, part of the Suwarrow Atoll in the South Pacific. Born in New Zealand in 1902, Neale spent most of his life in Oceania: after leaving the Royal New Zealand Navy, he worked for decades aboard inter-island trading vessels and in various temporary jobs ashore before his first glimpse of his desert island home. He moved to Anchorage in 1952 and over three different periods, lived in hermitic solitude for 16 years, with rare visits from yachtsmen, island traders, and journalists. Among the last was Noel Barber, a close friend of my late father: he gave my father a copy of Neale’s book, in Rome, shortly after it was published in 1966 (I still have it). Neale was taken off his beloved island in 1977 and died not long after of stomach cancer.

The Starship And The Canoe by Kenneth Brower, published in 1978, is an unlikely dual biography of a father and son that draws intriguing parallels between the ambitious ideas of renowned British theoretical physicist and mathematician Freeman Dyson — who, in the early 1970s explored concepts for interstellar travel, settlements on comets, and nuclear rockets that might propel mankind to the outer reaches of the universe — and his wayward son, George, who lived in a self-built tree house 30 metres up a Douglas fir overlooking the Strait Of Georgia, in British Columbia and devised large canoes based on Aleut baidarkas in which to paddle north to the wild, uninhabited littoral of southern Alaska. Brower’s descriptions of long passages with the younger Dyson in the cold, sometimes fierce tidal waters between Vancouver Island and the Canadian mainland are gripping and I have read them again and again. It is, unarguably, my favourite book.

The late, New Zealand-born doctor and sailor, David Lewis, is not as widely known as he was half a century ago, even by avid readers of sea stories, but from his earliest memoirs in the 1960s — of his participation in the first-ever singlehanded trans-Atlantic race (The Ship That would Not Sail Due West), and of incident-prone voyages to far-flung coasts with his young family (Dreamers of the Day, Daughters of the Wind, and Children Of Three Oceans) — to his practical, first-hand studies of instrument-less ocean navigation among South Pacific islanders, (We, The Navigators and The Voyaging Stars) in the 1970s, Dr. Lewis was not only the late 20th century’s most remarkable and intelligent writer on the sea and small-boat voyaging but also one of its most adventurous. My favourite of his several books: Ice Bird, published in 1972, an account of a gruelling, almost fatal voyage from Sydney, Australia, in an ill-prepared, steel, 32-foot yacht to achieve the first singlehanded circumnavigation of Antarctica.

It’s said that spending time anywhere with Lorenzo Ricciardi, late ex-husband of Italian photographer Mirella Ricciardi, was an adventure. A film-maker and former senior advertising executive, once described by a British writer as “a penniless Neapolitan count”, he gambled at roulette to raise enough money to buy an Arab dhow, which, in the 1970s, with little seafaring experience and plenty of mishaps, he sailed from Dubai to the Arabian Gulf, and from there down the Arabian to coast of Africa, where the dhow was shipwrecked among the Comoros Islands. The Voyage Of The Mir El Ah is Lorenzo’s picaresque account (illustrated by Mirella’s photographs). Astoundingly, several years later, Lorenzo and Mirella Ricciardi completed an even more dangerous, 6,000-kilometre voyage across Equatorial Africa in an open boat — and another book, African Rainbow: Across Africa By Boat.

Italian madmen aside, it used to be that you could rely on surfers for poor impulse control and reckless adventures, on the water and off. Back in the late 1990s, Allan Weisbecker sold his home, loaded his dog and a quiver of surfboards onto a truck, and drove south from the Mexican border into Central America to figure out what had happened to an old surfing buddy — in between checking out a few breaks along the way. In Search Of Captain Zero: A Surfer's Road Trip Beyond The End Of The Road is a memoir of a two-year road-trip that reads like a dope-fuelled fiction but feels more real than William Finnegan’s somewhat high-brow (and more successful) Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life.

Which brings me to Dana and Ginger Lamb. In 1933, these newly-weds would certainly have been looked at askance by most of their middle-American peers when they announced that they weren’t ready yet to settle down and instead built a 16-foot hybrid canoe-sailboat and set of on what would turn out to be a 16,000-mile, three year journey down the Pacific coasts of Mexico, Guatemala, Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica to the Panama Canal. Dana’s 415-page book, Enchanted Vagabonds, published in 1938, was an unexpected New York Times best-seller and today is more exciting to read than the ungainly, yawn-inducing books produced by so many, more commercially-minded, 21st century adventurers.

First published in Sirene, No. 17, Italy, 2023.

[maddenwriting]

The Supernatural and Paranormal world in history

(I wrote this back in my junior year of highschool for a research essay but decided I wanted to share it with others because some of the things on here are just so fascinating to me I didn’t want to keep it to myself. The writing here is definitely all over the place)

The supernatural world has had a chokehold on cultures and civilizations around the world since history even began being recorded, and even today it’s still an almost everyday thing for plenty of people and countries.

The idea of the supernatural dates back as far as ancient Babylon when the Babylonians recorded how to dispel a ghost to the underworld on a stone tablet. The tablet was made in ancient Babylon sometime around 1500 B.C.E. At the time it was the earliest known depiction of a ghost. It is extremely difficult to see the writing and it must be viewed under specific light. It is small and half of the tablet is missing, but it still gives specific instructions on how to remove ghosts. The directions say to have an exorcist make figurines of a man and woman, prepare two vessels of beer; next at sunrise speak ritual words calling on the Mesopotamian god Shamash, who was the god of the sun and was responsible for guiding the undead to the underworld. One of the texts has a warning to not look behind you; whether this is directed at the ghost going to the underworld or the exorcist is unknown. Throughout history people have believed that they encountered ghosts in their everyday life; many scholars even have writings that give instructions on how to exercise these ghosts. Mesopotmians had rituals during funerals to specifically ensure the dead would not rise as ghosts, but instead of being viewed with fear, the Mesopotamians viewed them with sympathy as their eternal slumber had been taken away from them (Gershon, n.pag).

Ghosts were less known during ancient Rome; and more feared than honored; unlike in the Babylonian culture one of the first ghost stories came from Ancient Rome. The first ghost story was written by Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus, better known as Pliny the Younger. He was a scholar and magistrate in Ancient Rome and wrote hundreds, if not thousands, of letters in his time. One of the most popular may be his letter to Roman Senator Lucius Licinius Sura, where Pliny asks if he truly believes in the specters, which reveals this conversation may have been going on for some time. Pliny goes on to speak about the story of a haunted house in Athens where the inhabitants reported hearing noises in the night; this slowly drove them to madness; and eventually death. Once the home was empty Athendoros the Philosopher inquired about it, he was intrigued by the story of the previous owners and decided to see if these stories held any truth. He said the ghost had appeared for him, a specter of a man with a long white beard and disheveled hair. The ghost led him outside before disappearing on a specific spot. Athendoros had the magisterium dig the spot up the next day where they discovered a long-deceased body; once the body of the man received a public funeral, the home was no longer haunted (Secundus n.pag).

Pliny the younger seemed to be worried about the ghost according to his letter, and even wrote to a politician about these concerns; Pliny states, “I am extremely desirous therefore to know your sentiments concerning specters, whether you believe they exist and have their proper shapes and a measure of divinity, or are only the false impressions of a terrified imagination?” (Secundus n.pag).

In the 1700s the paranormal was part of everyday life, so much that a newspaper had daily tales about paranormal stories in neighborhoods. People would report strange events that took place in their homes and it would be posted. Most reported stories said ghosts were horrible and loud creatures, but not violent. Newspapers devoted to reporting unusual behavior were a hit with communities in the 17th century (Sangha n.pag).

People had begun to believe some of the living could be directly connected to the supernatural world; they called themselves psychics and clairvoyants. The 1700s were the rise of this belief, mainly in England and Egypt with women. Many used playing cards or tea for readings to avoid suspicion as witches. Travelers from Egypt had become well known for their spiritual abilities and would receive payment to tell fortunes. The French scholar and writer Antoine Court De Gebelin was one of the first to use tarot for the occult; he claimed these cards originated from Egypt and were brought to England by travelers (Matthews n.pag).

The second most prominent figure in the occult was Etteila, the grandfather of the occult tarot. Very little is known about his life before beginning to work with the tarot, but he was born in 1738 to Maître Rôtisseur, a caterer, and his mother, whose name is unknown, a seed merchant. Those who began practicing the occult often believed that what they were doing was with the help of spirits, again tying the 18th century with the paranormal world (Matthews n.pag).

The paranormal has always been a part of the world, while people do not truly know if it is real or not. The cultures of the past may have been heavily influenced by the ideas of ghosts and spirits. Many modern historians speculate that the reason the civilizations centuries ago relied so heavily on the idea of the supernatural was to give them a possible answer to what happens after death. In history humans did believe ghosts were a part of life, and that they were an important part of life and how the world functioned.

Personal Position

The world has always been filled with intricate and detailed stories revolving around the supernatural and while it is unlikely that monsters or other supernatural creatures live in the world the theories of it are interesting and a large part of the past. The way entire cultures can form around a simple thought of nonexistent creatures is fascinating. Knowing about the history of past civilizations is important; and since the supernatural was so deeply rooted in their culture it should be just as important. The supernatural has had a strong hold on cultures around the world since ancient times.

Everyone wonders if the supernatural exists if monsters roam the earth hidden from the naked eye. Most cultures were created with the idea that the supernatural wanted to harm them, but today modern society calls these old ideas myths or folktales. Has the supernatural world existed this entire time or are myths created to cause fear among civilizations as a way of controlling them?

The supernatural was first created as a way for early civilizations to understand what they believed to be unexplainable events, such as their crops suddenly dying must have been the cause of a witch or missing money must be a demon.

The use of the supernatural in culture has varying motives and can neither be proven nor disproven. Psychics believe they have the power to contact the other side; while there is no scientific proof of this one woman, Dorothy Allison has assisted in over 400 police cases and is still being contacted by police for assistance, “In her voluntary detecting career, Allison worked on more than 5,000 cases for law enforcement agencies around the globe and was credited by many with helping to solve more than a dozen murders and find at least 50 missing children.” (Oliver, n.pag)

In early history the invisible world served a deep and important cultural purpose; they had originally used it to show what was unacceptable in their societies, eventually, these monsters created from simple ideas turned into people's darkest fears, “Many Tudor and Stuart people – from the most educated elites to ordinary working men and women – believed that alongside their own, visible world was what has been termed an ‘invisible world’. These two worlds were deeply intertwined: from the malevolent powers of witches, to the demonstration of divine will in monsters and other ‘wonders of nature’, they thought that the supernatural shaped the natural world“ (Cambridge 1).

At first, the idea of monsters may have been helpful in their eyes; it was a way to easily represent unwanted traits in communities, at some point it got out of hand and their beliefs turned into monsters, “In the Early Modern Period monsters played an important role in European society, they were created by communities in order to serve cultural purposes. One of these purposes was that monsters outlined characteristics that were culturally unacceptable, and through the image of monsters were used to enforce these beliefs” (Smith 1).

What was once a cultural idea turned into fear that lasted generations; every small event that may have been believed to be unexplainable turned into a monster out to get them and their family. They were no longer in control of these fears; instead these monsters controlled and shaped their culture, “Whatever the community would fear the most, monsters would spawn from these anxieties. Witches would attack crops, murder livestock, and create curses, all acts that European communities would fear, another example of how fear began to construct monsters” (Smith 1).

In early history the idea of the supernatural served a cultural purpose; these supernatural beings often had characteristics that were unacceptable to the culture. They used these creatures to reinforce their beliefs. These creatures were created to specifically hold monstrous traits, for example, one monster may be gluttonous or violent. The problem these ideas brought with them was severe anxiety amongst communities; most of the farmers believed witches may come and destroy their crops randomly or a shop owner thought a demon would steal their earnings. Communities found a way to make their fears a physical threat to their well beings; they wanted what they were as a rational answer for irrational events. In early history people feared what they could not understand or recognize; for example when discoveries of animals were made people thought they must be beasts of the unnatural world if they did not understand it, it must be monstrous or dangerous.

