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................. From the Sayings of Buddha ...............
The greatest achievement is selflessness.
The greatest worth is self-mastery.
The greatest qualities is seeking to serve others.
The greatest precept is continual awareness.
The greatest medicine is the emptiness of everything.
The greatest action is not conforming with the worlds ways.
The greatest magic is transmuting the passions.
The greatest generosity is non-attachment.
The greatest goodness is a peaceful mind.
The greatest patience is humility.
The greatest effort is not concerned with results.
The greatest meditation is a mind that lets go.
The greatest wisdom is seeing through appearances.
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"大士爺" "Dai Si Yeh" is the highly respected Guardian of Hell, and of all spirits. A paper statue of "Dai Si Yeh"Every festival, who plays the role of maintaining order and discipline among the spiritual realm during the festival.
By the end of the festival, a ritual will be held to send off the Guardian and his paper statue will then be burnt.
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The Ghost Festival, also known as the Hungry Ghost Festival, or Yu Lan is a traditional Chinese festival and holiday celebrated by Chinese in many countries. In the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in southern China).
In Chinese tradition, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm.
Distinct from both the Qingming Festival (in spring) and Chung Yeung Festival (in autumn) in which living descendants pay homage to their deceased ancestors, on Ghost Day, the deceased are believed to visit the living.
On the fifteenth day the realms of Heaven and Hell and the realm of the living are open and both Taoists and Buddhists would perform rituals to transmute and absolve the sufferings of the deceased. Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is ancestor worship, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.
Activities during the month would include preparing ritualistic food offerings, burning incense, and burning joss paper, a papier-mâché form of material items such as clothes, gold and other fine goods for the visiting spirits of the ancestors
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More images of the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival
More Chinese Temples images here:
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Elderly man checking out the list of donations for this ceremony from local residents.
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** Origin and facts of the Hungry Ghost Festival:
The Ghost Festival, also known as the Hungry Ghost Festival, or Yu Lan is a traditional Chinese festival and holiday celebrated by Chinese in many countries. In the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in southern China).
In Chinese tradition, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm.
Distinct from both the Qingming Festival (in spring) and Chung Yeung Festival (in autumn) in which living descendants pay homage to their deceased ancestors, on Ghost Day, the deceased are believed to visit the living.
On the fifteenth day the realms of Heaven and Hell and the realm of the living are open and both Taoists and Buddhists would perform rituals to transmute and absolve the sufferings of the deceased. Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is ancestor worship, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.
Activities during the month would include preparing ritualistic food offerings, burning incense, and burning joss paper, a papier-mâché form of material items such as clothes, gold and other fine goods for the visiting spirits of the ancestors
=====
More images of the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival
More Chinese Temples images here:
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Kyot the Provençal, claimed the Grail was a stone that fell from Heaven (called lapsit exillis), and had been the abode of the Neutral Angels who took neither side during Lucifer’s rebellion. The stone was said to be green, but of no one specific material. In an obscure account by another author, Lucifer was said to have claimed the emerald and set it in a crown. The crown was destroyed when Lucifer fell to Earth from Heaven. Apparently, the stone had survived. It, being the source of Lucifer’s power over Alchemy, was said to have split into two parts. At first, Lucifer pursued the two fragments of the emerald, but gave up. Then, human beings found them and made them into a tablet and another object which eventually became a cup. The material is assumed to have been emerald, or just simply glass.
The emerald chalice at Genoa was obtained during the Crusades at Caesarea Maritima, and thought to be the Holy Grail. But an accident on the road, while it was being returned from Paris after the fall of Napoleon, revealed that the emerald was green glass. The broken chalice was later found by Nazis during their occupation of Paris, but the chalice were said to have been destroyed during bombings and explosions. There is a museum, I forget where, which actually had the charred pieces of the Genoa chalice. They couldn’t carbon date it though, because of some kind of deterioration.
Account 2. The Emerald Lens
The Roman emperor Nero was near-sighted, so he had an enormous emerald which he used as a glass to view gladiatorial fights. The Romans thought that emeralds were good for the sight, and Nero’s emerald was hollowed out to act as a lens to help him see. Many of the Christians persecuted by him came to think that the emerald was of diabolical origin. It is less commonly believed that the emerald was actually a sacred object to the early Christians, and that Nero’s misuse of it was a deliberate blasphemy, while to the Romans it was seen as just an expensive and inefficient waste. The emerald itself was described as being concave-shaped, and nothing is mentioned of it’s fate. Here is a little of this object’s story on a history page about emperor Nero:
A mysterious plate made of some green material, which legend says is a half of a fragment of an emerald lost by Lucifer when he/she was cast out and fell to Earth (the remaining half is said to have been used to forge the Holy Grail). The Tablet was found, according to the legend, by one of the soldiers of Alexander the Great in a tomb at Ebron, in the hands of the mummy of Hermes Trismegistus, defined as “all alchemists’ father”. The Tablet, also known as Smaragdine Table, Tabula Smaragdina, or The Secret of Hermes, is a text said to reveal the secret of primordial substances and transmutations. It claims to be the work of Hermes Trismegistus (“Hermes the Thrice-Great”), a legendary Egyptian sage or god, variously identified with the Egyptian god Thoth and/or the Greek god Hermes. No one knows what the fate of this object is, since no one has actually seen it since sometime prior to 400 AD, where it was last reported being found in a cave by a man who copied the writings engraved upon the surface of the tablet. The full history of this object is too much to fit here, so here is a link to a site that has the story: Now, here are my thoughts regarding the Emerald of Lucifer: (Speculation, for the most part, but educated speculation, so just bear with me here…)
Theory 1 – If the Legend is True:
If the legend is to be believed, this huge “emerald” belonged to some neutral angels until Lucifer stole it and put it into his/her crown. Lucifer got kicked out of Heaven, the emerald broke in two. Lucifer went looking for it, but gave up, and human beings found them. It was after this time that the two halves of the emerald were made into the Tablet and the Grail by who knows who.
