Week 14 Reading: Dante's Inferno Part A

 

 

Layers of Hell

 

The Gate of Hell and Charon

Charon, the ferryman of the Acheron

carries souls of the newly deceased across the river Styx 

A coin to pay Charon for passage, usually an obolus or danake, was sometimes placed in or on the mouth of a dead person

Some authors say that those who could not pay the fee, or those whose bodies were left unburied, had to wander the shores for one hundred years, until they were allowed to cross the river

Limbo

The First Circle: Limbo - The Heathens

 Virtuous pagan is a concept in Christian theology that addressed the problem of pagans who were never evangelized and consequently during their lifetime had no opportunity to recognize Christ, but nevertheless led virtuous lives, so that it seemed objectionable to consider them damned.

Prominent examples of virtuous pagans are Heraclitus, Parmenides, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Trajan, and Virgil. Dante Alighieri, in his Divine Comedy, places a number of virtuous pagans in the first circle of Hell (analogous to Limbo), including Homer, Horace, Ovid, and Lucan.

Bibliography: 

Dante's Inferno

Week 13 Reading: English Tales Part 2

 

Source.

Mr. Fox

Mr. Fox - Devious, homicidal, 

Lady Mary - Curious, brave, bold, but not too bold

 

 

LADY MARY was young, and Lady Mary was fair. She had two brothers, and more lovers than she could count.

Lady Mary gets around

She's brave, and curious.

Oh Mr. Fox isn't an actual Fox. Hm.

Lady Mary likes Mr. Fox the best and they agree to get married. She's weirded out by his not letting her see his castle. But he surely has one, no?

She found his castle

Be Bold, Be Bold. - Isn't that from The Faerie Queen?

Oh this is just like Rebecca 👀

Mr. Fox is killing dames

oh my god lol

he got his I suppose

Week 13 Reading: English Tales Part 1

 

Source

The Rose Tree Notes:

Little girl - murdered by stepmother. Beautiful, golden hair and sweet demeanor. 

Brother - loves his sister. Very sad when she's murdered

Father - absent 

Stepmother - Evil. Murders little girl out of jealousy. 

 

My wicked mother slew me
My dear father ate me,
My little brother whom I love
Sits below, and I sing above
Stick, stock, stone dead.

 

Bird gathers items by singing this song.  Father and brother go outside and receive shiny items. Stepmother is tricked into going outside, and the bird drops a millstone on her head.

 revenge

Bibliography: Laura Gibbs; https://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/p/weeks-12-13.html

Week 12 Reading: Faerie Queen Part 2

Source

 

 

Enchanted Chamber

Fancy Desire Doubt Danger Fear Hope Dissembling Suspicion Grief Fury Displeasure Pleasure Spire Cruelty

Amoret

Duessa 

Ate Mother of Strife

Sir Scudamore

WHAT THE HECK HAPPENED TO AMORET?????

Week 12: Reading Faerie Queen Part A

 

Faerie Queene. Source.

Characters

Britomart - Fell Sir Guyon with an enchanted spear. Fell in love with the image of Artegall. Beats the heck outta some knights. Wins a fair maiden.

Sir Guyon - Travels with King Arthur.

Malecasta- crazy chick who collects knights like rare coins.

Merlin - Tells Britomart where she can find her true love

Knight - saved by Britomart. Tells her about her love, and they promise to remain friends foreva

The miserly churl called Malbecco - a miserly churl. He's called Malbecco.

 

Bibliography:

https://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/07/myth-folklore-unit-faerie-queen.html

Week 11: Reading Notes - Native American Myths: California/Southwest

 

Source

Coyote - created the earth and hills

Eagle - scratched ridges to perch

Fox - Created man with coyote. Wanted them to live forever, but coyote won

Old Mole - formed the world after burrowing down

Flood Myth - a great flood took out everything on earth. Coyote planted a feather in the ground and revived everyone.

Week 9 Reading Notes: West African Folk Tales:

Anansi prop in a play for children. Illustration by Tere Marichal, from Puerto Rico.Source

 

Father Anansi - In multiple stories. Trickster god that turns into a spider. Considered to be a god of all knowledge of stories. 

