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aerkame · 3 months

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Is there perhaps an explanation as to why Finfolk are so obsessed with silver? I tried to look up information online but can’t seem to find an answer.

I could not find an answer myself, it seems to just be a thing with them. Much like how dragons have hoards, fairies love kidnapping mortals, goblins having greed, the list goes on with characteristics in folklore creatures that are not explained.

Some of them could probably just be symbolism like how the dragon hoard in Beowulf cursed humans to turn into greedy dragons themselves. I wouldn't doubt it really. One of the stories (well two, but one only mentioned it) had Christian symbolism in the form of crosses that could ward off finmen from kidnapping women. They would paint a cross on their chest or hold onto a silver cross around their wrist and the women were warned to never turn their back towards the ocean, letting their guard down.

But aside from that, I really don't know. It might be symbolism for something but it is interesting as the folklore is from Orkney but has Christian influence sprinkled in SOME stories that I read.

Bit of a history/folklore rant

The cross on the chest thing really does remind me of unicorns (the original, not modernized ones). Unicorns are also Christian /English folklore creatures that were seen as wild, untamable, magestic beasts that could only be calmed by the innocent or pure of heart. It was said that they lay their heads on the chest of pure women, which is something that is often seen in some folklores that involved Christian values or had influences. I personally think this is because of how the soul was viewed back then. A lot of people always thought of the heart and soul as everything to the person and not the brain like today. So it would make sense that it was seen that the chest/breast (where the soul and heart of a person is) of an innocent woman was extremely precious and needed to be protected from evil or harm. (Fun fact: This is also why everyone always went for the chest in battle. A stab or shot to the chest was considered instant death, not the head.)

I would like to note that when talking about folklore, I tend to lean towards learning from OLD English times. They have some really interesting things to learn about and some of the folklore is just so fun to get into. Also old unicorns were really badass looking. So strong, so beautiful.

In case you couldn't tell, I really love history and folklore.

#welcome home #welcome home finfolk au #welcome home au #finfolk #folklore #folklore history #history #just for fun

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prokopetz · 5 months

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The funniest thing about all the speculation regarding the origins of the Bigfoot myth is that we know where it came from. It was a prank carried out by a guy named Ray Wallace who vandalised a couple of logging camps in California in 1958 while wearing fake feet to conceal his identity. They literally found his collection of giant wooden feet in his basement after he died in 2002, his involvement has been corroborated by multiple accomplices, and the timing of the incidents precisely lines up with when interest in Bigfoot exploded in American popular culture. We've known all this for twenty years, and everybody just quietly ignores it because it's no fun, I guess.

#history #folklore #cryptids #bigfoot #cryptozoology #death mention

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illustratus · 6 months

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Enid and Geraint by Rowland Wheelwright

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lilis-palace · 4 months

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🍷 FOLKLORE - Konyha Set Pt1 🥧🍴

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#ts4 cc #ts4 buy cc #ts4 historical cc #ts4 maxis match #ts4 maxis mix #FOLKLORE #ts4 historical #ts4 history challenge

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fallbabylon · 9 months

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Gravestone with memento mori- Newcastle Cathedral, UK

#gothic #memento mori #goth #skull #history #grave #gravestones #graveyard #dead #folklore #folk horror #cemetery #taphophilia #crossbones #skull and cross bones #newcastle

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rongzhi · 10 months

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A look at a few mythological beings from 山海经, Classic of Mountain and Sea, compiled beginning around 500 BC with the earliest remaining finished version existing by 200 BC.

Right column graphics created by me, translating the left and adding a few more details.

#chinese folklore #arts #chinese mythology #text #kind of different from what i normally do i guess!#chinese history #mine #if you see any typos in this no you don't bc i didn't either

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nesyanast · 4 months

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Scene from the most famous Yiddish play The Dybbuk by the Vilner Trupe. 1910s.