1. The Tablet’s history, unlike the Grail’s, is actually better documented even though the object itself has never been found by archeologists. It is possible that the Tablet is the Philosopher’s Stone of Alchemy, the “Stone which is not a Stone”. Since the legend tells that Lucifer had power over Alchemy through the Emerald, this would be exceedingly likely. It is also possible that it may have been destroyed or reworked into something else in the years since 400 AD, but something of it’s fate can be guessed at in this theory:
2. The Grail’s history can be pieced together, and may tie into the Lens’s as well. Clearly, it was an object of sacred value to early Christians, and it likely was a green glass cup mistaken for the cup of Christ. I say mistaken because Jesus would not have been able to *afford* such a rich cup to drink from. Carpenters back then did not exactly earn a king’s wage, and glasswork like that was rare and costly. But because Jesus was, to his faithful, the King of Kings, to them he would have had only the best. Maybe Nero heard about this object… and in an effort to make Christians even more miserable, had it made into his famous lens. Now let’s say this object was given to Nero and he was told that it was emerald. Since emeralds were both “expensive and inefficient” to treat poor vision Nero’s physicians could have used glass and just told Nero it was emerald, to satisfy the emperor’s extravagant taste. No one knows the fate of this lens, but then we have that green glass chalice appearing at Genoa, so it’s possible that Christians simply reworked Nero’s lens back into a cup again… but this time a more expensive kind of cup: a chalice. This chalice found it’s way into the hands of Napoleon and Hitler before it met destruction in World War II, as documented by some sources. So, this could be a reason why we’ll never find the Holy Grail of the legends. And, since this Grail is more Lucifer’s holy object than Christ’s, that is most likely for the best, and could be the reason so many conquerors and tyrants were drawn to it. This theory makes the fate of the Tablet rather obvious…
3. If the Grail was just green glass and not really emerald, and let us say for argument’s sake the legend of Lucifer was true and the Grail was just one half of a larger object, the other half being the Tablet… then the Tablet would also be made from green glass. It is likely, therefore, the Tablet was broken and that is the reason why the last man to actually see it made a copy of what it said upon it’s surface: to preserve what was lost. Moses had made a new set of Ten Commandments for a similar purpose… because the originals broke. If the Emerald Tablet is Lucifer’s own “Commandments”, you can bet it suffered a similar fate to Moses’ Tablets. It is likely that this is one excuse why the Church had put so many Alchemists to death during the Inquisition and accused them of doing “the Devil’s work”. If they knew the history of the “Philosopher’s Stone”, a.k.a. the Emerald Tablet, it would have, to them, confirmed their worst fears about Alchemy being a “Magic of the Devil”, even though we know Alchemy is just chemistry combined with esoteric philosophy.
4. Is this instead about DNA?
Theory 2 – If the Legend is False:
If the whole legend isn’t true, then someone made both the Grail and the Tablet, and tried to get people to believe that these objects were of divine origin. From this viewpoint, the Grail of Genoa, the Lens of Nero, and the Tablet not only have nothing to do with one another but are by themselves rather common objects compared to more important relics. Since the ruined remnants of the Genoa cup apparently cannot be dated in any kind of truly satisfactory manner, we can *never* know if this old legend is true or false.
1. The Emerald Tablet:
“Here is that which the Priest Sagiyus of Nablus has dictated concerning the entrance of Balinas [Apollonius] into the hidden chamber [Cave of Trophonius?]:
After my entrance into the chamber, where the talisman was set up, I came up to an old man sitting on a golden throne, who was holding an Emerald Tablet in one hand. And behold the following — in Syriac [Assyrian], the primordial language — was written thereon:
1) Here is a true explanation, concerning which there can be no doubt.
2) It attests: As Above, So Below — the work of the miracle of the One.
3) And things have been created from this primal substance through a single act. How wonderful is this work! It is the main principle of the world and is its maintainer.
4) Its father is the Sun and its mother, the Moon.
5) The wind has borne it in its body, and the Earth has nourished it.
6) The father of talismen and the protector of miracles whose powers are perfect, and whose lights are confirmed.
7) A fire becomes Earth, so separate the Earth from the fire, and thereby attain the subtle over the gross, with care and sagacity.
8) It rises from Earth to Heaven, so as to draw the lights of the heights to itself, and descends to the earth; thus within it are the forces of above and below.
9) Thus wilt thou partake of the light of the world, and darkness will flee from thee.
10) This is the force of forces, which overcomes every subtle thing and penetrates into all that is gross.
11) The structure of the microcosm is in accordance with the structure of the macrocosm.
12) And accordingly, the arrangements to follow this road are hidden.
13) And to this, aspired Hermes, who was thrice graced with majestic wisdom.
14) And this is his last book, which he concealed in this chamber.”
“Is Moldavite a Grail Stone? Pieces of the Emerald from the Crown of Lucifer? Moldavite is a heavenly stone that fell approximately 15 million years ago to Earth. It is mostly found in Bohemia near the Austrian Czech border. Some were found in Moravia, Lausitz in Germany and close to Radessen in Austria. The term Moldavite was coined in 1836 by the German curator of the mineralogical collection in the Vlasteneck Museum in Prague Dr. Franz Xaver Maximilian Lippe . The name Moldavite is derived from the German name ‘Moldau’ for the Moldavian river. Around 1826, they were called Bohemian emerald. Moldavite is probably the only tektite made into gemstones because of their coloration and gloss. Moldavite has been used as jewels for kings, “VIP’s” and/or political, social or religious leaders. In Wolfram von Eschenbach’s version of the grail’s legend the Moldavite is considered to be the Grail – the “lapsit exillis” – a green gemstone that fell from heaven out of a crown of an higher ranking angel, Lucifer, after the battle with Archangel Michael.” So, this is why they mistook it for “green glass”! Moldavite looks like emerald, yet resembles green glass in it’s texture and some of it’s properties, such as being more fragile than emerald. This was a great thing to discover about it.