The supernatural has been an important part of culture since some of our earliest recorded histories. Understanding the importance of the supernatural in history is something that more people should see. Early civilizations used monsters to form what they did not want in their culture; or as an excuse for negative parts of their life. Today the supernatural has become fictional to most people, or are folktales.

While the supernatural is most evident in early history, it still has its involvement in cultures and daily life today. Some still believe that the paranormal and supernatural world is part of life, such as certain people believing that they can contact the other side or cultures believing in supernatural creatures like the chupacabra or skinwalker.

Psychics in the modern day are often used in many police investigations, especially homicides. The first recorded assistance of a psychic in police investigations was in 1845, though many believe they were helping before that, unfortunately, this recorded case has been lost. They have been shown to give useful information that has even been proven true later in the investigations. Many psychics have become trusted members of many police departments.

In history, civilizations used the supernatural to either cause or ease fear in their daily lives. They used these monsters to specifically form their world how they saw fit, if someone had the traits of these monsters they were targeted. For a widow not remarrying was seen as a witch. They came to truly believe the supernatural existed in their world and that it was working against them.

There has been no scientific evidence of the supernatural or paranormal world hidden in our own. Many people have tried to falsify evidence and there have been competitions offering thousands of dollars for the science behind the supernatural to be proven but no one has truly discovered it, not with physical evidence that can show the paranormal and supernatural are part of our world.

The supernatural is not a natural everyday phenomenon; it was created for a specific purpose. Only after decades of being used to show what is culturally unacceptable did civilizations begin to convince themselves these monsters were real and they are what is causing the problems in life, “In the Early Modern Period monsters played an important role in European society, they were created by communities in order to serve cultural purposes” (Smith 1).

The supernatural was at first only a thought someone had to use to help form civilizations; it then turned into something much more over time. The citizens of the old world turned these thoughts into what they believed to be real physical creatures through fear, they had no way of knowing if they were real or not, and they believed what they were told by chiefs, kings, and lords. They let their fear control them and their entire lives.

The paranormal and supernatural world has been tied with culture for over a thousand years; while they may not be real it is important to many parts of the world. People at the beginning of recorded history believed this unseen world was something they could not live without, and the world could not function without. After a few hundred years the paranormal was beginning to be more unnatural rather than natural and important; it was purely fictional now. The idea of the paranormal and supernatural in the world changed multiple times across the world throughout time, many cultures stopped believing in it and many had it involved in daily life and religion. The supernatural is a heavily important part of this world’s history; and many times influenced the past. The supernatural may continue to affect the future of everyone.

Works Cited

Gershon, Livia. “3,500-Year-Old Babylonian Tablet May Contain Earliest Known Depiction of a

Ghost.” Smithsonian Magazine, 22 October 2021. Accessed 6 December 2022.

Matthews, Mimi. “Nineteenth century fortune-telling: From the drawing room to the courtroom.”

victorianweb, 17 February 2017. Accessed 6 December 2022.

Sangha, Laura. ““Newspapers” devoted to reporting spooky behavior were a hit with

communities in the 17th century” University of Exeter, 1 November 2017. Accessed 6

December 2022.

Secundus, Gaius. “Book Seven, Letter 27”. VROMA, n.d. Accessed 6 December 2022.

Smith, Lisa. ‘About - Supernatural and Natural Worlds.” 26 May 2020. Accessed 6 December.

“The Supernatural in Tudor and Stuart Britain”. 8 July 2019. Accessed 6 December 2022.

Violette, Stephanie. “Cultural Belief in the Supernatural from 500 to 1500: Change over Time,

Significance, and Dispersion of Ideas from Augustine to Shakespeare.” 17 April 2017.

Accessed 6 December 2022.

Mesopotamia god of the sun, Shamash

Pliny the younger

Etteilla (Jean-Baptiste Alliette)

Antoine Court De Gebelin

-while I do as much research as I can on each topic I write about, I can not promise it is 100% historically accurate. Please do not use my writing as research or an educational source. My personal opinion is also occasionally added to my writing as it’s a personal blog. Thank you for reading <3

[connectparanormal]

Ghosts in Ancient Rome

The belief in ghosts, or manes, permeated both daily life and religion in ancient Rome. These were seen by the Romans as the spirits of the dead, who lived on in some way or another after they passed away. Their view of the afterlife and the significance of appropriate funeral customs were closely related to the idea of manes. It was thought that the dead may come back to haunt the living if these rites were ignored or not carried out properly.

To respect and please the dead, the Romans observed a number of festivals and rites, including Lemuria and Parentalia. Families visited the graves of their ancestors during the Parentalia, which was held in February, to present food, wine, and other presents to the spirits. Families used this time to honor and remember their deceased loved ones, making sure they were happy and wouldn't bother the living. The Lemuria, which took place in May, was a more solemn event intended to placate lemures, or restless or evil spirits. The head of the family would carry out certain rituals during this festival, such as tossing black beans over his shoulder and chanting incantations to drive out any ghosts that might be hiding there.

Ancient Roman literature also displays their preoccupation with ghosts. Ghosts and haunted places are mentioned in the writings of writers like Virgil, Pliny the Younger, and Plautus. A character in Plautus's comedy Mostellaria makes the pretense that the house is haunted in an attempt to frighten off an unwanted guest. There are ghost encounters throughout Virgil's epic poem, the Aeneid. One such ghost is the spirit of Aeneas's father, Anchises, who provides instruction from the underworld. The letters of Pliny the Younger tell tales of spectral encounters, such as the well-known story of the haunted home in Athens where the residents were tormented by the restless spirit of an elderly man chained in chains.

The political arena was not exempt from the belief in ghosts. Numerous accounts of Julius Caesar's ghost appearing to different persons, including his heir Octavian (later Augustus), followed his killing in 44 BCE. The instability of the time and the divine favoritism or disfavor accorded to significant historical personalities were taken into consideration when interpreting these apparitions as omens.

Ghosts were frequently seen as representations of the immortality of the soul and the moral consequences of one's life choices in the larger framework of Roman philosophy and religion. Following the Epicurean school of philosophy, philosophers such as Lucretius argued against the existence of ghosts, considering them to be superstitious illusions. In spite of this criticism, the general public mainly upheld ancient beliefs and engaged in complex rituals to ensure that the spirits of the deceased were respected and appeased.

All things considered, the Romans' conception of death, the afterlife, and the moral duties of the living toward their ancestors relied heavily on ghosts, making them more than just fantastical creatures. These practices and beliefs, which emphasize the strong connection the Romans had with both the past and the afterlife, shaped their cultural and spiritual landscape.

[liminalwings]

Dracontia - The Serpent's Stone

First attested in Pliny the Elder's Natural History, the dracontia (aka. draconite/drakonite/dragonite) is purported to be a stone taken from the head of a living dragon; otherwise "out of spite" the dracontia will not solidify into a gem. While Pliny and select other authors describe the dracontia as a white, semi-transparent gem, other accounts describe it as being beautifully colored. It has had various powers attributed to it, or even none at all (Pliny), but the most commonly believed is that of detecting and curing poisons. Semi-related is the Adder Stone (also known as hag/witch/holey stones, anguinum, Glain Neidr in Wales, and Hühnergötter in Germany), a glassy stone (usually flint) with a naturally-occuring hole which, in addition to curing poison/snake bite, also allows one to see through glamours, win lawsuits, and has protective properties. It was so named because it was thought to be created by the saliva of several congregated serpents (once again from Pliny), though some accounts also claim that it comes from the head of a serpent (just like dracontias) or is the result of an adder "stinging" the rock. 

Whereas in the 17th to 18th century, British antiquarians William Stukeley and John Bathurst Deane used the term 'dracontia/dracontium' to refer to sites of purported "ancient serpent worship", particularly locations of standing stones or pillars such as those found through the British isles. One notable example is Abury. 

The dracontia has even been used in various media, not the least of which is the "dragon/dragoon spirits" in the PS1 game The Legend of Dragoon (my dearest heart). 

Similarly, some stories and games see crystals in place of a dragon's heart. Labradorite has come to be known as "dragon heart stone" in some practices (wish I knew where this originated and when).

Any way you look at it, even without talking about dragons' supposed propensity for hoarding gold and gems, there seems to be a frequent association between dragons/serpents and rocks. Or maybe there's just a rock for everything. Even in the actual mineral kingdom, there are several specimens named for or associated with dragons/serpents: serpentine, septarian (aka "dragon stone"), dragon's blood jasper (technically green and red epidote, also also called dragon stone), snake skin agate, dragon vein agate, among others. 

Given that you can't really go out and harvest a mythical dracontia, and it would be bad form to try anyway as someone who wants to work with dragons, your next best bet would be to choose a stone you can dedicate to your dragon workings. 

Why have a dedicated dragon stone?

-Energetic battery. If your paradigm deals with it, you and/or your draconic allies can charge the stone with draconic energy, which you can tap into to get yourself into a good mindset for dragon work, and could be used to give your working extra "oomph". 

-Magical focus/conduit. Even without a stored energetic component, the built-up draconic association you make with it can allow it to act as a channel or an anchor. One idea, for those who work with elemental aspects, is to have a dracontia for each associated element/group of elemental dragons that they can use as a physical representation in ritual. You can honestly be pretty creative with this.

-Symbol of your path. Whether you only have one stone or many in your practice(if any), it can be considered not just an important tool, but also represent dedication to your draconic path. You might call it a "spiritual investment piece". It can also be useful for on-the-go workings or in situations where having a physical altar is not an option.

But what stone should/could I use?

Any, really. If you want to go super obvious and use one of the aforementioned serpent/dragon-named stones, that's fine. Is there a different stone that feels more dragony to you? Go for it. Want to follow dracontia lore and use a milky quartz? Sure. My first one was a Botswana agate that looked like a grey and black dragon eye from one side, so any stone that looks like a dragon's eye would also be great. It boils down to your personal association, unless you have dragon allies giving you a particular suggestion. It doesn't have to be a fancy expensive stone, or even a new stone; if you already have some sort of stone collection, you might have something suitable. Or you might be able to find an interesting quartz-streaked river rock from a local natural area. 

As an aside, if you have some ability to sense spirits/entities, you might come across a stone that seems to have a dragon attached to it. I don't mean in the "spirit binding/keeping" sense, just that a passing dragon found the stone and went "mine!" and is sticking with it. While you might be able to use the stone as a dracontia, you'd have to take it up with the attached dragon first. It might be that you'll have to pick another stone, while the stone with the attachment would only be used for working with that specific dragon. I have a tektite with this kind of thing going on. 

What if I lose my dragon stone?

Then you'll just have to find another and start over with building your association with it. There's no magical consequence or punishment. If there was an attachment, it may be that the dragon has moved on. Some may feel that it could be a message that it isn't the right time for you to be following this path, that the stone wasn't right, or any number of worries, but that kind of thing is for you to discern. Sometimes you just lose things. 

Do I have to call it dracontia? And do I have to have one to work with dragons?

The answer to both of these is 'no'. Some might be put off by the lore of the dracontia due to the whole "dragon killing" thing, which is understandable, and is why I mentioned the secondary use of the term in reference to temple standing stones, even if it's a relatively more recent usage, along with other variations of the concept. As long as the mythical origin of attainment isn’t what you focus on, it’s unlikely that the dragons you work with will be offended, considering it’s not how you’re getting your dragon stone anyway. 

I also do not personally know of an existing dragon path that utilizes a similar concept (not to say there aren't any, I just have never heard of it in a modern dragon magic context), and decided to write about it as something that had come up organically in the early stages of my own path. So, if you've been thinking about doing something similar on your path but weren't sure about there being any precedent or are afraid of doing something silly or 'wrong', here's encouragement to go ahead and try it out. 

And honestly, you don't technically need to use a stone for this purpose; a favored dragon pendant or other jewelry can be used for the same thing, I just decided to write about the 'dragon stone' in particular for the historic associations and potential interest to others who may not have come across the idea before.