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kriskukko · 4 months

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leppä

#thinking about history nature folklore and cultural significance of trees #and how the flesh of alder trees turns reddish when exposed to air #medieval fantasy

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trupowieszcz-moved · 4 months

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fun facts about (polish) vampire folklore because i'm too autism

(disclaimer: my source for all of this is the book "Upiór. Historia naturalna" by Łukasz Kozak i'm not pulling this out of my ass)

The word "vampire" came from a mistranscribed Serbian word, written down by Austrian officials informing about a panic among the locals, who claimed that during a plague their dead were rising and biting them and spreading the plague further

In Poland, the words used to describe what later transformed into a "vampire" in literature were: upiór (and variations thereof - the word came from Ukrainian, and the Ukrainians got it from Turkish "ubyr"), strzyga (f)/strzygoń (m) and wieszczy (m)/wieszczyca (f). "Upiór" was used in the southeast, "strzyga" around the central regions, "strzygoń" (as well as strzyga) specifically in Lesser Poland (Małopolska) and "wieszczy" in Greater Poland (Wielkopolska) and in Kashubia. "Wąpierz" was not a word until some writer in the 19th century made it up!

The upiór actually very rarely drank blood. It happened, sure, but a much more bloodthirsty creature was zmora/mara. However, upiory often drank milk, stealing it from cows and horses. Both are life-giving bodily fluids, after all.

The above might make you think about witches, who were often blamed with stealing or spoiling milk, and you wouldn't be far off. You see, you had to be born as an upiór (these ones weren't contagiously biting!), and while you were alive, it would give you various magical powers, like clairvoyance and detecting the dead upiory, and so the upiór was practically a synonym of a sorcerer or witch. Of course, the sources vary, but depending on who you asked, they could control weather bringing heavy rains or droughts, see the future, know literally everything and so on. Those so-called "living vampires" knew who they were since birth and were often helpful, until they died.

After an upiór died, that's when the bad things happened. They disappeared from their graves, destroyed churches, broke candles, brought plague upon the people, scared their neighbors, and if one puffed in your face, you would soon die. They were said to be able to walk around with their decapitated head, so anti-vampiric burials often had to be very thorough and decapitation wasn't enough.

The signs that were supposedly telling of a living vampire were, among others: being born with teeth, being born in a caul, not having armpit or pubic hair BUT having a hairy chest, not having undergone confirmation (i'll come back to that in a moment), having a very red face and easily and often blushing (not being pale!), or being born with a deformed foot.

Not having participated in the confirmation sacrament was especially damning, because it was believed that upiory had two souls (and two hearts). When they were baptized, only one soul was being saved, and the confirmation sacrament was supposed to protect the second soul. This, of course, was extremely against the catechism, so the first "official", church-related sources recording those beliefs had to invent another "backstory" for upiory, and they claim that an upiór is a dead person specifically, who was given to the devil at birth, the baptism saving their soul, but their body still belonging to the dark forces, which was why they rose from their graves - the devil basically hijacked their corpses.

I won't make this post much longer but I will GLADLY answer any questions because this is my special interest and I just came back from an exhibition where the author of the aforementioned book talked about all of that so. me right now ⬇️ (readmore so you dont get continuously blased with the gif under it)

#vampires #history #folklore #poland

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lionofchaeronea · 3 months

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The Snow Maiden, Viktor Vasnetsov, 1899

#art #art history #Viktor Vasnetsov #genre painting #genre art #Snow Maiden #snegurochka #Russian folklore #fairy tales #Russian fairy tales #Russian art #19th century art #oil on canvas #Tretyakov Gallery

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bigfootboyband · 6 months

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As Halloween approaches, I’ve been seeing many very talented makeup artists recreate the face of the bride in Tim Burton’s “The Corpse Bride.” I thought this would be a good oppertunity to make some art and remind one and all that the “The Corpe Bride” (known in some tellings as “The Finger” or “The Demon in the Tree”) is a beloved Jewish folktale. Folklorist Howard Schwartz traces the orgins of “The Finger” to 16th century Levant. Aftrer hundreds of years of retelling, the story, like all folktales, has undergone many iterations and also became highly informed by the violence of life in the Pale of Settlement (specifically towards women and young brides).

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