The creepiest thing that links all this to Indiana Jones, is the fact that there exists a Moldavite Crystal Skull. And here is the picture to prove it: The legend is trying to tell us that before it took form as Moldavite, this old stone which fell to Earth from space long ago was part of the elements that make up all of Creation. Part of the universe, in other words. So, if Lucifer is a force of Creation and the Crown is the five elements, then before this angel fell from Heaven he/she must have aided God in the act of Creation! Which is why Alchemy (which reveals this as a secret spiritual truth) was demonized by the Church as “Devil’s Magic” even though it was a good and solid science that formed the basis for modern Chemistry as it is known today. There is a basis for what these alchemists believed about Lucifer, in ancient myths and legends. Apparently, God and Lucifer needed each other in order to create the universe and have everything be in balance. Three examples:
According to Gnosticism, the God of Darkness Yaldabaoth (which derives from the Sumerian Yog-Sothoth and is the origin of the name Yahweh), created all the physical universe; the God of Light (Lucifer) whose name no one dared to speak helped Him by first creating the spiritual universe. Yaldabaoth never saw the God of Light, however, seeing instead His own reflection through the waters of the Abyss in Hell, which served as a barrier between Yaldabaoth’s Heaven and the God of Light’s Heaven. The God of Light grew angry with Him and sent an aspect of itself to cast Yaldabaoth into the Abyss. When this occurred, there was war in Heaven between darkness and light. In the end, the God of Light retreated into the highest Heaven and the God of Darkness laid claim to all of creation. However, he could only claim it physically, since he didn’t make it spiritually. Thusly are peoples’ souls fully immortal, being of the spiritual plane, although Yaldabaoth cursed all flesh to be mortal and die. When Lucifer’s aspect manifested to Yaldabaoth, he/she appeared as in the form of a goddess with the name Sophia (Wisdom). The other names of God given in this account are Sakla and Samael. In Greek tradition, Yaldabaoth was Zeus and Lucifer as Sophia was Athena. The term Philosophy originates from Philosophia: “Love of Sophia” or “Love of Wisdom”. In Gnosticism, this whole legend was the reverse of the Greek myths. Instead of Zeus creating Athena from his head (thought) as a subservient daughter, Lucifer as Sophia created a rebellious God from her Light (Knowledge). It is widely believed that religions that worshiped the male sky gods such as Zeus totally altered the goddess faiths that were older and came before them. (What a twisted web we weave! Samael/Zeus/Sakla are names for Lucifer/Satan.) According to Zoroastrianism, Ahura Mazda (God) cast a shadow from Himself in the beginning of time. This shadow became possessed of it’s own soul and became the God of Light’s brother. Ahura Mazda named the being Ahriman (Lucifer), and together they created everything in the universe. Ahura Mazda created all that was light and good, while Ahriman created all that was dark and evil in order to balance his brother and keep true harmony in Creation. However, once this was done, Ahriman wanted to make everything over in his own image, so Ahura Mazda just gave him his own domain (Hell) to rule over. There, Ahriman created mockeries of all that Ahura Mazda had made above in Heaven, and ever after sought to persuade human hearts to his own cause. This is the only myth that actually tells how and why Hell was first made, and it was not as a prison for the damned but as an abode for a god and all that god’s creations. Ahriman, however, saw Hell as a fancy prison and in several legends is constantly trying to escape from it, into the mortal world. Each time, he is vanquished by a savior who appears to prevent his emergence. Ahura Mazda and Ahriman: According to J.R.R. Tolkien’s created mythology for England, The Silmarillion, from which all of Tolkien’s fiction including The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings derives… Melkor (his name for Lucifer) helped Eru Illuvatar (God) to shape Arda (The Earth) by singing a song of creation along with all the Valar (Angels). At some point, Melkor wanted to shape things his/her own way and Eru countered this with ideas of His own. This is why there is good and evil in the universe. In the end, Melkor was banished to his own domain Utumno, or Hell, and from there he created twisted versions of everything Eru created. It is worth noting that J.R.R. Tolkien mentioned the Crown of Lucifer in the Silmarillion, as Melkor’s Iron Crown in which three sacred Silmaril jewels were placed, which Melkor stole from the beings who had originally created them. In the later myths, the lovers Beren and Luthien stole one of the jewels from Melkor’s crown. Luthien danced for the dark god, causing him to fall asleep. As he slept, she remained by his side while Beren managed to steal the stone.
Note: Tolkien’s Silmarillion was so influential, it even inspired a scene in the movie “Legend”! The princess, Lily, dances before the Lord of Darkness to make him believe she is under his spell while her lover Jack sneaks into his fortress to rescue her. Instead of a jewel, the treasure Jack must steal from the Dark Lord before escaping is the horn of a unicorn. At some point, the Lord of Darkness is cast into the Void, also exactly like in the Silmarillion. Melkor and the Iron Crown: It’s the same story told different throughout history. I imagine it’s partly why the Church declared Gnosticism a heresy in the Middle Ages. But Gnosticism has a point to it: darkness and light cannot exist without the one to define what the other is. For that reason, there cannot be a final victory of the one over the other, since everything in the universe must be in balance. People always think we’ve come a long way, but people still have a long way to go! Anyhow, with the mystery of the Crown solved, we can move on to: The Cup of Death...Apparently, whereas the Cup of Christ would grant you eternal life, the Grail of Lucifer would bestow eternal death. This is a continuation of an old Pagan legend about the twin Cauldrons. There was the Cauldron of Creation which would allow those placed in it to be reborn in a reincarnated body, and then there was the Black Cauldron which would raise only the body of someone as a zombie known as a “Cauldron Born” and sending their soul to the underworld. That duality was depicted very nicely, in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade! Who carved the Emerald Tablet? An old myth regarding the Emerald Tablet is that it was first carved by an evil necromancer named Koeshu of Egypt, who then allowed Hermes to inscribe it with it’s alchemical secrets. Koeshu was probably the famous Egyptian Moon God, Khonshu. The Moon being synonymous with darkness, night, and the art of necromancy, this is most likely the case. Again, we have a duality where something cannot be created without both good and evil getting together to make it balanced. It seems everything in this legend is about cosmic balance.