As to how you would use your dragon stone… Well, that would largely be up to you. You could meditate with it, using it as a focus to facilitate connection with the dragons you work with or as a point of contact with dragon energy. You can keep it on your dragon altar if you have one and use it as a conduit/portal. Carry it with you during the day for when you need a boost or need to fuel a dragon-flavored shield. The limit for how you can use a dragon stone and what for is really just limited by your imagination and the techniques you know. 

For me personally, the first dragon stone I had (the Botswana agate) was a symbol of my draconity foremost. I would hold it when I felt I needed comfort or protection, or wanted to feel dragony. I ended up losing the stone (along with some other favorite stones I still sorely miss) the last day of fourth grade, but that's how I can confidently say that losing your dragon stone isn't going to harm you. I also never took it as a message of "this isn't for you", as I continued having interactions with dragons and further exploring my draconity well after that. It's a tool in the end, despite how much meaning you might put into it.

References

Jennings, Hargrave. Ophiolatreia. London, 1889. Sacred-texts, https://www.sacred-texts.com/etc/oph/index.htm

Pliny the Elder. The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 6. July 19, 2020. Project Gutenberg, https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/62704/pg62704-images.html

Deane, John Bathurst. Dracontia, or Observations on circle and serpent worship. London, 1834. Hathi Trust, https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/009724090

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adder_stone 

[trubioart]

Reading and Response #3- Projection: Vanishing and Becoming by Sean Cubitt

Sean Cubitt dives into some of the fundamentals of drawing and painting. He examines these principles and how they translate into video and film. Cubitt begins his article by historically diving into the Buddhist tale of the origin of art and how it compares to Pliny’s story of the origins of paining and use of light and shadows. These tales go into the origin of use of line, light, reflection, shadow, and projection. Projection is a very important word in this article. From artists projecting light and shadows onto prints, as well as lines and colors; Cubitt also explores the metaphorical meaning of projection. How we as humans use projection. It is vital in childhood and human development. Think back to when we were children and could not communicate properly with words we would have to project emotion to get across what we were needing. Projection could be literal, metaphorical, implied,etc. In video art you are able to project all of the above. With the creation of film and cameras artist had the ability to visually project their message. Rather that message be direct or implied, the artist had more resources at their fingertips to create their visual work. Art is considered a way to preserve. Video would be the ultimate preservation tool. To capture a moment in time, forever. A way to outlive Father Time. This made me think if this is something video artists consider when starting their project. Is that part of the purpose of using video? For this particular artwork to “cheat death”. With today’s technology like the internet and media platforms, even if a video is deleted does it really “die” or does it live forever in some spaces? Do artists consider that aspect today?

5 examples of time based art/video art/film/cinematic artist:

William Kentridge (South African, born 1955). The Refusal of Time, 2012. Five-channel digital video installation, black-and-white and color, sound, 30 min. Steel megaphones, and a breathing machine ("elephant"), dimensions variable. Jointly owned by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 2013. Purchased for The Metropolitan Museum of Art with Roy R. and Marie S. Neuberger Foundation Inc. and Wendy Fisher Gifts and The Raymond and Beverly Sackler 21st Century Art Fund (2013.250). © William Kentridge. All rights reserved.

Video Flag, 1995, Nam June Paik. Pictured on view at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in 1996. “Video Flag’s enormous bank of 70 14 in. CRT monitors represents the American flag’s stars and stripes through flashing imagery of technological advances and iconic moments from American politics: news stills, rotating shots of the State of Liberty, scrolling streams of zeros and ones (the binary language of computers), and a morphing sequence portraying U.S. president portraits, from Harry S. Truman to Bill Clinton. The always-present image of the flag serves as a backdrop against which these individual cultural events, personas, and technologies are experienced, recalled, and understood.” https://www.si.edu/tbma/work/video-flag

Pipilotti Rist, Open my Glade, Times Square, 2016. “For instance, he work of Pipilotti Rist is notable in the proportions that Video Art has taken in recent decades. In 2016, she was selected to exhibit her work in Times Square. The artwork consisted of 62 video screens, monumental in size, right in the middle of all the advertising screens in Times Square. On these 62 screens, looping over several days, numerous videos were shown. There, in the middle of one of the most emblematic squares of capitalism, she smashed her face against a window that was placed just a few centimeters from the camera lens. Her face deformed, her makeup spread out, she questioned, brutally, the gaze that the spectator has on feminine beauty.” https://blog.artsper.com/en/a-closer-look/what-is-video-art/

Looking for Langston, 1988. Photograph: Bfi/Sankofa Film/Kobal/Rex/Shutterstock

Isaac Julien | Looking for Langston, 1989

“More than a tribute to the American poet Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance, Julien’s film is a powerful meditation on the history of black gay desire, the intersection of queer and black politics with art and activism, poetry and prejudice. The action plays out against a soundtrack mixing 1920s jazz and anachronistic 1980s disco.” https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2020/oct/17/warhol-steve-mcqueen-a-history-of-video-art-barbara-london

Lorna, 1984, interactive videodisk installation, infinite duration, video stills

“With Lorna, Lynn Hershman Leeson created the first art work that used laserdisk technology. Exploiting the interactive capabilities of the medium, the artist enables users to explore and intervene in the world of an agoraphobic woman named Lorna.” https://www.lynnhershman.com/project/interactivity/

[semper-legens]

104. The Temple of Fortuna, by Elodie Harper

Owned?: No, library Page count: 374 My summary: Amara's success has reached new heights. From a slave in a brothel to a courtesan in Pompeii to the betrothed of a freedman who sits at the emperor's right hand. But her little family - the enslaved man she loves, and the daughter whose freedom she has fought so hard to procure - is still at home in Pompeii, still beholden to her former master so that her secret does not get out. But there's more trouble stirring. The earth is rumbling. There is the smell of sulphur in the air. Volcano day is approaching, and Amara's world will never be the same… My rating: 4/5 My commentary:

The last in the Wolf Den trilogy! And this is an interesting one again. The formula gets shaken up somewhat because the stakes of this book are different - there's a ticking clock to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, soon to happen in this, the first year of Emperor Titus' reign. Amara has her own problems going on, but the volcano waits for nobody, and has no mercy on anyone, rich or poor. In some senses, I liked this less - it was more disaster movie than the close personal drama of the previous books. But like, set your story in Pompeii in 79 CE, you're gonna have to reckon with Vesuvius. I didn't dislike it, especially as that meant a little more face time for everyone's favourite Ancient Roman natural historian, Gaius Plinius Secundus aka Pliny the Elder. It was just a shift in the way the story had progressed to this point, and that in itself is interesting.

Amara is at her highest point here - her patron might be a freedman, but he's well-connected in Rome, and she's rubbing shoulders with the highest powers in the land. That still, however, comes with its own struggles. The opening scene has Amara attend Berenice, the Emperor's lover, as she prepares to leave for Judea, exiled from the court and from Titus' life. It's a chilling reflection of her own future fate should she fail to be all that her lover wants, and if he decides to get rid of her. Similarly, she is pulled between two worlds; wealth and luxury in Rome, versus love and domesticity in Pompeii. She doesn't really know her daughter, and while Philos has been raising Rufina, he can be recalled to attend Rufus at a moment's notice, and would neither be able to see his daughter nor the woman he loves again. As such, even though she has far more than she could ever have dreamed of in the Wolf Den, Amara is just…empty, here. She's compromised so much of herself - the love she has for Philos, her motherhood, her genuine wants and desires - because she has to in order to get ahead and live a comfortable life. She's making sacrifices for Rufina as much as she can, but the main sacrifice is of their relationship. It's heartbreaking to read.

And once again, the prospect of violence rears its ugly head. Felix is extorting Amara, with the promise that if she stops paying him, he will let the truth of Rufina's parentage come out, thereby potentially condemning her to a life of slavery and Amara to ruin. Time and again, Amara's friends have recommended that she kill Felix; time and again she has refused, that being a bridge too far for her. But here is where Felix finally dies. I had assumed the volcano would get him, but he survives that, only to be taken out by Amara in her last act as Amara, before she becomes Timarete for good. I like this cap on their story, that Amara has to know and understand violence and that her ruthlessness still remains, even when she has a happy and settled life. Sometimes, you just have to stab the man who symbolises all that has gone wrong in your existence.

This book is more of a thriller than the previous novels, entirely because of the lingering threat of Vesuvius. Obviously the average reader knows that the volcano is soon to erupt, but the characters don't - it wasn't known that Vesuvius was a volcano until it erupted. And while the volcano was preceded by earthquakes and sulphur fumes and other signs, the average person didn't know that they were portents of a volcanic eruption specifically; earth tremors were common in the region, and knowledge of the signs of a volcano was the purview of natural historians, not the common man. As such, the eruption comes as a shock to all of the characters, and we play a little in the dramatic irony of people making plans we know will be distrupted, at the very least. Amara's concerns over getting her daughter to Rome have an extra layer to them; her lingering in Pompeii gains a new drama. In the end, the volcano provides a chance for a new future. Philos sets himself up as a freedman, and Amara sheds her courtesan identity to become Timarete once more, his wife and her own woman. While I was predicting this from the outset (they'd be fools not to take the opportunity to remake themselves in the chaos of the volcano) there's still a bittersweet tinge to it that I much appreciated in the name of realism. Many of their Pompeiian friends are dead or missing, and they have lost everything they couldn't carry away from their home. Amara is genuinely sad that she had to ditch her former patron. But she's alive, and Philos is alive, and they can be a family. And, maybe, they can find happiness in the end of all of it.

Next, a murder on a Caribbean island sends shockwaves through a community.

[aeidemnemosyne]

"IV. Transformation of females into males is not anchange of sex. idle story. We find in the Annals that in the consulship of Publius Licinius Crassus and Gaius Cassius Longinus a girl at Casinum was changed into a boy, under the observation of the parents, and at the order of the augurs was conveyed away to a desert island. Licinius Mucianus has recorded that he personally saw at Argos a man named Arescon who had been given the name of Arescusa and had actually married a husband, and then had grown a beard and developed masculine attributes and had taken a wife; and that he had also seen a boy with the same record at Smyrna. I myself saw in Africa a person who had turned into a male on the day of marriage to a husband; this was Lucius Constitius, a citizen of Thysdritum. . . ."

from: Pliny the Elder, Natural History, 7.4

Between information on the birth of twins and triplets, Pliny the Elder makes a brief mention of trans-masculine persons (as well as intersex people in 7.3). What his exact reasons are for this are unclear. It does provide us with the possibility that one could socially transition in Antiquity, and that a new name/presentation was even accepted in f.e. the case of Arescon.

Recommended reading: Parker, Holt N. “The Myth of the Heterosexual: Anthropology and Sexuality for Classicists.” Arethusa 34, no. 3 (2001): 313–62. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44578440.

[dwellordream]

“...If any precedent might have preoccupied Livia, especially in her early career, when she was attempting to mould an image fitting for the times, it would have been a negative one, provided by the most notorious woman of the late republic and, most important, a woman who clashed headlong with Octavian in the sensitive early stages of his career. Fulvia was the wife of Mark Antony, and his devoted supporter, no less loyal than Livia in support of her husband, although their styles were dramatically different.

Fulvia’s struggle on behalf of Antony, Octavian’s archenemy, has secured her an unenviable place in history as a power-crazed termagant. While her husband was occupied in the East in 41, Fulvia made an appearance, along with Antony’s children, before his old soldiers in Italy, urging them to remain true to their commander. When Antony’s brother Lucius gathered his troops at Praeneste to launch an attack on Rome, Fulvia joined him there, and the legend became firmly established that she put on a sword, issued the watchword, gave a rousing speech to the soldiers, and held councils of war with senators and knights. This was the ultimate sin in a woman, interfering in the loyalty of the troops. 

In the end Octavian prevailed and forced the surrender of Lucius and his armies at Perusia. The fall of the city led to a massive exodus of political refugees. Among them were two women, Livia and Fulvia. Livia joined her husband, Tiberius Claudius Nero, who escaped first to Praeneste and then to Naples. Fulvia fled with her children to join Antony and his mother in Athens. Like Octavia later, she found that her dedicated service was not enough to earn her husband’s gratitude. In fact, Antony blamed her for the setbacks in Italy.