"Despite taking on the role of the trickster, Anansi's actions and parables often carry him as protagonist due to his ability to transform his apparent weaknesses into virtues. He is among several West African tricksters including Br'er Rabbit and Leuk Rabbit. " - wiki

 

 Kweku Tsin

Week 9 Reading Notes: West African Folk Tales: Why Spiders Are Always Found in Corners of Ceilings

 

Lucas the Spider. Source.

Egya Anansi - A father and husband. A skillful farmer. Selfish and greedy.

Rubber-man sucks Anansi in,

Anansi turns into a spider

The villagers are unsuspecting of Anansi, or why their crops are disappearing

Week 7: Reading Notes The Monkey King Part A

 

Painted mural depicting Sun Wukong (in yellow) and other main characters of the novel. Source.

Sun Wukong - The Monkey King. He was born out of a magic stone after having absorbed the powers of the heaven and earth. He became King of the Apes after jumping through a waterfall, and finding an iron bridge. The other monkey's beg him to take them there, and they make this place their home. He fears Death, and intends to seek out the gods to teach him how to escape Death. Receives his name from his master.

Traits: persistent, ambitious, curious, willing to learn, reckless

 

The Master - Teaches Sun Wukong the ancient art of immortality. Gives Sun Wukong his name.

 Traits: 

Dragon King - Denis the Monkey King entrance, but upon MK's encouragement to receive a weapon he pretends to be hospitable and lets him choose. He also gifts him attire fit for a king. The Monkey Kings tricking of the Dragon King subsequently becomes his death sentence.

Traits: distrusting, manipulative,

Week 6 Reading: Anicent Egypt Part B

Sheet from the Tale of Two Brothers, Papyrus D'Orbiney, British Museum

 

Anpu (Anubis) - Brother of Bata. Kills his wife after she lied about Bata trying to seduce her.

"Before the Greeks arrived in Egypt, around the 7th century BC, the god was known as Anpu or Inpu. The root of the name in ancient Egyptian language means "a royal child." Inpu has a root to "inp," which means "to decay."" - wiki

 

Bata - Brother of Anpu. Anpu's wife tries to seduce him, then lies about it. He appeals to his brother, and tells him the truth. After he is resurrected, he confronts his wife as a bull, then as a tree. As he's being cut down, a splinter falls into his wife's mouth, impregnating her. He's reborn as their son, and takes the throne along with Anpu.

"Until the middle of the Eighteenth Dynasty Bata was represented as a ram and later as a bull. Bata is probably identical with the death god Bt of the Egyptian Old Kingdom, known from the Saqqara necropolis, for instance from the Mastaba of Ti. Bata is not mentioned in the Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts." - wiki

Ennead - "Nine deities in Egyptian mythology worshiped at Heliopolis: the sun god Atum; his children Shu and Tefnut; their children Geb and Nut; and their children Osiris, Isis, Seth, and Nephthys." - wiki

Creates a wife for Bata

Bata's Wife - Divinely created, and sought after by the Pharaoh. After Bata's resurrection, she attempts to thwart him by eating his liver in his bull form, then cutting him down in his tree form. As the tree is cut down, a splinter falls into her mouth and impregnates her.

 

Week 6 Reading: Ancient Egyptian Myths and Stories Part A

 

Hathor, in bovine form, emerges from a hill representing the Theban necropolis, in a copy of the Book of the Dead from the 13th century BC. (source: wiki)

Gods:

Nu - Oldest of the ancient Egyptian gods and father of Ra, the sun god.

Nun's name means “primeval waters,” and he represented the waters of chaos out of which Re-Atum began creation. ... Nun was also thought to continue to exist as the source of the annual flooding of the Nile River

Ra - Sun God. He was often considered to be the King of the Gods and thus the patron of the pharaoh and one of the central gods of the Egyptian pantheon. He was also described as the creator of everything.

Isis - Goddess of the moon. As goddess of life and magic, Isis protected women and children, and healed the sick. She was the sister and wife of Osiris. Isis and Osiris had a son named Horus.