God’s Emerald Throne in Heaven
I’ll bet somewhere along the line, all this is what inspired the Emerald City in the Oz stories. Wizard: a flawed person who tries to be perfect but ends up making mistakes. Lucifer is like Ozma: once a beautiful queen but now stuck in another form and searching for a way to regain all her lost glory. The idea of Lucifer (bringer of light to man), or Prometheus (bringer of fire to man), tie into KOTCS, with the Interdimensionals bringing knowledge to man. What KOTCS does is take away God, for now it’s the Interdimensionals punishing man, or woman as in the case of Spalko, for demanding too much knowledge. Spalko takes the place of Lucifer (who was cast out of Heaven) or Prometheus (who suffered daily torture as punishment) for her crime of trying to gain knowledge to give to man (i.e., the Soviet regime). With these old myths I’m sure there’s more mileage for Indy, with ancient and powerful intelligence. I’m still thinking Cthulhu and a creepy, mysterious supernatural element for the next movie. Something other than the Interdimensional aliens we saw in KOTCS could cross into Indy’s world, brought forth by cultists dabbling with an Emerald something.
" Mahakala is almost always depicted with a crown of five skulls, which represent the transmutation of the five kleshas (negative afflictions) into the five wisdoms."
三件神袍高掛在神袍棚內, 分別為給「天地父母」、「南辰北斗」和「諸位福神」穿著。
其中天地父母衣上的裝飾手工精細，往往以金龍為中心。
Hanging at one of the tents are three giant paper crafted robes, as offerings for the "Gods of Heaven & Earth", "Gods of Spiritual Realm" and "Gods of Blessings".
The golden dragon is often the center point of the delicate design.
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The Ghost Festival, also known as the Hungry Ghost Festival, or Yu Lan is a traditional Chinese festival and holiday celebrated by Chinese in many countries. In the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in southern China).
In Chinese tradition, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm.
Distinct from both the Qingming Festival (in spring) and Chung Yeung Festival (in autumn) in which living descendants pay homage to their deceased ancestors, on Ghost Day, the deceased are believed to visit the living.
On the fifteenth day the realms of Heaven and Hell and the realm of the living are open and both Taoists and Buddhists would perform rituals to transmute and absolve the sufferings of the deceased. Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is ancestor worship, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.
Activities during the month would include preparing ritualistic food offerings, burning incense, and burning joss paper, a papier-mâché form of material items such as clothes, gold and other fine goods for the visiting spirits of the ancestors
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Follow my rediscovery of the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
For my past visits to the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival
More Chinese Temples images here:
On the occasion of the 56th International Art Exhibition of la Biennale di Venezia, one of Venice’s most celebrated landmarks, the Basilica of San Giorgio Maggiore, will host Together, a major exhibition of new works by Spanish artist Jaume Plensa.
Plensa (Spain, b.1955) is one of the world’s foremost artists working in the public art space, with permanent works spanning the globe including the Crown Fountain (Chicago), Echo (Seattle), Breathing (London) and Roots (Tokyo). The exhibition is curated by Clare Lilley, Director of Programmes at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. The works in the exhibition all make their debut in San Giorgio and reflect the artist’s continued interest in a bodily relationship to space, scale, material and place.
For four hundred years the Basilica of San Giorgio Maggiore has been a place of worship, communication and meditation, where Palladio’s profound architecture creates a stilling and contemplative environment. Plensa’s response to this powerful space is Together; a conversation between two sculptures - hand, suspended beneath the cupola in the foreground of the altar, and head, sited in the nave. Placed on the dominant west-east axis of the building, the works set up a line of spiritual and intellectual discourse which evokes emotion and seeks to connect with his viewers on an intuitive level.
As a speaker of five languages alongside a nomadic life that takes him around the globe, Plensa’s work reflects a desire to break down barriers. Merging difference is a cornerstone of his work, and here it is further emphasized by the installation of meticulous drawings and a group of five alabaster portraits in the contiguous Officina dell’Arte Spirituale, located 300 meters from the entrance to the Basilica on the island’s northern edge. Plunged in darkness and lit to reveal their luminous opacity, the sculptures were carved using reformed scans of real girls; chosen because, like nomads, they have traveled, settled and traveled again. Chosen, too, because they are teenage girls on the cusp of leaving and arriving, whose potential – like that of all humanity – so deeply glows.
Plensa’s sculptures reference a Judeo-Christian tradition while connecting with a much longer human history, where the making of art has social purpose and which we see played out across histories and geographies – in heads from the Croatian Upper Paleolithic, carved some 26,000 years ago; in exquisite, elongated hands incised in stone from 1300 BCE Egypt. For these and other reasons, Plensa’s forms will connect people and welcome them into the Basilica. Made from stainless steel which distills and diffuses light, Plensa’s hand and head are at times transmutable hazes that pull and root the gaze. The opening, gestural hand formed from characters of eight languages, speaks of a coming together of peoples and traditions. Similarly, Nuria’s face speaks of diversity; indeed the subject is the daughter of a Chinese friend in Barcelona, who in her young life has already crossed many borders.
Clare Lilley, Curator, commented: “Plensa’s installations for the Isola di San Georgio Maggiore are testament to his acute understanding of space and scale. His sculptures do not impose themselves on these historic spaces; rather they capture and reflect the actual light and shadows within to communicate a metaphorical language. Both visually stunning and intimate, they draw our attention to a world where migration and difference challenge civilized behavior; in this place, which for centuries has welcomed world travelers, Plensa’s work will connect people of many faiths and of no faith.
In collaboration with the monks of the Abbazia di San Giorgio, as part of the cultural activities of the Benedicti Claustra Onlus, Together hopes to advance the Benedictine community’s efforts to develop a number of restoration projects of the monumental Palladian complex on San Giorgio Maggiore. Inspired by textual elements in the body of Plensa’s work, the project has contributed a significant donation to restore the Abbazia’s 15th and 16th Century illuminated manuscripts; prayer books previously too delicate for public view. (Press release)
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
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Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
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www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
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this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.
It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
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questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Some pictures before de-transmuting. Went to church and then did some Christmas shopping.
Never imagined a couple inches (5 cm) could make such a difference! I'm 5'11" (1.8 m), only slightly taller than the average height for males, but 6.5" (16.5 cm) taller than the average female. I normally wear shoes with a heel height of around a half-inch (1.3 cm). Tonight I wore 2 inch heels. I felt like I was towering over everyone. At church I was the tallest woman and just about the tallest person. Standing in the checkout lines I was nearly a head above the others.