A broken woman, she fell ill at Sicyon on the Gulf of Corinth, where she died in mid-40 bc. Antony in the meantime had left Italy without even troubling himself to visit her sickbed. Fulvia’s story contains many of the ingredients familiar in the profiles of ambitious women: avarice, cruelty, promiscuity, suborning of troops, and the ultimate ingratitude of the men for whom they made such sacrifices. She was at Perusia at the same time as Livia, and as wives of two of the triumvirs, they would almost certainly have met. In any case, Fulvia was at the height of her activities in the years immediately preceding Livia’s first meeting with Octavian, and at the very least would have been known to her by reputation. Livia would have seen in Fulvia an object lesson for what was to be avoided at all costs by any woman who hoped to survive and prosper amidst the complex machinations of Roman political life. 

In one respect Livia’s career did resemble Fulvia’s, in that it was shaped essentially by the needs of her husband, to fill a role that in a sense he created for her. To understand that role in Livia’s case, we need to understand one very powerful principle that motivated Augustus throughout his career. The importance that he placed in the calling that he inherited in 44 bc cannot be overstressed. The notion that he and the house he created were destined by fate to carry out Rome’s foreordained mission lay at the heart of his principate. Strictly speaking, the expression domus Augusta (house of Augustus) cannot be attested before Augustus’ death and the accession of Tiberius, but there can be little doubt that the concept of his domus occupying a special and indeed unique place within the state evolves much earlier.

Suetonius speaks of Augustus’ consciousness of the domus suae maiestas (the dignity of his house) in a context that suggests a fairly early stage of his reign, and Macrobius relates the anecdote of his claiming to have had two troublesome daughters, Julia and Rome. When Augustus received the title of Pater Patriae in 2 bc, Valerius Messala spoke on behalf of the Senate, declaring the hope that the occasion would bring good fortune and favour on ‘‘you and your house, Augustus Caesar’’ (quod bonum, inquit, faustum sit tibi domuique tuae, Caesar Auguste). 

The special place in the Augustan scheme enjoyed by the male members of this domus placed them in extremely sensitive positions. The position of the women in his house was even more challenging. In fashioning the image of the domus Augusta, the first princeps was anxious to project an image of modesty and simplicity, to stress that in spite of his extraordinary constitutional position, he and his family lived as ordinary Romans. Accordingly, his demeanour was deliberately self-effacing.

His dinner parties were hospitable but not lavish. The private quarters of his home, though not as modest as he liked to pretend, were provided with very simple furniture. His couches and tables were still on public display in the time of Suetonius, who commented that they were not fine enough even for an ordinary Roman, let alone an emperor. Augustus wore simple clothes in the home, which were supposedly made by Livia or other women of his household. He slept on a simply furnished bed. His own plain and unaffected lifestyle determined also how the imperial women should behave. 

His views on this subject were deeply conservative. He felt that it was the duty of the husband to ensure that his wife always conducted herself appropriately. He ended the custom of men and women sitting together at the games, requiring females (with the exception of the Vestals) to view from the upper seats only. His legates were expected to visit their wives only during the winter season. In his own domestic circle he insisted that the women should exhibit a traditional domesticity.

He had been devoted to his mother and his sister, Octavia, and when they died he allowed them special honours. But at least in the case of Octavia, he kept the honours limited and even blocked some of the distinctions voted her by the Senate. Nor did he limit himself to matters of ‘‘lifestyle.’’ He forbade the women of his family from saying anything that could not be said openly and recorded in the daybook of the imperial household. In the eyes of the world, Livia succeeded in carrying out her role of model wife to perfection. To some degree she owed her success to circumstances. It is instructive to compare her situation with that of other women of the imperial house. 

Julia (born 39 bc) summed up her own attitude perfectly when taken to task for her extravagant behaviour and told to conform more closely to Augustus’ simple tastes. She responded that he could forget that he was Augustus, but she could not forget that she was Augustus’ daughter. Julia’s daughter, the elder Agrippina (born 19 bc?), like her mother before her, saw for herself a key element in her grandfather’s dynastic scheme. She was married to the popular Germanicus and had no doubt that in the fullness of time she would provide a princeps of Augustan blood.

Not surprisingly, she became convinced that she had a fundamental role to play in Rome’s future, and she bitterly resented Tiberius’ elevation. Her daughter Agrippina the Younger (born ad 15?) was, as a child, indoctrinated by her mother to see herself as the destined transmitter of Augustus’ blood, and her whole adult life was devoted to fulfilling her mother’s frustrated mission. From birth these women would have known of no life other than one of dynastic entitlement. By contrast, Livia’s background, although far from humble, was not exceptional for a woman of her class, and she did not enter her novel situation with inherited baggage. 

As a Claudian she may no doubt have been brought up to display a certain hauteur, but she would not have anticipated a special role in the state. As a member of a distinguished republican family, she would have hoped at most for a ‘‘good’’ marriage to a man who could aspire to property and prestige, perhaps at best able to exercise a marginal influence on events through a husband in a high but temporary magistracy. Powerful women who served their apprenticeships during the republic reached their eminence by their own inclinations, energies, and ambitions, not because they felt they had fallen heir to it.

However lofty Livia’s station after 27 bc, her earlier life would have enabled her to maintain a proper perspective. She did not find herself in the position of an imperial wife who through her marriage finds herself overnight catapulted into an ambience of power and privilege. Whatever ambitions she may have entertained in her first husband, she was sadly disappointed. When she married for the second time, Octavian, for all his prominence, did not then occupy the undisputed place at the centre of the Roman world that was to come to him later. Livia thus had a decade or so of married life before she found herself married to a princeps, in a process that offered time for her to become acclimatised and to establish a style and timing appropriate to her situation. 

It must have helped that in their personal relations she and her husband seem to have been a devoted couple, whose marriage remained firm for more than half a century. For all his general cynicism, Suetonius concedes that after Augustus married Livia, he loved and esteemed her unice et perservanter (right to the end, with no rival). In his correspondence Augustus addressed his wife affectionately as mea Livia.

The one shadow on their happiness would have been that they had no children together. Livia did conceive, but the baby was stillborn. Augustus knew that he could produce children, as did she, and Pliny cites them as an example of a couple who are sterile together but had children from other unions. By the normal standards obtaining in Rome at the time they would have divorced—such a procedure would have involved no disgrace—and it is a testimony to the depth of their feelings that they stayed together. In a sense, then, Livia was lucky. 

That said, she did suffer one disadvantage, in that when the principate was established, she found herself, as did all Romans, in an unparalleled situation, with no precedent to guide her. She was the first ‘‘first lady’’—she had to establish the model to emulate, and later imperial wives would to no small degree be judged implicitly by comparison to her. Her success in masking her keen political instincts and subordinating them to an image of self-restraint and discretion was to a considerable degree her own achievement.

In a famous passage of Suetonius, we are told that Caligula’s favourite expression for his great-grandmother was Ulixes stolatus (Ulysses in a stola). The allusion appears in a section that supposedly illustrates Caligula’s disdain for his relatives. But his allusion to Livia is surely a witty and ironical expression of admiration. Ulysses is a familiar Homeric hero, who in the Iliad and Odyssey displays the usual heroic qualities of nerve and courage, but is above all polymetis: clever, crafty, ingenious, a man who will often sort his way through a crisis not by the usual heroic bravado but by outsmarting his opponents, whether the one-eyed giant Polyphemus, or the enchantress Circe, or the suitors for Penelope. 

Caligula implied that Livia had the clever, subtle kind of mind that one associates with Greeks rather than Romans, who were inclined to take a head-on approach to problems. But at the same time she manifested a particularly Roman quality. Rolfe, in the Loeb translation of Suetonius’ Life of Caligula, rendered the phrase as ‘‘Ulysses in petticoats’’ to suggest a female version of the Homeric character. But this is to rob Caligula’s sobriquet of much of its force.

The stola was essentially the female equivalent of the toga worn by Roman men. A long woollen sleeveless dress, of heavy fabric, it was normally worn over a tunic. In shape it could be likened to a modern slip, but of much heavier material, so that it could hang in deep folds. The mark of matronae married to Roman citizens, the stola is used by Cicero as a metaphor for a stable and respectable marriage. Along with the woollen bands that the matron wore in her hair to protect her from impurity, it was considered the insigne pudoris (the sign of purity) by Ovid, something, as he puts it, alien to the world of the philandering lover. 

Another contemporary of Livia’s, Valerius Maximus, notes that if a matrona was called into court, her accuser could not physically touch her, in order that the stola might remain inviolata manus alienae tactu (unviolated by the touch of another’s hand). Bartman may be right in suggesting that the existence of statues of Livia in a stola would have given Caligula’s quip a special resonance, but that alone would not have inspired his bon mot. To Caligula’s eyes, Livia was possessed of a sharp and clever mind.

But she did not allow this quality to obtrude because she recognised that many Romans would not find it appealing; she cloaked it with all the sober dignity and propriety, the gravitas, that the Romans admired in themselves and saw represented in the stola. Livia’s greatest skill perhaps lay in the recognition that the women of the imperial household were called to walk a fine line. She and other imperial women found themselves in a paradoxical position in that they were required to set an example of the traditional domestic woman yet were obliged by circumstances to play a public role outside the home—a reflection of the process by which the domestic and public domains of the domus Augusta were blurred.

Thus she was expected to display the grand dignity expected of a person very much in the public eye, combined with the old-fashioned modesty of a woman whose interests were confined to the domus. Paradoxically, she had less freedom of action than other upper-class women who had involved themselves in public life in support of their family and protégés. As wife of the princeps, Livia recognised that to enlist the support of her husband was in a sense to enlist the support of the state.

That she managed to gain a reputation as a generous patron and protector and, at the same time, a woman who kept within her proper bounds, is testimony to her keen sensitivity. In many ways she succeeds in moving silently though Rome’s history, and this is what she intended. Her general conduct gave reassurance to those who were distressed by the changing relationships that women like Fulvia had symbolised in the late republic. It is striking that court poets, who reflected the broad wishes of their patron, avoid reference to her. She is mentioned by the poet Horace, but only once, and even there she is not named directly but referred to allusively as unico gaudens mulier marito (a wife finding joy in her preeminent husband).

The single exception is Ovid, but most of his allusions come from his period of exile, when desperation may have got the better of discretion. The dignified behaviour of Livia’s distinguished entourage was contrasted with the wild conduct of Julia’s friends at public shows, which drove Augustus to remonstrate with his daughter (her response: when she was old, she too would have old friends). In a telling passage Seneca compares the conduct of Livia favourably with even the universally admired Octavia. After losing Marcellus, Octavia abandoned herself to her grief and became obsessed with the memory of her dead son. She would not permit anyone to mention his name in her presence and remained inconsolable, allowing herself to become totally secluded and maintaining the garb of mourning until her death.

By contrast, Livia, similarly devastated by the death of Drusus, did not offend others by grieving excessively once the body had been committed to the tomb. When the grief was at its worst, she turned to the philosopher Areus for help. Seneca re-creates Areus’ advice. Much of it, of course, may well have sprung from Seneca’s imagination, but it is still valuable in showing how Livia was seen by Romans of Seneca’s time. Areus says that Livia had been at great pains to ensure that no one would find anything in her to criticise, in major matters but also in the most insignificant trifles. He admired the fact that someone of her high station was often willing to bestow pardon on others but sought pardon for nothing in herself. 

…Perhaps most important, it was essential for Livia to present herself to the world as the model of chastity. Apart from the normal demands placed on the wife of a member of the Roman nobility, she faced a particular set of circumstances that were unique to her. One of the domestic priorities undertaken by Augustus was the enactment of a programme of social legislation. Parts of this may well have been begun before his eastern trip, perhaps as early as 28 bc, but the main body of the work was initiated in 18.

A proper understanding of the measures that he carried out under this general heading eludes us. The family name of Julius was attached to the laws, and thus they are difficult to distinguish from those enacted by Julius Caesar. But clearly in general terms the legislation was intended to restore traditional Roman gravitas, to stamp out corruption, to define the social orders, and to encourage the involvement of the upper classes in state affairs. The drop in the numbers of the upper classes was causing particular concern. The nobles were showing a general reluctance to marry and, when married, an unwillingness to have children. It was hoped that the new laws would to some degree counter this trend. 