Shu - God of the air and supporter of the sky, created by Atum by his own power, without the aid of a woman. Shu and his sister and companion, Tefnut (goddess of moisture), were the first couple of the group of nine gods called the Ennead of Heliopolis

Tefnut - Deity of moisture, moist air, dew and rain in Ancient Egyptian religion. She is the sister and consort of the air god Shu and the mother of Geb and Nut.

Seb - the Egyptian god of the earth and a mythological member of the Ennead of Heliopolis. he could also be considered a father of snakes. It was believed in ancient Egypt that Geb's laughter created earthquakes and that he allowed crops to grow.

Nut - goddess of the sky, vault of the heavens, often depicted as a woman arched over the earth god Geb. ... As the goddess of the sky, Nut swallowed the sun in the evening and gave birth to it again in the morning

Hathor - goddess associated, later, with Isis and, earlier, with Sekhmet but eventually was considered the primeval goddess from whom all others were derived. She is usually depicted as a woman with the head of a cow, ears of a cow, or simply in cow form

Reading Notes: Gospel of Mark Part B

 

The Kiss of Judas (between 1304 and 1306) by Giotto di Bondone depicts Judas' identifying kiss in the Garden of Gethsemane

 (image source: wiki)

Judas Iscariot - Betrayed Jesus

And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, "Verily I say unto you, one of you which eateth with me shall betray me."

Judas betrayed Jesus for a bribe of "thirty pieces of silver" by identifying him with a kiss—"the kiss of Judas"—to arresting soldiers of the High Priest Caiaphas, who then turned Jesus over to Pontius Pilate's soldiers.

"Whomsoever I shall kiss, that same is he; take him, and lead him away safely."

Etymology:

Judas's epithet Iscariot (Ὶσκάριωθ or Ὶσκαριώτης), which distinguishes him from the other people named Judas in the gospels, is usually thought to be a Greek rendering of the Hebrew phrase איש־קריות, (Κ-Qrîyôt), meaning "the man from Kerioth".^[16][8][17]  One of the most popular alternative explanations holds that Iscariot (ܣܟܪܝܘܛܐ 'Skaryota' in Syriac Aramaic, per the Peshitta text) may be a corruption of the Latin word sicarius, meaning "dagger man",^{[16][8][18][19]} which referred to a member of the Sicarii (סיקריים in Aramaic), a group of Jewish rebels who were known for committing acts of terrorism in the 40s and 50s AD by assassinating people in crowds using long knives hidden under their cloaks.^[16][8]

16th-century fresco from Tarzhishte Monastery, Strupets, Bulgaria, showing Judas hanging himself as described in Matthew 27:1–10

(image source: wiki)

Reading Notes: Gospel of Mark Part A

 

Mosaic of the exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac from the Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna, dating to the sixth century AD

(image source: wiki)

 

Jesus Christ - Son of God 

Casts out "unclean spirits" — first exorcist 

Heals the sick and dying. 

Bleeding? "Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague."

Etymology:

The word Christ was a title or office ("the Christ"), not a given name.^[63][64] It derives from the Greek Χριστός (Christos),^[48][65] a translation of the Hebrew mashiakh (משיח) meaning "anointed", and is usually transliterated into English as "messiah".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus#Etymology

 

John the Baptist -  Baptized Jesus

Imprisoned by Herod after criticizing him for divorcing his wife, and marrying Herodias

Beheaded after Herodias asked for his head through her daughter Salome.

Herod mistook Jesus for John the Baptist after hearing of his miracles. He believed John revived.

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

Apostles:

Simon Peter - Follower of Christ, One of the Twelve Apostles 

James the Great - Son of Zeebedee 

John - Brother of James the Great  

Andrew -  

Philip -

Bartholomew -

Matthew -  

Thomas -

James the Less -

Thaddeus -  

Simon the Zealot -  

Judas Iscariot - Betrayed Jesus by kissing him 

 

Bibliography: Gibbs, Laura. Gospel of Mark

https://mythfolklore.blogspot.com/2014/05/myth-folklore-unit-gospel-of-mark.html

Reading Notes: Homer's Illiad Part A

 

 

Oil flask (lekythos) with Achilles, Ajax and Athena. Greek, Late Archaic Period, about 500 B.C.