I used to think that everyone (especialy children) was eyeing me and seeing "a man in a dress," but a good freind pointed out that tall women stand out; and people are going to look, and sometimes stare. So don't cower, accept that you stand out, you're a special and exceptional woman. Oh, and help others reach the top shelves in the supermarket.
Great Work (Latin: magnum opus) is a term used in Hermeticism and occult traditions descended from it, such as Thelema.Accomplishing the Great Work, symbolized as the creation of the philosopher's stone, represents the culmination of the spiritual path, the attainment of enlightenment, or the rescue of the human soul from the unconscious forces which bind it. The Great Work signifies the spiritual path towards self-transcendence in its entirety. This is the process of bringing unconscious complexes into the conscious awareness, in order to integrate them back into oneself. Within Thelema, the Great Work is generally defined as those spiritual practices leading to the mystical union of the Self and the All through the accomplishment of True Will. Its founder, author and occultist Aleister Crowley, re-iterated the idea of the unification of opposites, saying in his book Magick Without Tears:
The Great Work is the uniting of opposites. It may mean the uniting of the soul with God, of the microcosm with the macrocosm, of the female with the male, of the ego with the non-ego."
Although the Great Work can describe specifically the moment of union between the self and the divine, it can also deal with the spiritual process in its entirety. Crowley also speaks on the Great Work as the conscious process of spiritual growth. The aspect of conscious devotion to the Great Work is very important.[2][better source needed] By purposefully, consciously turning inward and choosing to pursue self-realization, the seeker seals themselves in their very own vas hermeticum, their very own alchemical vessel. This attitude of deliberate turning within is necessary for the Great Work. By consciously devoting oneself to the Great Work, and therefore sealing oneself within one's own vas hermeticum, the inner heat of psychic struggle which is generated from this aids in the dissolution of ego boundaries and the integration of what is unconscious.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Work_(Hermeticism)
Within Thelema, the Great Work is generally defined as those spiritual practices leading to the accomplishment of the True Will of one's Self in mystical union with the All. Its founder, author and occultist Aleister Crowley, based this path of mystical attainment or enlightenment on his studies in Hermetic alchemy and the Hermetic Qabalah, particularly as they were expounded by Eliphas Levi in the 19th century and later by various members in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an occult society of which had Crowley had been a member.
Crowley wrote that in 1904 he heard and transcribed, from an entity called Aiwass, a book which came to be titled The Book of the Law. Crowley made this book the central sacred text of his new religious movement called Thelema, which he believed heralded a new Aeon for mankind. Between 1907 and 1911, Crowley wrote a series of other small texts which he considered to be inspired, written through him rather than by him, which he afterwards collected together in an anthology now called The Holy Books of Thelema. These texts formed the mystical backbone of Crowley's system, on which he elaborated in his extensive writings on magick, mysticism, and occult subjects.
True Will and Union
Thelema is a path intended to do two interrelated things: to enable one to learn one's 'True Will'; and to achieve union with 'the All'.[1] This unification of opposites, the individual and the universal, is reiterated by Crowley in his book Magick Without Tears:
The Great Work is the uniting of opposites. It may mean the uniting of the soul with God, of the microcosm with the macrocosm, of the female with the male, of the ego with the non-ego.
The techniques for accomplishing these goals Crowley referred to as 'Magick,' a word he used to describe Western ceremonial magic (especially invocations and eucharistic ceremonies) supported by Buddhist meditation, Hermetic Qabalah, English Qaballa, tarot, and yoga, all set in the context of the worship of Nuit, the goddess of "Infinite Stars and Infinite Space"
Within the system of the magical Order A∴A∴, the Great Work of the Probationer Grade is considered to be the pursuit of self-knowledge to, as Crowley said in The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, "obtain the knowledge of the nature and powers of my own being."However, Crowley continues, the Great Work should also be something that is integrated into the daily life of all. Although Crowley often discussed the idea of "succeeding" or "accomplishing" in the Great Work, he also recognized that the process is ongoing.
The ability to accomplish the Great Work requires a great deal of preparation and effort, according to Crowley's system. The programme consists of several key elements, including a thorough knowledge of the Hermetic Qabalah (especially the Tree of Life), disciplined concentration (i.e. meditation), the development of one's body of light (in order to experience other planes) and the consistent and regular invocation of certain deities or spiritual beings ('assumption of godforms').
Within the mystical and philosophical system developed by Crowley, the core task for a practitioner is the discovery and manifestation of True Will. The realisation of this True Will is itself the Great Work, as expressed in the Benediction at the end of Crowley's Gnostic Mass, where the Priest blesses the congregation with the words:
The LORD bring you to the accomplishment of your true Wills, the Great Work, the Summum Bonum, True Wisdom and Perfect Happiness.
Methods
Tree of Life[edit]
The Tree of Life is a tool used to categorize and organize various mystical concepts. At its most simple level it is composed of ten spheres, or emanations, called sephiroth (sing. "sephira") which are connected by twenty-two paths. The sephiroth are represented by the planets and the paths by the characters of the Hebrew alphabet, which are subdivided by the five elements, the seven classical planets, and the twelve signs of the Zodiac.
Within the Western magical tradition, the Tree is used as a kind of conceptual filing cabinet. Each sephira and path is assigned various ideas, such as gods, cards of the Tarot, astrological planets and signs, elements, and so forth. Crowley's Liber 777 is one of the most comprehensive collections of such qabalistic correspondences.[7] Other authors have written on the topic, including Eliphas Levi,[citation needed] Israel Regardie,[citation needed] and Gareth Knight.
The path of attainment is largely defined by the Tree of Life. The aspirant begins in Malkuth, which is the everyday material world of phenomena, with the ultimate goal being at Kether, the sphere of Unity with the All. Through various exercises and practices, the aspirant attains certain spiritual and mental states that are characterized by the various sephiroth that ascend the Tree. Crowley considered a deep understanding of the Qabalah to be essential to the Thelemite. The practice of the Middle Pillar is especially important.
Qabalah is key to understanding Thelemic texts and scriptures, many of which, including The Book of the Law, are written in abstract, poetic, and often cryptic language. Through the use of the Qabalah, and especially the function of gematria (a form of numerology), the normally opaque meaning of the texts can be made clear. Thelemites can also make use of gematria to link words and concepts and to validate revelations given to them in magical operations, such as astral travel.
