A collage exploring the alepole tradition. At left and top right are 17th-century-style illustrations of alepoles and hanging ale signs, showing poles and suspended greenery used to signal ale for sale. At centre and bottom are close photographs of ivy, one climbing tree bark and one rimed with frost, linking the practice with evergreen plant lore. Illustrated sources from The History of Signboards by Jacob Larwood and John Camden Hotten (1866).

In old England, an ale-pole or ale-stake, set like a flagpole or suspended outside an inn, marked that fresh ale was on sale. Often dressed with ivy, long linked to Bacchus, the Roman god of drink and revelry, it called passers-by to stop and share the cheer 🍺
#FolkloreSunday

A small film of spring flowers from my garden because we recover from stress 60% more quickly when we look at plants & if we find them beautiful our brains release dopamine, lifting mood. Pause for a few moments to help your synaptic soup 🌿🧠:

The Piper (Pan) looks out at us while holding his pipes, a baby otter between his hooves.

‘‘Afraid?’ murmured the Rat, his eyes shining with unutterable love. ‘Afraid! Of HIM? O, never, never! And yet — and yet — O, Mole, I am afraid!’’ — Kenneth Grahame, ‘The Wind in the Willows’ (1908) #WyrdWednesday

🎨Arthur Rackham, ‘The Piper at the Gates of Dawn’ (1939)

And here is the river Acheron, if you were wondering about a trip to Hades!

Episode 2 of Divine Fury is out tomorrow, if you want to join me…

A black goat against a black background.

In Robert Eggers’ 2015 film ‘The Witch,’ the goat named Black Phillip tempts Thomasin by asking, ‘Wouldst thou like to live deliciously?’ #WyrdWednesday

A black-furred pwca in a tree. Illustration by Tony DiTerlizzi.

The pwca is the black-furred Welsh version of the pooka - a forest goblin trickster. Sometimes a pwca uses a magic candle to lead travelers off the path, and other times a pwca transforms into a black animal, such a horse, and entices travelers to chase it.
🎨Tony DiTerlizzi
#FairyTaleTuesday

Oh, YES!
To Yamyam and Biscuit then. 🍻

Wyrdlings!

"But I like animals better than the best people," said Doctor Dolittle & since it’s his creator Hugh Lofting's 140th birthday, falling on the Feast of the Ass – yes, that was a thing in the Middle Ages – it’s:

“Talking Animals!”

as this week’s #WyrdWednesday topic.
Heehaw!

Work in progress of a hand painted map of ancient Oxfordshire

I’m making great progress on my latest #painting: a hand painted #map of the main #megalithic sites in #Oxfordshire.

I have literally no idea why I didn’t paint this yeeeears ago.

#workinprogress #standingstones #ancientstonebothering #StandingStoneSunday #stonecircles @megalithic.bsky.social

Elementary School Choir Sings the Grateful Dead’s “Ripple,” “Box of Rain,” “Brokedown Palace” & More: RIP Bob Weir Down in Austin, Texas, music teacher Gavin Tabone leads the Barton Hills Choir, made up of 3rd- through 6th-grade students.

Elementary School Choir Sings the Grateful Dead’s “Ripple,” “Box of Rain,” “Brokedown Palace” & More: RIP Bob Weir

Is your dissertation available online?

Colour portrait photo of a man dressed as The Green Man. Emerald green face paint, holly with red berries on his head and cover his shoulders, katkins dangle in front of his face. Ivy leaves are stuck to his face. The background is very dark and the head and shoulders of the figure are lit by direct sunlight.

Photos from Twelfth Night Wassailing on the Southbank, London, organised by The Lions Part theatre group. The Holly Man.

Look at my baby! ☺️

I reedited Modole folk stories published 110 years ago

Old journals and archives are full of story collections in underdocumented languages, often difficult or impossible to access for both linguists and the speaker community. Using legacy material is valuable and sustainable 🙌🏻

Fenrir wants to hold Tyr’s hand (courtesy of Gustave Doré).

The University of Vienna is offering 40 pre-doctoral positions in the humanities, social sciences, and cultural studies. Anyone interested can find more information here. Otherwise, please forward this post.
careers.univie.ac.at/en/praedoc/p...

Painting of a snow-covered city.

View of Oudenaarde in Winter, Edmond Van de Vyvere (1880-1950).

I’m so sorry 🥺 he reminded me of my childhood hamster Yamyam. RIP Big Man, hope you have all the nuts to stuff your cheeks in hamsterheaven.

Bleak winter landscape of a frozen, snow-covered field stretching toward two distant stands of bare trees. In the foreground, a shaggy black, dog-like creature crouches low in the snow, its glowing eyes fixed forward. Sparse grass blades and a trail of footprints mark the icy surface, heightening the sense of eerie solitude.