(image source: Museum of Fine Arts: Boston)

Characters:

Achilles - "Bravest and Strongest of all the Greeks; 

Agamemnon - Brother to Menelaus; Stealer of spoils

Brseis - Achilles' spoil; Taken by Agamemnon 

Allies to Achilles:

Patroclus - Friend/Lover of Achilles;

Calchas - Prophet; Told Achilles why Apollo is angry

Chryseis - Agamemnon's spoil; Daughter of a priest of Apollo

Apollo - Sun God; Angered by Agamemnon denying Chryseis' father his daughter

Thetis - Mother of Achilles; Pleas with Zeus to favor her son

Zeus - King of the Gods; God of Thunder and Sky; Helps Thetis in restoring Achilles' honor

Switzerland:

Ulysses - Returns Chryseis; Hero of the Odyssey 

 

bibliography: Homer's Iliad (retold by A. J. Church)

Reading Notes: Week 2 Anthology

Notes for The Tiger, The Brahman, and the Jackal:

Brahman - Naive, empathetic

"Our dinner! What a remarkably delicate way of putting it!" 

Hollywood casting: Taika Waititi. I thought he'd be a good fit after I casted Jemaine for the jackal. He has that kind of awkward character, and would have great chemistry with the Jemaine.

Tiger - Cunning, manipulative, hungry, impatient

"What a fool you are! What is to prevent my eating you now, for after being cooped up so long I am just terribly hungry!"

Hollywood casting: Idris Elba. I imagine the tiger to have a very deep voice - probably because I'm thinking of Shere Khan (I haven't seen the live action one, but apparently Idris Elba voiced Shere Khan, so perfect casting choice. Good job me).

Jackal - Wily, clever, patient

"Let me see — the tiger was in the Brahman, and the cage came walking by — no that's not it, either!"

Hollywood casting: Jemaine Clement. I just really like Jemaine and want to see him in more stuff. I think it'd be great if he sang an original song to the tiger.

The tree, the Buffalo, the Road - distrusting, mistreated by humans

"What have you to complain about?"

 

Setting: caged tiger on the side of house outside of village. The forest sits in front of him. To his left is a field, and across is a road. The Jackal and the Brahman meet on the road

Bibliography: Indian Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs with illustrations by John D. Batten (1912).

https://sites.google.com/view/mythfolkloreanthology/tricksters 

 

 

Image of a jackal. I think they're really cute, and are probably my favorite species from Canina. That's most likely why I enjoyed this story so much! The image is sourced from African Wildlife Foundation, which provides information about the jackal, its habitat, and the challenges presented to this animal.

 (image source: African Wildlife Foundation)

Week 2 Reading Overview

 Week 2

I'm so excited to get started - the units are all so interesting, but I'm so excited to read the Ancient Egypt and King Arthur units. I was also interested in Ancient Mesopotamian myths, but I didn't see that as an option.

----

Choose from CLASSICAL and/or BIBLICAL units for Weeks 3 and 4.

Week 3: Classical

Week 4: Biblical

Choose from MIDDLE EASTERN and/or INDIAN units for Weeks 5 and 6.

Week 5: Middle Eastern

Week 6: Middle Eastern

Choose from ASIAN and/or AFRICAN units for Weeks 7 and 9. [Week 8 is review week.]

Week 7: Asian

Week 9: African

Choose from NATIVE AMERICAN units for Weeks 10 and 11.

Week 10: Break Week?

Week 11: Native American

Choose from BRITISH and/or CELTIC units for Weeks 12 and 13.

Week 12: King Arthur

Week 13: Celtic Tales

Choose from EUROPEAN units for Weeks 14 and 15.

Week 14: Brothers Grimm

Week 15: Russian Fairy Tales

----

And now... an image.

This painting depicts the witch Morgan le Fay weaving an enchanted robe for King Arthur on a loom. I first saw this image on the cover of a book, and I've always been fascinated by it. I love Pre-Raphaelite art, as well as Arthurian legend.

 

 Morgan le Fay by Frederick Sandys, 1864