Concentration
Another key element to Thelemic mysticism is the ability to concentrate. This skill has two modalities: the first is the rapid, accurate, and efficient movement of thought (which is the realm of magick) and the other is the stopping of thought altogether (which is accomplished in Yoga). In the first, it is the manipulation of all ideas into one idea, and in the second is the taking of that one thought and reducing it to nothing.
Concentration is essentially the prerequisite for all sustained success, not only in spiritual practices, but in day-to-day life as well. The general program for developing concentration is borrowed almost completely from the practice of Yoga within the Hindu and Buddhist systems. Crowley gives a general overview of the techniques in two books: Eight Lectures on Yoga and in the section called "Mysticism" in Magick
Body of light
Main article: Body of light
Crowley referred to the 'augoeides', a Greek term for the body of light, and connected it with 'the Knowledge & Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel' associated with each human being. He stressed that the body of light must be built up though the use of imagination, and that it must then be animated, exercised, and disciplined.According to Asprem (2017):
The practice of creating a "body of light” in imagination builds on the body-image system, potentially working with alterations across all of its three modalities (perceptual, conceptual, and affective): an idealized body is produced (body-image model), new conceptual structures are attached to it (e.g., the doctrine of multiple, separable bodies), while emotional attachments of awe, dignity, and fear responses are cultivated through the performance of astral rituals and protections from "astral dangers" through the simulation of symbols and magical weapons.
Crowley explains that the most important practices for developing the Body of Light are:
1. The fortification of the Body of Light by the constant use of rituals, by the assumption of god-forms, and by the right use of the Eucharist. 2. The purification and consecration and exaltation of that Body by the use of rituals of invocation. 3. The education of that Body by experience. It must learn to travel on every plane; to break down every obstacle which may confront it.
According to Crowley, the role of the body of light is broader than simply being a vehicle for astral travel — he writes that it is also the storehouse of all experience.
The benefit of astral travel is essentially one of education: it is akin to exploring one's own spiritual universe[g] and understanding its fundamental components so that the one can eventually master it. The general object is the "control of the Astral Plane, the ability to find one's way about it, to penetrate such sanctuaries as are guarded from the profane, [and] to make such relations with its inhabitants as may avail to acquire knowledge and power, or to command service". Also, "one's apprehension of the Astral Plane must be accurate, for Angels, Archangels, and Gods are derived therefrom by analysis. One must have pure materials if one wishes to brew pure beer".
Crowley believed that what was experienced during "astral travel" was not relevant in terms of what is "real" or "unreal". He thought that the only value to this practice is in the utility it provides to the practitioner.[h] He believed that the body of light is more important than simply for astral travel—that it is also the storehouse of all experiences.[i]
Magick
Main article: Ceremonial magic
According to Crowley, there is a single definition of the purpose for ritual magick: to achieve Union with God through "the uniting of the Microcosm with the Macrocosm". Since this process is so arduous, it is also acceptable to use magick to develop the self (i.e. one's body of light) or to create ideal circumstances for the Work (e.g. having access to a place in which to do ritual undisturbed). There are many kinds of magick, but the categories of ritual that are recommended by Crowley include banishing unwanted forces, various forms of invocation, and the eucharist, which "consists in taking common things, transmuting them into things divine, and consuming them".
Milestone
Further information: A∴A∴ § Initiatory structure
Crowley often wrote that every practitioners's path will be unique. He also wrote that two major milestones are fundamental to Thelemic mysticism, which he called the knowledge of and conversation with one's Holy Guardian Angel and the crossing of the Abyss. Crowley wrote, "the two crises—the Angel and the Abyss—are necessary features in every career. The other tasks are not always accomplished in [any given order]".
Holy Guardian Angel
Main article: Holy Guardian Angel
Even though the Holy Guardian Angel (or HGA) is, in a sense, the “higher self”, it is often experienced as a separate being, independent from the experiencer. In the system of the A∴A∴ magical order, the single most important goal is to consciously connect with one's HGA, a process termed “Knowledge and Conversation.” By doing so, a magician becomes fully aware of their own True Will. For Crowley, this event was the single most important goal of any practitioner of magick.
In most of his writings, Crowley described the Holy Guardian Angel as one's "Silent Self", at times equitable with one's deepest unconscious. In later writings, he insisted that the HGA is an entirely separate and objective being. Whichever position is taken, the object remains the same—to gain an intimate spiritual connection so that one's True Will can become fully known and manifested. When using the Tree of Life as a guide, this event occurs in the Sphere of Tiphareth.
Crowley wrote Liber Samekh as an example of a ritual designed specifically for attaining the Knowledge and Conversation with one's HGA. In his notes to this ritual, Crowley sums up the key to success: “INVOKE OFTEN.” Another detailed description of the general operation is given in The Vision and the Voice, Aethyr 8.
Crossing the Abyss
Main article: Abyss (Thelema)
After one attains Knowledge and Conversation with the Holy Guardian Angel, a practitioner may choose to then reach the next major milestone: the crossing of the Abyss, the great gulf or void between the phenomenal world of manifestation and its noumenal source, that great spiritual wilderness which must be crossed by the practitioner to attain mastery.
According to Crowley, Choronzon is the Dweller in the Abyss; he is there as the final obstruction. If he is met with the proper preparation, then he is there to destroy the ego, which allows the practitioner to move beyond the Abyss. If unprepared, then the unfortunate traveller will be utterly dispersed into annihilation. Both Choronzon and the Abyss are discussed in Crowley's Confessions (ch. 66).
However, just on the other side of the Abyss awaits Babalon (in the sphere of Binah on the Tree of Life). She calls the practitioner to surrender completely, so that they may cross over.[citation needed]
City of the Pyramids and the Night of Pan
Main article: Night of Pan
If a practitioner gives themselves to Babalon, as symbolised by the pouring of the practitioners' blood into Babalon's graal, they become impregnated in her, becoming a "Babe of the Abyss" who is then reborn as a Master and a Saint that dwells in the City of the Pyramids.