The Lex Iulia de adulteriis coercendis, passed probably in 18 bc, made adultery a public crime and established a new criminal court for sexual offences. The Lex Iulia de maritandis ordinibus, passed about the same time, regulated the validity of marriages between social classes. The crucial factor here, of course, was not the regulation of morality but rather the legitimacy of children. Disabilities were imposed on the principle that it was the duty of men between twenty-five and sixty-five and women between twenty and fifty to marry. Those who refused to comply or who married and remained childless suffered penalties, the chief one being the right to inherit. The number of a man’s children gave him precedence when he stood for office.

Of particular relevance to Livia was the ius trium liberorum, under which a freeborn woman with three children was exempted from tutela (guardianship) and had a right of succession to the inheritance of her children. Livia was later granted this privilege despite having borne only two living children. This social legislation created considerable resentment—Suetonius says that the equestrians staged demonstrations at theatres and at the games. It was amended in ad 9 and supplemented by the Lex Papia Poppaea, which seems to have removed the unfair distinctions between the childless and the unmarried and allowed divorced or widowed women a longer period before they remarried. 

Dio, apparently without a trace of irony, reports that this last piece of legislation was introduced by two consuls who were not only childless but unmarried, thus proving the need for the legislation. Livia’s moral conduct would thus be dictated not only by the already unreal standards that were expected of a Roman matrona but also by the political imperative of her husband’s social legislation. Because Augustus saw himself as a man on a crusade to restore what he considered to be old-fashioned morality, it was clearly essential that he have a wife whose reputation for virtue was unsullied and who could provide an exemplar in her own married life.

In this Livia would not fail him. The skilful creation of an image of purity and marital fidelity was more than a vindication of her personal standards. It was very much a public statement of support for what her husband was trying to achieve. Tacitus, in his obituary notice that begins Book V of the Annals, observes that in the matter of the sanctitas domus, Livia’s conduct was of the ‘‘old school’’ ( priscum ad morem). This is a profoundly interesting statement at more than one level. It tells us something about the way the Romans idealised their past. But it also says much about the clever way that Livia fashioned her own image. 

Her inner private life is a secret that she has taken with her to the tomb. She may well have been as pure as people believed. But for a woman who occupied the centre of attention in imperial Rome for as long as she did, to keep her moral reputation intact required more than mere proper conduct. Rumours and innuendo attached themselves to the powerful and prominent almost of their own volition. An unsullied name required the positive creation of a public image. Livia was despised by Tacitus, who does not hesitate to insinuate the darkest interpretations that can be placed on her conduct.

Yet not even he hints at any kind of moral impropriety in the narrow sexual sense. Even though she abandoned her first husband, Tiberius Claudius, to begin an affair with her lover Octavian, she seems to have escaped any censure over her conduct. This is evidence not so much of moral probity as of political skill in managing an image skilfully and effectively. None of the ancient sources challenges the portrait of the moral paragon. Ovid extols her sexual purity in the most fulsome of terms. To him, Livia is the Vesta of chaste matrons, who has the morals of Juno and is an exemplar of pudicitia worthy of earlier and morally superior generations. Even after her husband is dead she keeps the marriage couch (pulvinar) pure. (She was, admittedly in her seventies.) 

Valerius Maximus, writing in the Tiberian period, can state that Pudicitia attends the couch of Livia. And the Consolatio ad Liviam, probably not a contemporary work but one at least that tries to reflect contemporary attitudes, speaks of her as worthy of those women who lived in a golden age, and as someone who kept her heart uncorrupted by the evil of her times. Horace’s description is particularly interesting. His phrase unico gaudens marito is nicely ambiguous, for it states that Livia’s husband was preeminent (unicus) but implies the other connotation of the word: that she had the moral superiority of an univira, a woman who has known only one husband, which in reality did not apply to Livia.

Such remarks might, of course, be put down to cringing flattery, but it is striking that not a single source contradicts them. On this one issue, Livia did not hesitate to blow her own trumpet, and she herself asserted that she was able to influence Augustus to some degree because she was scrupulously chaste. She could do so in a way that might even suggest a light touch of humour. Thus when she came across some naked men who stood to be punished for being exposed to the imperial eyes, she asserted that to a chaste woman a naked man was no more a sex object than was a statue. Most strikingly, Dio is able to recount this story with no consciousness of irony. 

Seneca called Livia a maxima femina. But did she hold any real power outside the home? According to Dio, Livia believed that she did not, and claimed that her influence over Augustus lay in her willingness to concede whatever he wished, not meddling in his business, and pretending not to be aware of any of his sexual affairs. Tacitus reflects this when he calls her an uxor facilis (accommodating wife). She clearly understood that to achieve any objective she had to avoid any overt conflict with her husband.

It would do a disservice to Livia, however, to create the impression that she was successful simply because she yielded. She was a skilful tactician who knew how to manipulate people, often by identifying their weaknesses or ambitions, and she knew how to conceal her own feelings when the occasion demanded: cum artibus mariti, simulatione filii bene composita (well suited to the craft of her husband and the insincerity of her son) is how Tacitus morosely characterises that talent. Augustus felt that he controlled her, and she doubtless was happy for him to think so. 

Dio has preserved an account of a telling exchange between Augustus and a group of senators. When they asked him to introduce legislation to control what was seen as the dissolute moral behaviour of Romans, he told them that there were aspects of human behaviour that could not be regulated. He advised them to do what he did, and have more control over their wives. When the senators heard this they were surprised, to say the least, and pressed Augustus with more questions to find out how he was able to control Livia. He confined himself to some general comments about dress and conduct in public, and seems to have been oblivious to his audience’s scepticism.

What is especially revealing about this incident is that the senators were fully aware of the power of Livia’s personality, but recognised that she conducted herself in such a way that Augustus obviously felt no threat whatsoever to his authority. Augustus would have been sensitive to the need to draw a line between Livia’s traditional and proper power within the domus and her role in matters of state. This would have been very difficult. Women in the past had sought to influence their husbands in family concerns. But with the emergence of the domus Augusta, family concerns and state concerns were now inextricably bound together. 

…Although Livia did not intrude in matters that were strictly within Augustus’ domain, her restraint naturally did not bar communication with her husband. Certainly, Augustus was prepared to listen to her. That their conversations were not casual matters and were taken seriously by him is demonstrated by the evidence of Suetonius that Augustus treated her just as he would an important official. When dealing with a significant item of business, he would write things out beforehand and read out to her from a notebook, because he could not be sure to get it just right if he spoke extemporaneously. Moreover, it says something about Livia that she filed all Augustus’ written communications with her.

After his death, during a dispute with her son, she angrily brought the letters from the shrine where they had been archived and read them out, complete with their criticisms of Tiberius’ arrogance. Despite Tacitus’ claim that Livia controlled her husband, Augustus was willing to state publicly that he had decided not to follow her advice, as when he declined special status to the people of Samos. Clearly, he would try to do so tactfully and diplomatically, expressing his regrets at having to refuse her request. On other issues he similarly reached his own decision but made sufficient concessions to Livia to satisfy her public dignity and perhaps Augustus’ domestic serenity. 

On one occasion Livia interceded on behalf of a Gaul, requesting that he be granted citizenship. To Augustus the Roman citizenship was something almost sacred, not to be granted on a whim. He declined to honour the request. But he did make a major and telling concession. One of the great advantages of citizenship was the exemption from the tax (tributum) that tributary provincials had to pay. Augustus granted the man this exemption. When Livia apparently sought the recall of Tiberius from Rhodes after the Julia scandal, Augustus refused, but did concede him the title of legatus to conceal any lingering sense of disgrace.

He was unwilling to promote Claudius to the degree that Livia wished, but he was willing to allow him some limited responsibilities. Thus he was clearly prepared to go out of his way to accede at least partially to his wife’s requests. But on the essential issues he remained very much his own man, and on one occasion he made it clear that as an advisor she did not occupy the top spot in the hierarchy. In ad 2 Tiberius made a second request to return from exile. His mother is said to have argued intensively on his behalf but did not persuade her husband. He did, however, say that he would be willing to be guided by the advice he received from his grandson, and adopted son, Gaius.”

- Anthony A. Barrett, “Wife of the Emperor.” in Livia: First Lady of Imperial Rome

[whoppert]

Sunna 3 (loki/reader) (stephen strange/reader)

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4007 words

warnings: none

AO3 Master Fic List

The story continues with Stephen Strange . . . .

The name’s Doctor Stephen Strange M.D., Ph.D, actually.

Well, and Sorcerer Supreme.

Master of the Mystic Arts.

Cleaner of cosmic messes and

Cosmic Mess, himself.

I almost pull a muscle trying to look positive as I left her at the Sanctum. She definitely recognized my hesitance. Finally, after a month of avoiding her I had rallied together a plucky enough attitude to be able to sit quietly in her presence. I thought maybe it had been long enough that the sight of her wouldn’t twist my heart into a million pieces.

I had been wrong of course, but since when does anything go right for me?

Didn’t matter if I was a surgeon or sorcerer, it's all the same to me, the only thing I ever botched was my love life.

AO3 Master Fic List

Surprisingly, the basilisk ends up being the high point of my day.

Wong hadn’t been kidding about a beast downtown. We portal behind a food truck, but Wong's already taken off so I'm following, but I can't see anything and I can’t hear anything unusual in the sounds of the city.

Of course, it wasn’t until I make it around the corner that the giant snake comes into view. Easily twenty feet long, green and blue, but in the light of the setting sun, the scales shone a bright turquoise, easily scaling its way down a building. It wasn't particularly girthy, so to speak. Like a very large python. Judging from the trail behind it and the way the garden balcony wilted and died as it slithered through, the poisonous energy it radiated wasn’t purely an aesthetic choice.

I guess this thing isn’t in a very good mood.

"How does a supernatural snake even find its way to Greenwich Village?"

"Don't look in its eyes," Wong ordered bluntly.

I tear my wandering gaze away, the glimpse of the snake’s striking golden lamp-like eyes filling my body with adrenaline.

"What's it going to do?” I joke, watching the snake tongue flickering in the air as it tasted the rich, smog-heavy scents of the city. “Turn me to stone?"

"Probably."

"Awesome. Awesome."

"Any ideas?"

"What did the kid in Harry Potter do?"

"I haven't seen it."

Great, because how could this day possibly get any worse? Hmm, what would Stark say if he was here? Probably, ‘you got this Steve Urwin.’

There are times in life when having a photographic memory really sucks (like when you walk in on your college roommate getting pounded by his lit professor, not speaking from personal experience or anything) but it sure is helpful when it comes to situations like this, where you needed to quickly recall everything you’ve ever read about a monster. Preferably, before it eats you.

Basilisk… name originates from the Greek form 'basilískos', meaning ‘little king’. According to Naturalis Historia, by the questionable Pliny the Elder, this thing is supposed to be tiny, spanning the width of two adult hands. He was right about the trails of scorching poison at least.

The snake is making its way down the building towards the sidewalk, where the people are. Together, Wong and I jog underneath it and try to encourage it down without looking in its eyes, which is easier said than done. The bonus however, the crowd parts. They walk around the two crazy men yelling at nothing.

Pliny had claimed that the smell of a weasel was enough to kill a basilisk.

“Dammit, fresh out of weasels,” I finish aloud. "Shit."

Suddenly the snake drops into a large coil on the concrete. Wong and I are saved by our reflexes, but before I try to trap it with magic the snake squeezes itself between a tree and a garbage can, knocking the can over in the process, trash spilling all over the pavement. The rolling receptacle is narrowly avoided by a suit talking into an ear piece. No one was gawking at the beast, no one even seemed to notice it.

“Even a New Yorker would take a second glance at a basilisk,” I muse. When I check, I can only see the snake with my third eye. "They can't see it."

It isn’t uncommon for normal people to miss magic even when they are literally surrounded by it every day. Most people’s brains can’t process it without developing trauma from the experience, so the prefrontal cortex tends to filter out the stuff you can't explain.