“The hard snow held me, save where now and then
One foot went through. The view was all in lines
Straight up and down of tall slim trees”

(Robert Frost)

🎨 anihilova

“My colleagues are calling from downstairs, troopers are getting out from their tanks with guns and weapons, entering our building…” On 13 January 1991, Lithuanian TV presenter Eglė Bučelytė remains on air in a locked studio as Soviet troops storm the TV station

Diocletian (284-305), the emperor who created the Tetrarchy (rule by four emperors).

From Nicomedia (İzmit), now at Istanbul Archaeological Museums

Part of the Neolithic stone circle at Castlerigg, near Keswick in Cumbria. Constructed in around 3000 BC, Castlerigg is one the earliest stone circles in Britain. 📸 My own. #StandingStoneSunday #Prehistory #Cumbria #Castlerigg

The window drew inspiration from the book 'Cuthbert and the Animals 'by John Mc Manners & the Lindisfarne Gospels. So two otters link to “The Tale of the Affectionate Sea Otters” who were reputed to have warmed and dried Cuthbert's feet after a night of him meditating and praying whilst standing in the sea. The Celtic knotwork border is influenced by designs in the Lindisfarne Gospels.

St Cuthbert’s Church, Crayke, North #Yorkshire

“St Cuthbert” window (2020)
#HelenWhittaker

The detail shows the Tale of the Affectionate Sea Otters who were reputed to have warmed & dried Cuthbert's feet after a night of him meditating & praying whilst standing in the sea.

#StainedGlassSunday

Today in 1863 the world's first underground railway opened in London.
Photos via Michael Rosen #Underground #London #Railways

A stone sculpture displayed in a museum gallery, carved from rough brown rock.The figure is front-facing and stylized, with a rounded top, deeply incised facial features, and symmetrical patterns resembling eyes, nose, hands, and legs. Lines on the cheeks can be seen, as well as a pendant and a belt.. The surface is textured and weathered.

For #StandingStoneSunday a #Neolithic human-shaped stela with a necklace and a belt, found in La Serre, Aveyron (#France). The lines on the cheeks are interpreted as facial #tattoos or scars. Dating 3000-2500 BC. In the late neolithic period several cultures living....🧵 1/2

🏺 #archaeology

📷 me

My photo collage shows five cylindrical Minoan cups each with a single handle and a slightly flaring rim. Each cup is decorated with a different geometric polychrome motif as follows: Top left: on a black background, a central band delineated by an upper and lower white line contains evenly-spaced dark-orange circles, each orange circle is outlined by a white line. Above and below the central band are swirling white vine-like lines. Top right: on a black background, a large white spiral on the front of the cup and beside it a dark-orange oval with stylised white petals at each end which looks like a wrapped sweet! Middle left: a central band of white and dark orange diagonal lines runs around the cup. Above and below the central band are alternating black and white diagonal shapes, the black ones look like shark fins Bottom left: a central reddish-orange band delineated with a white line. Above the central band are swirling, spiralling white lines against a black background, and below the central band are alternating white and black diagonal lines. Bottom right: all set against a black background. A central band delineated with white lines contains white ‘s’-shaped diagonal white stripes. Above the central band a row of red dots outlined with white circles. Below the central band a single white line on the black background. This type of Minoan pottery is known as Kamares Ware, named after the Kamares Cave on Mount Ida on the Greek island of Crete where this kind of pottery was first discovered. Kamares Ware vessels were luxury items produced by palace workshops at Phaistos and Knossos on Crete. These five cups were excavated at Phaistos and are dated 1800-1700 BC.

Something lovely for the weekend!

Minoan cups made by Bronze Age potters some 3,800 years ago!

Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Crete 📷 by me

#Archaeology

An Otter going about its business (swimming, diving, eating fish) on the River Clyde, east of Glasgow Green. If you watch to the end you'll get some other bonus fishing-beasts from the Clyde.

Brit pop demon hunters where the barrier that prevents the demons coming through is called the wonderwall.

And one of the Gallaghers and Damon Albarn fall in love.

Is this a thing?

Stoke Row community unite to bring unique treasure to the Oxfordshire Museum An early medieval treasure hoard is now in the hands of Oxfordshire County Council’s museum service to go on display following a successful fundraising campaign by residents in Stoke Row.Dating back t...

A hoard of 21 silver pennies, dating back to the mid-7th to 8th centuries, has been saved for Oxfordshire’s museums following a successful community fundraiser. Villagers from Stoke Row, together with local businesses, raised £1,300 to acquire the treasure. news.oxfordshire.gov.uk/stoke-row-co...

Iran is seeing some of the most serious protests since 1979. Assessing what is actually happening is extremely difficult: internet and phones are down; Starlink is being jammed, thanks (presumably) to tools from allies 1/6

Hey, thanks! Really enjoyed the thread.