The City of the Pyramids is the home to those practitioners that have crossed the great Abyss, having spilled all their blood in the Graal of Babalon. They have destroyed their earthly ego-identities, becoming nothing more than piles of dust (i.e. the remaining aspects of their True Selves without the self-sense of "I"). Within, they take on the name or title of Saint or Nemo (Latin for No-Man or No-One). In the system of A∴A∴ they are called Masters of the Temple. It is a step along the path of spiritual purification, and a spiritual resting place for those who have successfully shed their attachments to the mundane world.
The City exists under the Night of Pan, or N.O.X. The playful and lecherous Pan is the Greek god of nature, lust, and the masculine generative power. The Greek word Pan also translates as All, and so he is “a symbol of the Universal, a personification of Nature; both Pangenetor, "all-begetter," and Panphage, "all-devourer".[21][better source needed] Pan is both the giver and the taker of life, and his Night is that time of symbolic death where the practitioner experiences unification with the All through the ecstatic destruction of the ego-self. In a less poetic symbolic sense, this is the state where one transcends all limitations and experiences oneness with the universe.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Work_(Thelema)
A Haiku Note:
=======================
Into a time warp
finding a new dimension
with time/space anew
=======================
As energy flows
so there, we find attention
creating our world
=======================
"Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth,
so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom
appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk
safely through the maze of human life, one needs
the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue."
~ The Buddha ~
~ (0101 1011) ~
::::::::::: 5B:::::::::::
=====: 91 :=====
======================================================
................. From the Sayings of Buddha ...............
The greatest achievement is selflessness.
The greatest worth is self-mastery.
The greatest qualities is seeking to serve others.
The greatest precept is continual awareness.
The greatest medicine is the emptiness of everything.
The greatest action is not conforming with the worlds ways.
The greatest magic is transmuting the passions.
The greatest generosity is non-attachment.
The greatest goodness is a peaceful mind.
The greatest patience is humility.
The greatest effort is not concerned with results.
The greatest meditation is a mind that lets go.
The greatest wisdom is seeing through appearances.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hunterian Art Gallery, University of Glasgow.
"The Entombment" (detail).
After RAPHAEL, Raffaello Santi; (Italian; 1483-1520)
oil on canvas 174.6 x 170.0 .This is a full-scale copy, by an unknown artist, of one of Raphael's major panel pictures, finished in 1507 (Galleria Borghese, Rome). A fine painting, it was bought by the Foulis brothers for their Academy of Fine Arts, Glasgow's first art academy, so that students could learn from an important example of the master's work. This picture was rescued by the Friends of College in 1776 from the Foulis bankruptcy sale in London. It was finally sold to the University of Glasgow in 1779. The work is an accomplished copy, by an unknown hand, of Raphael's dymanic response to Atalanta Baglioni's 1505 commission for an altar piece for San Francesco del Prato in Perugia. Robert Foulis, who inaugurated the Academy in 1754, made copious purchases of casts and 'Old Masters' - genuine or not - to support the teaching role of the school. Raphael seems to have been held in dutiful regard by the Academy, which possessed a few good copies of the master, and which issued sets of engravings after certain of his most celebrated works. Yet Raphael's position was equivocal within the fledgling Academies of Britain - he represented the epitome of 'high taste', yet could be lampooned mercilessly for that very rigidity : witness Joshua Reynolds' caricature of the 'School of Athens' of 1751, now in the National Gallery of Ireland. It indeed transpired that the Foulis Raphaels had little role in the formation of subsequent trends in Scottish art. Genre, portraiture and landscape were too important to the Scots, as was the desirability of evolving a distinctive personal style. Nevertheless, the average Foulis student may have gained from the 'Entombment' an insight into the mechanics of high art, namely, the absorption of great example transmuted by highly developed personal taste. For has not Raphael himself, in this composition, adapted, in the most cunningly surreptitious way, both the Christ figure of Michelangelo's 'Pieta' of 1497-1500 and the Virgin of Michelangelo's Doni Tondo (1503-4) for the figure supporting the swooning Virgin on the right? The Scottish artist doubtless acknowledged this complexity, but resolved ultimately to resist its convolutions. After the dissolution of the Foulis Academy, this fine copy was rescued by the 'Friends of College', who purchased it at sale in London in 1776. It was finally sold to the University of Glasgow in 1779, and remains as memorial to Glasgow's precocious artistic life in the latter half of the 18th century. Text Copyright : Marion Lawson, History of Art Department, University of Glasgow, 1984. Our painting was among the works acquired by the Glasgow University Printer Robert Foulis to hang in the Academy of painting and used by students for copying. For another of the paintings formerly in the Foulis collection see 43521, the Martyrdom of St Catherine by Cossiers. In 1768 Robert Paul, a Foulis Academy pupil, engraved a Raphael drawing for the picture then owned by Crozat. Oil copies of the heads of Saint Mary Magdalen and of Nicidemus appear in p. 3 of A Catalogue of Pictures, Drawings, Prints, Statues and Busts in Plaster of Paris done at the Academy in Glasgow, c.1763 (Duncan p.113). Another same size copy, attributed to Cavaliere d'Arpino, is in the National Gallery of Umbria in Perugia. Purchased, 1779.
www.huntsearch.gla.ac.uk/cgi-bin/foxweb/huntsearch/Detail...
======================================================
................. From the Sayings of Buddha ...............
The greatest achievement is selflessness.
The greatest worth is self-mastery.
The greatest qualities is seeking to serve others.
The greatest precept is continual awareness.
The greatest medicine is the emptiness of everything.
The greatest action is not conforming with the worlds ways.
The greatest magic is transmuting the passions.
The greatest generosity is non-attachment.
The greatest goodness is a peaceful mind.
The greatest patience is humility.
The greatest effort is not concerned with results.
The greatest meditation is a mind that lets go.