Even if the people around us haven’t noticed the snake, we can, and judging from the way it steadied its head to examine us, it finally gave us the time of day. The snake hisses and slithers off down the street.

“For fuck’s sake,” I groan. Moons of Munnopor, I’m an idiot. I hadn’t let my lack of sleep get this bad on purpose, but even I have to admit that going a month without sleeping wasn’t the smartest idea, but my cognitive reasoning was impaired. Thank Agamotto for Declaran Energy Elixirs and caffeine.

The New Yorkers are oblivious to the jade green monster sliding on its belly amongst them, but they sure can see the two men in robes and a cloak. To avoid mass-panic, using magic to trap this thing was a no-go until we can find a private place where passersby won’t be in the line of fire. There are some positives that come from the public's inability to see the snake though, it rendered the snakes

I jog carefully after it, trying not to let it out of my sight, but no matter how close I manage to get, it was always just quick enough to evade me, and it doesn't taken me long to lose track of how many blocks we ran just trying to catch the beast. It's been forever since I last went for a run and I can feel the burn.

The snake slows only once on our journey, pausing to swallow a pigeon whole. The feathers of the bird are quickly regurgitated, leaving a young boy, the only person who seemed to have noticed, tugging nervously on his father’s jacket. If the boy can see the snake, then the snake can make eye contact. I take the opportunity, sprinting straight at the snake, almost getting hit by a town car as I leap into the street without looking. I ignore the horn, leaving Wong behind me to apologize.

The boy's dad, looks down confused when he realizes his kid is missing.

Shrinking back away from the snake, the boy has finally caught the attention of the animal, who slithers up to the child, rearing its head, fixing its rising gaze on his shoes, then his pants and dinosaur tee shirt and-

"Hey," I yell, waving my arms in the air. "Hey! Over here!"

I get everyone's attention, but most importantly, I get the kid's attention for a second. Long enough for the boy's father to gather him up in his arms.

The snake senses me closing in and twists into the open doors of a building. It's dragged me all the way to Clinton, and in my sleep-deprived state, my patience is wearing thin. I need to catch this thing. Bursting into the building after it, I catch a hint of emerald green as the snake disappears up the stairwell.

I really needed to take up jogging again.

The only open door from the stairwell leads tp a law office, ‘Nelson and Murdock’ said the newly-etched gilded door plate, and from the sounds of the commission, the basilisk has wormed its way inside.

Cautiously, I step into the small greeting area, just as a man flies out of his office, slamming the door after him. He doesn't even take a second to breathe before he's noticed me.

“Ah, are you after the snake?” he asks, “cause it’s in there.”

"Strangely enough, I am actually after the snake, thanks."

I didn’t have time for further chat, instead opening the door to the adjacent room.

Nestled amongst moving boxes on the desk is a massive fucking snake, coiled and hissing at me. My line of sight almost catches on those golden orbs. It spits at me, but at this point in the life throwing up a shield is second nature, and thank goodness for that. The acid in its venom eats away at the box that caught the ricocheted droplets. I'm not willing to risk indirect eye contact through a reflection but...

The snake rolls its long body out, pushing the last of the steaming box off of the desk, and filling the space on top of the wood almost entirely, before rearing up to eye level.

“No you don’t.” With some concentration I thicken the shield until it is opaque, and then twist my hands, turning the shield into a two-way mirror. I can see the snake, but the snake could only see itself.

I am a genius. Problem solved, the snake will see it's own reflection and turn itself to stone.

Only the snake never stops launching its entire body against my shield.

New problem: Plan A failure, so Plan B it is (there is no Plan C).

“Hey there, little guy.” Shield stays up as I take another step closer to the beast, despite its obvious aversion to my life. Stray droplets of acid melt tiny holes in my trousers. “I need you to come with me, and if you’re not going to play nice, PETA is going to end up making a video about me for their social media. And it will go viral.”

The snake swivels attempting to go under my shield.

I do the only logical thing and summon a weasel with a portal to the woodlands and open up a hole in the shield, tossing the poor mammal at the snake.

When nothing happens I dare to look, only to find that the pigeon from earlier had only been the entrée.

Yikes, sorry weasel.

I am too tired for this. I'm to stupid when I'm sleep deprived. People depend on me. I'm an idiot.

It takes me several seconds to close the hole in my shield and in that time the snake pulls up, rearing back on its spine to stare into my eyes. The movement is so quick I can't save myself.

A prominent wave of nausea washes over me. Terrible feeling, but I feel nauseous all the time, it's part of the toll magic takes on me, so I'm a little surprised when I realize I haven't actually turned to stone.

Springing at my shield, the snake launches at me, hitting the orange, attacking again, and again, and again, and again, biting and spitting, with no regard for its own skull. I definitely do not want to see what those fangs could do to human skin.

I lengthen the shield, curving it over the head of the snake and behind it and in my state it took all my concentration just to keep the shield from disintegrating. The snake begins thrashing in every direction in an attempt to escape, but I manage to seal it on all sides. The dome reducing in size until the snake was forced to coil tightly on the desk, subdued.

“Hello there,” I sigh, finally safe enough to approach the animal. I press my palm against the curved pane of magic.“Where did you come from?”

But in response the snake just bares its fangs at me.

A moment passes, before I am rouses by the sound of voices in the reception area, and Wong, who was breathing heavily, joined me in the office.

“You couldn’t let me know where you’d gone?” he snapped, irritated.

“Had a job to do.”

Wong sighed impatiently, but stepped forward to examine the creature. “It’s a baby.”

“So that’s why it didn’t turn me to stone when I looked in its eyes.”

“You- I told you not to do that!”

“Eyes are the windows to the soul, and we were bonding, Wong. I think it likes me.”

The snake hisses on cue.

"You could have been killed-" Wong started.

"I know, I know."

“Oh, good,” owner of the office, the man from earlier, steps into the room, hands nonchalantly slung inside his pockets. “You got it! I really didn’t want to deal with that thing myself. You make a hell of an animal control.”

I process the man’s dark sunglasses and, with a start, realize that he is blind. In the face of all the New Yorkers that hadn’t seen a giant snake weaving through them, of course it was a blind man who had noticed it.

"Thanks, I'm volunteering for the local shelter."

"Local shelter has robes and cloaks as their uniform?" I barely have time to look confused before he taps his ear, adding, "I can actually hear the extra fabric when you move."

"Huh."

Wong lets out a noise like a deflating balloon from where he stands studying the snake. “Strange, we have to get home. Now.”

I looked at him, eyebrows raised, “I don’t think-”

"The snake is from Svartálfar."

"Remind me where that is again-?"

“This is a juvenile Svartálfar Basilisk, it can only have come by way of Asgard,” Wong interrupts, muttering some incantation that I can't hear over the sound of blood in my ears.

The snake was a diversion.

Without a word to the man from the office, I use my sling-ring to create a portal, on the other side of which was the house’s foyer.

The Sanctum Sanctorum felt empty of people. Something was wrong.

I called her name, and called it again and again, louder each time, but I was met with nothing but silence. I checked all the common areas of the house by teleportation, eventually finding a trail of magic from the library.

According to the laws of Mystic Arts, all magic and magical beings leave a residue behind, a vestige like some esoteric GPS tracker. I could feel her where her magical trail lingered in the library, probably from our earlier translation exercise, but there was a fresh trail laid over it and it reeked of the Prince of Asgard.

The trail led upstairs, but I came to a grinding halt outside of her room, empty, the door wide open. Dread began to seep into my blood as I noted the remnants of Loki's seidr hanging like a fog in the air, the spot on the floor containing textbook shards of telepathy magic. What had he done to her?

“She’s not here,” Wong was at my side in seconds, the basilisk forgotten.

"Her trail of magic leads here," I say, "it doesn't leave this room." Everything is very far away right now. "But she is not here."

I’m an idiot, my mind begins to whir uncomfortably; considering every possibility. I left her alone. Alone with him. He created a diversion- what could he want with her? I can barely think over the rush of expletives in my thoughts.

A presence behind us shifts, and Wong and I both turn ready to fight, rings of orange around our wrists.

From the shadows of the room, Loki steps into view, hands raised in peace.

“Where is she?” My sentence slid through my teeth.

Loki, being faux cheerful, ignores my question, “Strange, how did your mission go?”

“Where is she?”

I begin to step towards him, prepared to force an answer if needed, but Loki steps back a few paces with a defeat-ridden gesture.

“She left, about an hour ago,” Loki offers the information like he might actually be remorseful. “I thought it best to let her go, she was, uh, none too pleased with me.”

“Alone?” Wong asks, voice deep.

Loki nods.

Neither Wong nor I have moved out of our defensive positions. Red. Everything around me was turning deep shades of scarlet and crimson and growing impossibly hot. “What did you do?”

The corners of Loki’s mouth tug downward. “Recently I was visiting… an acquaintance, Nightmare. Anyway, while I was in the Dream Dimension, Nightmare received a report from one of the dream construction sites about a foreign dream, forced into the network-”

“All dreams originate from the network,” I interrupt, “get to the point.”

“Normally, yes. With some persuasion Nightmare mentioned that there had been a series of dreams transplanted into the network from some outside source. Odd. He’d never had a problem before.”

My gut knows where Loki is going with this, and all my hot anger shifts until I was frozen in my spot. I could have been swallowed up by the ground and I wouldn’t have been able to stop it.

“So I asked him just who had been the recipient of these dreams, and when he said it was you, well, it piqued my interest.”

Heat swept across my face, and I watch as his eyes zero in on it, like a predator stalking its prey.

The grin from the god reveals white, straight teeth. He was ancient. He had been navigating these kinds of power plays for a thousand years, and Loki knew that he had shifted the power. Sacred Vishanti, Deathless Vishanti, protect me. Loki knows about my dreams.

There was no reason Loki had needed to report to me upon landing in the city to catch his prisoner… if he even had a prisoner to catch. A trick, it had all been a trick.

“So, you went into her mind to see if she had any knowledge of these dreams, but she didn’t,” I spat. The way that he had looked at her that day… Under normal circumstances I might have rolled my eyes, said a little quip and portalled the bastard to kingdom come, but I just froze, like I was frozen now. I remember being annoyed. I remember a flash of insecurity when Loki spoke with her, the way he looked at her like she was something to be stolen, something to be fucked. I remember the strong desire to beat him to death for it.

Loki nods. “She doesn’t know, I didn’t reveal your secret to her."

There it was, I suppose, conformation that she isn't behind these dreams. Nightmares.

"Really, you should thank me!”

“Stop speaking, Laufeyson.” Wong’s deep voice is the only thing anchoring me to the realm at this moment. “Why are you doing this? The snake, forcing yourself into her mind- I assume she was not willing.”

The dream I'd had the night after she and Loki had met had been one of the worst nightmares I had faced. Worse then anything I had seen even in real life. I had watched her die - not for the first time - but it had been so violent, so sharp and in focus and real. Slaughtered in her bed, and I was unable to stop it, unable even, to look away. Torture.

“Very few are awarded their soulmate on such a silver platter, Strange. Not only did you manage to discover her, you’ve been dreaming of her since before you even met.”

When I awoke from that dream, I couldn't stop my body from moving, and then I was halfway down the hall, padding shirtless and with bare feet, and then outside her door with my palm against the handle when I hear it. Gentle breathing. It had just been a dream. Just like the others.

There was a moment of silence, and then the dam broke, the rage courses like a floor through me; thrashing through me like the snake Loki planted; and in parallel to those minutes after I had awoken from my dream, I was mobilized.

“And you stayed here so I could kill you?” I hiss, releasing a wave of magic that should have blasted Loki back to the icy wasteland from whence he came.

The magic ripples right through him.

“I did not stay,” Loki replied, the illusion flickering, “but she interests me, and for her own safety, I thought it best to let you know.”

I haven’t slept in a month because every time I blink I find her mangled form behind my eyelids. Had Loki influenced that dream subconsciously? Perhaps Loki, himself, was involved in the dreams productions?

"Be gone, giant."

Loki looked as though me might hiss at me, himself, but a movement from Wong banishes Loki's visage.

“Don’t think about the dreams right now,” Wong mutters, as though I could push them from my mind at will. “We’ve got to go find her.”

Outside, we split up, both going in different directions to cover more ground. There was no trail. Nothing to indicate where she had gone. Nothing, period. It was like her magic had retreated deeply within herself, traumatized from Loki's violation. Wong and I had agreed to meet back in two hours at 11pm to regroup.

It feels impossible. The natural magic already present in the city is making it even harder to find her trail.

Deep breath, my inner voice commands. Find her, then panic.

My tracking spell bounces back to me like some preternatural form of echolocation, and there is nothing on it to indicate that it had found her.

If she’s hurt, I am going to lock Loki in the basement and let my friend down there enjoy him.

My mind replays the signature of magic I had found in her room. I can read it, I know he had trapped her against the floorboards of her bedroom, I know that he restrained her-

I grit my teeth. Stay calm. Just think about finding her.

Using a location incantation, I call to her in my mind, the basis for the spell centered around a memory of her, and I search for her magic, like I had done those months ago when I had sensed it walking past the museum. We’d chatted briefly, with me pretending to have an interest in Babylonian art, but I had been truly starstruck. In front of me was the woman I had dreamt about for half a year, and she was real, not just a trick of an ill mind.

This time the spell lets me know, that she is still far, but I am moving in the right direction, the trail fading in and out. I portal now, following the trail, uncaring of how the people around me react.

If she’s hurt, it’s your fault, the thought pierced through my concentration and the incantation breaks, forcing me to start over. She’ll never want you now, Stephen. How would you feel if you found out your soulmate, someone who was supposed to love you, had left you alone with a wolf? I start the spell again. You fell for Loki’s trick and now you’re paying the price. I start again. Hope she hasn’t been kidnapped, between the concerning lack of magic, and the probably disorientation, she wouldn't stand a chance. Some freak probably followed her into an alley. You hold back when you train her to fight, Stephen, you disadvantaged her in a real fight. You’ll be lucky to find her alive. This time I stop when I start again, pressing my hand against the brick of a building, something to ground my mind amongst its panic. If she only knew, knew that your dreams had made you search for her, that finding her in the museum hadn’t been a coincidence, she’d be horrified. You moved her in with you to keep her safe while you figured this out, but maybe it was you that she needed to be protected from. Images of the last dream flashed into my mind’s eye, broken bones and blood and gore in all its glory. That oppressive, villainous evil that had been hurting her to punish me for my moral failings, physically ripped her into two pieces along the vertical access of her body, guts connecting each half.

Stop, I demand of my mind. The spell bursts outwards, unable to be contained, the wave of magic exploding from me.

The magic returns seconds later, with just the hint of her on it.

I run east.

With that, we return to our hero . . . .

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AO3 Master Fic List

[jewfrogs]

What was the place of trans people in Ancient Greece? I don’t mean myths, but accounts of irl trans people. I once read something about priests of Aphrodite whose initiation ceremony was castration and wearing women’s clothing, which could be reinterpreted through a modern lens as Ancient Greece’s version of trans women, so to speak. Perhaps even non-binarism, though I don’t believe there was basis for escaping the gender binary and the very much enforced roles in the Greek patriarchy.

this is another great question! i’m going to broaden our scope a little bit to include some discussion of rome as well, because there’s a lot of useful stuff there and the two are interlinked.

discussing trans people in any historical context is difficult, because the framework through which we understand it doesn’t exist. that isn’t to say that people who didn’t conform to their assigned gender didn’t exist (gender variance has been documented for about as long as history), but that applying modern labels and understandings to them doesn’t always work, and there’s a lot of overlap between some categories (e.g. could we understand this individual as a trans woman or as an effeminate [gay] man? what does that mean when neither of those identities are contextual during the individual’s time?). all that to say: there isn’t a lot that directly corresponds to trans people from antiquity, but there’s certainly not nothing.

one reference to trans people in ancient greece comes from lucian’s dialogue of the courtesans (c. 120-190 CE), where the character megilla/us seems to be remarkably like a trans man: “I was born a woman like the rest of you, but I have the mind and the desires and everything else of a man.” this is an excellent post that discusses this passage in depth.

according to pliny the elder, there was a noted phenomenon of women turning into men: “The change of females into males is undoubtedly no fable. We find it stated in the Annals, that, in the consulship of P. Licinius Crassus and C. Cassius Longinus, a girl, who was living at Casinum with her parents, was changed into a boy; and that, by the command of the Aruspices, he was con- veyed away to a desert island. Licinius Mucianus informs us, that he once saw at Argos a person whose name was then Arescon, though he had been formerly called Arescusa: that this person had been married to a man, but that, shortly after, a beard and marks of virility made their appearance, upon which he took to himself a wife. He had also seen a boy at Smyrna, to whom the very same thing had happened. I myself saw in Africa one L. Cossicius, a citizen of Thysdris, who had been changed into a man the very day on which he was married to a husband.” (Plin. Nat. 7.4) it seems likely that this is discussing intersex people, since pliny references them immediately before, but it is interesting to see evidence for at least some form of transition and for the acceptance of said transition—arescon has a wife! that’s pretty neat! these people seem to be fairly well-accepted, which does make one think about how transition in general might have worked or been seen.

with regards to the priests, i haven’t read about anything like that with aphrodite (although i would be remiss not to mention aphroditos here, particularly her mention in macrobius’ saturnalia), but i’m guessing you’re thinking of the galli, priests of cybele (a phrygian goddess, often correlated with rhea and with the intersex deity agdistis) as well as her lover attis (who was castrated as well—catullus 63, which i am going to write something about one day, is a retelling of their myth). they were castrated and generally wore women’s clothing, and many sources refer to them with feminine language. firmicus maternus (c. 4th century AD) said of them negant se viros esse, et non sunt <mulieres>: mulieres se volunt credi (“they deny that they are men, and are not <women>: they want to be believed as women”). there are certainly parallels that can be drawn here!

in addition, there can be a lot of blurred overlap between gay readings and trans readings. in ancient greek & roman thought, the categories of men-who-are-penetrated and women-who-penetrate (or, well... hump, since one of the latin words for these women is tribades, or “rubbers”) are almost genders in their own right, or perhaps the intersection of two genders: men-who-are-penetrated are like women but not, and women-who-penetrate are like men but not. (it can definitely be interpreted, to some extent, that these people want to be read as the opposite binary gender to the one they were assigned—which raises the question of whether we simply don’t know some of these stories because people did pass and therefore it wasn’t outwardly transgressive.)

this is probably best encapsulated by an excerpt from the fables of phaedrus (a first-century CE roman author who is supposedly adapting aesop’s work), where the question tribadas et molles mares quae ratio procreasset (what reason brought [lesbians] and [effeminate men] into existence?) is asked, and this is the answer:

The same Prometheus, creator of the clay crowd (which is broken the moment it offends fortune), had made those parts of nature which decency hides with clothing apart from the rest for the whole day. Just before he could fix the parts to the right bodies, he was suddenly invited to dinner by Liber; when he had watered his veins well with nectar, he returned home late at night on faltering feet. Then, with a half-awake mind and a drunken mistake, he applied maidenhood to a type of man and affixed masculine members to the women; thus desire now enjoys perverse joy.

there are different ways this can be read, because “applicuit virginale generi masculo” and “masculina membra applicuit feminis” can both be taken as an aetiology for either tribades or molles mares. take one: the first line refers to molles mares, making them men in body with women’s spirits, and the second line refers to tribades, making them women in body with men’s spirits. take two: the first line refers to tribades, making them men in spirit with women’s bodies, and the second line refers to molles mares, making them women in spirit with men’s bodies. these are both really interesting readings that both resonate to some extent with transness and specifically with the space in between gayness and transness.

as an example, take the figure agathon (a fictionalized portrayal of a real playwright) from aristophanes’ thesmophorizusae. agathon is notably effeminate—he’s first introduced by a character saying εγώ γαρ ουχ όρω άνδρ’ ουδέν ενθάδ’ όντα, Κυρήνην δ’ όρω (“I see no man, but I see Cyrene”, in reference to, as one commentary puts it, “a dissolute woman of the day”). that is to say: agathon is read as a woman. when another character in the thesmo needs to dress up as a woman, he doesn’t borrow a woman’s clothes—he borrows agathon’s. could we read agathon as a trans figure? perhaps! but his effeminacy is tied to him being, as the greek puts it, ευρύπρωκτος—literally “wide-assed”, but often translated simply as a certain six-letter word that starts with f. agathon isn’t a woman, exactly, but he’s not quite a man either. i wouldn’t necessarily call this in-between space trans, but i don’t know if i could call it cis either.

tl;dr: there are few depictions of people we might call trans as we understand it today from ancient greece, but there are a lot of interesting questions we can ask and consider with regards to gender that touch on transness and antique experiences analogous to modern-day trans ones. also gayness and transness are very much intertwined.

[dozingbell]

So there seems to be 2 ways of thought regarding servant speculations for the upcoming event.

Rhodopis (The slave who married the Pharaoh of Egypt and is also the earliest known variant of Cinderella) And Dust of Osiris (Sion) who interestingly enough is also a dead apostle.

The presence of Scheherazade hints at Rhodopis who is actually Nitocris or a Nitocris face. (Which would then explain why there was no Desert beauty story in summer 6)

To explain the situation simply there are "2" Rhodopis:

The one from the eponymous story where a slave girl from Naucratis has her sandal taken by an eagle and dropped on the Pharaoh who puzzled by the situation ask his soldier to look for the owner of that sandal, Rhodopis then end up being the queen of Egypt.

And then there's Rhodopis the prostitute, a character that is assumed to be the inspiration for Rhodopis. She was bought by multiple people until arriving at Naucratis where Charaxus fell in love with her and bought her freedom so that all the money she made from her profession would be hers. She then proceeded to do multiple good deeds for the temple of Delphi.

The later gave ways to multiple tale and legends including one where she is said to have caused the construction of the 3rd Pyramid leading to her amalgam with Nitocris.

There was a tale current in Greece that Rhodopis caused the construction of the third pyramid. Herodotus takes great pains to show the absurdity of the story, but it persisted and is related by Pliny the Elder as an unquestioned fact. A variant of this story is told by both Diodorus Siculus and Strabo, in which the pyramid was built by lovers of Rhodopis to be her tomb. The origin of this tale, which is unquestionably false, has been explained with great probability by Georg Zoega and Christian Charles Josias Bunsen. In consequence of the name Rhodopis, she was confounded with Nitocris, the Egyptian queen, and the heroine of many Egyptian legends, who was said by Julius Africanus and Eusebius to have built the third pyramid.

Another tale about Rhodopis related by Strabo and Aelian makes her a queen of Egypt, and thus renders the supposition of her being the same as Nitocris still more probable. It is said that as Rhodopis was one day bathing at Naucratis, an eagle took up one of her sandals, flew away with it, and dropped it in the lap of the Egyptian king, as he was administering justice at Memphis. Struck by the strange occurrence and the beauty of the sandal, he did not rest till he had found the fair owner of the beautiful sandal, and as soon as he had discovered her made her his queen. This is the Rhodopis story, famed for being the earliest Cinderella story.

_____________

Basically she is the Mab to Medb and would probably be a 5* Nitocris if that's what DW is going for.

While the possibility is small the thing with Dust of Osiris is that she fit both the queen of Dust and the Apostle of Darkness making her quite the candidate for a pretender enemy of humanity in a fairy tale a lot like Oberon. The obvious problem being that Halloween is all memes so I doubt they'd make something this heavy instead of a desert beauty meme train.

In regard to Dust of Osiris the assumption would be that she can manifest as a pseudo servant.

[to-isengard-and-back]

Yule

This is the Yule entry from my Grimoire, feel free to use or advise on things I can add!

Yule: (Dec 20-23)

Also known as winter solstice, comes from pagan Yule and heathen Jól, can be celebrated through Dec 20-31. Both Fear and joy, darkness and light.

History: https://www.learnreligions.com/history-of-yule-2562997 

Norse: “The Norse peoples, who called it Jul, viewed it as a time for much feasting and merrymaking. In addition, if the Icelandic sagas are to be believed, this was a time of sacrifice as well. Traditional customs such as the Yule log, the decorated tree, and wassailing can all be traced back to Norse origins.”

Celtic: “The Celts of the British Isles celebrated midwinter as well. Although little is known today about the specifics of what they did, many traditions persist. According to the writings of Pliny the Elder, this is the time of year in which Druid priests sacrificed a white bull and gathered mistletoe in celebration.”

Roman: “Few cultures knew how to party like the Romans. Saturnalia, which fell on December 17, was a festival of general merrymaking and debauchery held around the time of the winter solstice. This week-long party was held in honor of the god Saturn and involved sacrifices, gift-giving, special privileges for slaves, and a lot of feasting. Although this holiday was partly about giving presents, more importantly, it was to honor an agricultural god. A typical Saturnalia gift might be something like a writing tablet or tool, cups and spoons, clothing items, or food. Citizens decked their halls with boughs of greenery, and even hung small tin ornaments on bushes and trees. Bands of naked revelers often roamed the streets, singing and carousing — a sort of naughty precursor to today's Christmas caroling tradition.”

Egyptian: “Four thousand years ago, the Ancient Egyptians took the time to celebrate the daily rebirth of Ra, the god of the Sun. As their culture flourished and spread throughout Mesopotamia, other civilizations decided to get in on the sun-welcoming action. They found that things went really well... until the weather got cooler, and crops began to die. Each year, this cycle of birth, death, and rebirth took place, and they began to realize that every year after a period of cold and darkness, the Sun did indeed return.”

Myths:

“The Oak and Holly Kings: In many Celtic-based traditions of neopaganism, there is the enduring legend of the battle between the Oak King and the Holly King. These two mighty rulers fight for supremacy as the Wheel of the Year turns each season. At the Winter Solstice, or Yule, the Oak King conquers the Holly King, and then reigns until Midsummer, or Litha. Once the Summer Solstice arrives, the Holly King returns to do battle with the old king, and defeats him. In the legends of some belief systems, the dates of these events are shifted; the battle takes place at the Equinoxes, so that the Oak King is at his strongest during Midsummer, or Litha, and the Holly King is dominant during Yule. From a folkloric and agricultural standpoint, this interpretation seems to make more sense.” (https://www.learnreligions.com/holly-king-and-the-oak-king-2562991)

“The Wild Hunt is one name for a myth that’s a bit more uniquely European, and perhaps a bit more Germanic-flavored as well. A host of the dead rides through the skies, particularly during the twelve nights of yuletide, led by one or more of the gods (Often Odin or Herne), making the sounds of strong winds and storms, and taking the souls of the dead or incautious wanderers (humans and livestock) with them as they pass. Sacrifices were left to the gods of the Hunt, to ensure that no one was taken from their homes in the night.” (https://throwbackthorsday.wordpress.com/2016/12/22/yule-and-the-wild-hunt-the-living-and-the-dead/#:~:text=Yule%20is%20the%20annual%20mid,end%20of%20December%20every%20year.) 

Saint Nicholas: “Although Santa Claus is primarily based upon St. Nicholas, a 4th-century Christian bishop from Lycia (now in Turkey), the figure is also strongly influenced by early Norse religion. Saint Nicholas was known for giving gifts to the poor. In one notable story, he met a pious but impoverished man who had three daughters. He presented them with dowries to save them from a life of prostitution. In most European countries, St. Nicholas is still portrayed as a bearded bishop, wearing clerical robes. He became a patron saint of many groups, particularly children, the poor, and prostitutes.” (https://www.learnreligions.com/the-origins-of-santa-claus-2562993)

Krampus: “The word Krampus means "claw," and certain Alpine villages have big parties featuring this scary clawed incubus who hangs around with Santa Claus. The Krampus costume also includes sheepskin, horns, and a switch that the incubus uses to swat children and unsuspecting young ladies. The Krampus' job is to punish those who have been bad, while Santa rewards the people on his "nice" list.” (https://www.learnreligions.com/beware-the-krampus-2563016)

Colors: Green, Red, White, Gold

Plants: Evergreens, Holly, Ivy, Mistletoe, Birch, Oak, Yew (https://www.learnreligions.com/sacred-plants-of-the-winter-solstice-2562958)

Rituals:

Witch Balls: glass balls filled with protective objects

Yule log: log that is decorated and burned (or candles are burned on) with wishes for the new year (https://www.learnreligions.com/make-a-yule-log-2563006)

[antiquecompass]

Untamed Fall Fest 2020 Day 1

Also on Ao3 here.

Lan Sizhui had grown up surrounded by whispers. They’d followed him as a child and only increased once he’d switched to Lan Academy. He’d never enjoyed it, but he’d grown used to it--one of the costs of being who he was, where he sat in regards to his various family members. He’d been allowed to disappear into the masses at Harvard, something that still held true even now in his Sophomore Year. Whispers still occasionally followed him, but most students here didn’t know or care about his large extended family. There would always be clout-chasers coming after him--he knew that would neve stop--but for the most part, he was left alone at Harvard.

Well--mostly.

The natural laws of everything fell in the face of Jingyi’s Crew Bros and their general chaos. And while Sizhui did generally tolerate and even adore some of them, all of them, Jingyi included, had been testing the absolute bounds of his patience these past two weeks.

“Hey, Sizhui. Sizhui. Psst. Come on, don’t ignore me, Lan.” A deep sigh. “Don’t make me do it to you, bro. You know I will.”

Sizhui rolled his eyes as he kept a steady pace towards the library. He had not agreed to take part in Jingyi's little 'treasure hunt' and he refused to support it. Most of the rowers had backed off when met with Sizhui’s general silence and the indifferent stare he’d learned from his Papa.

But there would always be those fools who tempted fate and most of them were Jingyi’s closest teammates.

“Yo, Little Bun!”

Sizhui froze and turned around, staring Marquis down hard, taking pleasure in the pained smile on the other’s face. It was always nice to see the exact moment someone knew they’d fucked up.

“You did not just yell that out for everyone to hear, Mr. Barton,” Sizhui said.

“Desperate times and desperate measures, oh, Great Snack God,” Marquis said with a bow that looked far too regal for a jackass decked out in Harvard athletic gear.

“You realize you’ve just taken your life into your own hands,” Sizhui said.

“Fortune favors the bold,” Marquis countered.

“And Pliny the Elder died after uttering those words,” Sizhui said.

A small frown crossed Marquis’ face for a second, only to be replaced by a pleading smile. Some would be charmed by the natural charisma that oozed out of Marquis Barton, but Sizhui felt nothing but betrayal now, from the one Crew Bro he thought he could trust.

“Come on, Sizhui. You know I wouldn’t have done it if I wasn’t so desperate.”

Sizhui had to admit that was true. Clearly Marquis had lost his better sense. All this fuss for the past two weeks over something so simple. Over mooncakes of all things.

“You know, you can just go into Boston, go to one of my aunt’s restaurants, and place an order for her mooncakes. You are aware of this, right? Wouldn’t that be easier? Wouldn’t it be better for your sanity and dignity? Wouldn’t you rather do that, instead of tempting me to absolutely verbally eviscerate right you, right now, for all to see? ”

“I possibly didn’t think this through,” Marquis admitted as he glanced around at the students gathered in small groups under trees and on benches.

“No, you did not,” Sizhui agreed.

“And while I do apologize for yelling out your childhood nickname, in my defense, it was in that write up The Crimson did on the new generation of Lans attending Harvard.”

Sizhui still hadn’t forgiven April for that one. Damn West Coast Lans.

“And your lovely, amazing, talented, goddess of an aunt doesn’t sell the snowskin ones to the public. Jingyi says that’s only for family and he’s the one who got us hooked on them last year and is now holding the entire batch your aunt made for us hostage.”

Hostage was a strong term. He had, in fact, placed them in a treasure chest lunch box he’d found in the basement and then shoved that into their extra freezer. The current treasure hunt was more about Jingyi enjoying a bit of a power trip, but honestly, anyone with half a brain could figure out they were stored at the house.

Of course, hungry Crew Bros and common sense didn’t always go together.

Though, to be fair, Jingyi had set up a booby-trapped obstacle course leading from the garage door to the extra freezer, so maybe it was a good thing none of them had tried to break into the house yet.

“I still fail to see why I should help you win,” Sizhui said.

“Remember last year when you thought they were all joking about dumping you into the Charles as a form of some sort of ritualistic victory celebration?” Marquis asked. "I led the veto on that. And won."

Sizhui knew Jingyi had lied to him when he asked about how Sizhui would react in such a purely hypothetical situation.

Sizhui pulled out his phone and sent Marquis a text with his Dad’s number.

“Look, I don’t know how the traps were set up,” he said. “But Dad helped and if you’re willing to trade him your entire life story, he’ll probably tell you how to disarm everything. No guarantees, it depends on what kind of mood he’s in, but he’s also done some truly idiotic things in order to hoard my aunt’s cooking for himself, so try your best to appeal to his Food Craving Induced Stupidity.”

“I know you just insulted me,” Marquis said as he started tapping away on his phone, “but I love your right now, bro. You sure Jingyi won’t be pissed you’re destroying his power trip?”

Sizhui shrugged. “It’s what he gets for turning our basement into a Rube Goldberg machine without even consulting me first.”

**********

The moon was high in the sky as Sizhui drove home. A blinding bright, waxing moon. Almost full and glorious enough to cause him to pause as he got out of his car.

He was pulled out of his moment of admiration by his phone.

“Papa?” he asked. “Is everything okay?”

“I’ve misplaced your father,” Papa said. “Or rather he’s misplaced himself. He left me a note telling me he was ‘going on an adventure,’ and while that is not uncommon, his adventures usually end before dinnertime.”

“His car isn’t here, but that doesn’t mean he’s not. Let me check the house. One of Jingyi’s teammates asked for his help earlier.”

“On some sort of quest, yes” Papa said. “That was in his added post-script.”

“When is his next draft due?” Sizhui asked. Dad always grabbed on to anything distracting he could find when a draft was post-due.

“Last Tuesday,” Papa said.

They shared a laugh as Sizhui walked into the house. There in the living room was his father and Marquis, both passed out in mooncake induced food comas.

“Found him,” Sizhui said. “At least Marquis shared the treasure with him. Or Dad demanded part of it as a finder’s fee.”

Papa laughed. “I suspected as much. I’m almost there. I just needed to confirm if he was with your or haunting your dear aunt’s kitchen.”

“I’ll see you soon, Papa.”

“Love you, Little Bun,” Papa said before ending the call.

Sizhui barely had time to pocket his phone before Jingyi came barreling through the door.

“Aren’t you supposed to be in class?” Sizhui asked.

“I was, but when I checked the video feed for the basement--”

“--You set up a video feed?”

“I found that I’ve been betrayed. By my own father-in-law!”

“We’re still not married yet,” Sizhui said. “And how did you get out of class?”

“Family emergency,” Jingyi said.

“Jingyi!”

“Don't 'Jingyi' me. This is clearly an emergency. My trust has been broken. The bond has been shattered. The torth has been--”

“I was the one who told Marquis to call Dad,” Sizhui cut him off.

“You?” Jingyi asked. He gasped, with hand held to his chest. “My heart? My soul? Did this to me?”

“Your heart and your soul is very tired of our home being used for your little schemes, especially when you fail to consult him first,” Sizhui said. “But he’s willing to forgive you if you turn your very nicely toned ass around and go pick up something for dinner. Papa’s on his way and will certainly be hungry, even if he won’t admit to it. You know his good manners won't allow him to refuse food we've paid for. It's the least you could do, after causing so much trouble.”

Jingyi shook his head. “Wait,” he said, holding up a hand. “How did the blame for all of this suddenly get shifted on to me?”

“Fried chicken will be good,” Sizhui said as he pushed Jingyi out the door. “Get a large salad for Papa.”

“But--”

“And pick up some Tums for Dad. You know he’s going to need them.”

“Sizhui--”

“Love you,” Sizhui said. He pecked Jingyi’s cheek and then closed the door in his adorably confused face.