The greatest wisdom is seeing through appearances.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Book 2 - Latex Empress Shimmerah Full book
Chapter 1 - The barren lands
Chapter 2 - The shiny sisters
Chapter 3 - The ring of change
Chapter 4 - The cave of greed
Chapter 5 - The stone of seeing
Chapter 6 - The ring of Blindsight
Chapter 7 - The dungeons
Chapter 8 - The forgotten queen
Chapter 9 - A new world
Chapter 10 The Lost fogotton queen of Neonlexia
Chapter 11 - Mass Manipulation
Chapter 6 - The ring of Blindsight
Latex Empress Shimmerah, at 29 years old, has achieved significant power and territorial control, primarily through her acquisition of Omniscience from the Stone of Seeing. This newfound ability allows her to perceive beyond her immediate world, granting her a comprehensive understanding of the fallen cities of the once 12 kingdoms she has conquered. Her dominion extends over the vast sandy lands of Terrubagron, which she seized from her younger sister, Latex Empress Shellyana.
Shimmerah's influence is further bolstered by her loyal follower, Mistress Luna, a latex sorceress from Hexonu. Luna, who possesses high intellect and mastery of cosmic and other forms of magic, was initially a spy for Shimmerah, gathering crucial information. Her devotion to Shimmerah evolved into a profound, lust-driven worship, making her a willing instrument in Shimmerah's ambitions. Shimmerah, being psychic, is aware of Luna's unwavering loyalty and trusts her implicitly. Shimmerah also possesses the Mirror of Knowing, an artifact that provides answers to any question, revealing locations and methods for acquisition, though it cannot directly retrieve items. Her personal abilities include teleportation and portal creation, limited to known or previously visited locations, a limitation now overcome by her Omniscience.
Shimmerah's base of operations is her dark crystal palace in Wealthold City, which continuously draws power from potent crystals. From this vantage point, her Omniscience allows her to survey vast distances. Having secured Terrubagron within the Lost Lands, she recognized the existence of two more territories: the Woodland of Elves and the Fortress ruled by Dwarfs. She then teleported to the Dwarf Fortress, a land Shellyana had conquered three years prior after a significant war. King Ore, the Dwarf King, had submitted to Shellyana, acknowledging her as Empress of the Lost Lands. Shellyana, in turn, allowed King Ore to retain his rule and, using her Staff of Wealth, Ring of Chrysopoeia, and Ring of Change, enriched the dwarf kingdom.
Upon Shimmerah's arrival at King Ore's palace, he was already aware of her widespread conquests across Dommalex and her overwhelming beauty and power. He recognized her most formidable ability: Lustful Temptation, amplified by the Liquid Youth, which enables her to enthrall others into submission through her beauty and voice. King Ore, anticipating his fate, Ore bowing low saying “yes my Empress all is yours.” The second Ore saw her his lust took him as he forgot his people and fell in worship to her beauty looking to her shiny perfect latex black and gold outfit. Her sultry sexy smooth voice and the sound of her high-heel boots as she catwalked in. She claimed his throne, declaring all thrones and lands as hers. Overwhelmed by lust upon seeing her, he forgot his people and succumbed to worship, captivated by her shiny black and gold latex outfit, sultry voice, and the sound of her high-heeled boots. Shimmerah then transformed the entire palace into shiny gold, and changing her outfit to more gold to show her power reiterating her claim of ownership. She subsequently teleported King Ore to the dungeons of her dark crystal palace in Wealthold City before departing. Knights who heard her goddess-like voice proclaiming her rule over the land were left in awe.
Next, Shimmerah change her outfit back to black and gold and teleported to the mines north of the now golden palace. She extracted all the gold, crystals, rubies, and rare gems from the mining caves, teleporting them away and causing the land above to collapse into the caves. Her journey continued to the Gold Plains, where she entered the Temple of the Unseen. This temple housed monks of dark and light who, unless accompanied by an unseen warrior, could not look upon non-monks. These monks possessed knowledge of both good and evil and guarded the Ring of Blindsight, which concealed their activities from higher beings. Some monks had been observing Fetishiah, the succubus of lust, and her wicked practice of luring lustful girls to the Cave of Greed. Despite Fetishiah's allure in her red latex outfits, the monks had never encountered a presence as captivating as Shimmerah. The Temple of the Unseen was, as its name suggests, hidden and unheard of, known to Shimmerah only through her Mirror of Knowing, as she wished to keep her ambitions secret from the six goddesses. The monks were astonished by Shimmerah's appearance, and many were overcome with lust, finding her even more alluring than Fetishiah. Shimmerah, pleased by this validation of her superior allure, took the Ring of Blindsight and transformed the entire temple into shiny gold, making it visible to all.
Powers and Abilities
Shimmerah possesses a vast array of magical abilities, which she has cultivated and amplified over time:
1) Telekinesis: The ability to manipulate objects with her mind.
2) Teleportation: Instantaneous travel from one location to another.
3) Telepathy: The power to read and transmit thoughts.
4) Elemental Manipulation: Control over natural elements, enhanced by the Ring of the 4 Elements.
5) Weather Manipulation: The ability to control weather patterns.
6) Outfit Manipulation: The power to change or create clothing.
7) Intangibility: The ability to pass through solid objects.
8) Umbrakinesis: Manipulation of shadows and darkness, granted by the Ring of Shadows, allowing for stealth and offensive use.
9) Evocation Magic: The summoning of entities or forces.
10) Absorbing Magic: A powerful ability, learned from the Book of Forbidden Knowledge, allowing her to absorb magical energy and power from sources like crystals and entire lands. This power was instrumental in her conquest of the twelve kingdoms and queendoms, where she absorbed the power from all magic crystals in the Queendom of Glossu and subsequently from all lands, making kings and queens her slaves.
11) Lustful Temptation: Her most potent form of seduction, amplified by the Liquid Youth, allowing her to entice others into submission through her beauty and voice.
12) Object Transmutation
13) Meta magic
14) power to bring back the dead
15) Omniscience
16) Sorcery
17) power of blindsight = High beings can see her.
18) Warp reality
More about Shimmerah
Name: Shimmerah
Her parents: Queen Veloria and King Zorath
Her sister: Shellyana
Her magic teacher: Mistress Virella
Birthplace: Wealthold city - Capital of Gonzzul
Her queendom: Gonzzul
Continent - The 12 kingdoms and queendoms - when Shimmerah took over it all she renamed it to Shimmerathia
Planet: Dommalex
Height : 5, 11
Age: 29
Hair colour: black
Eye colour: light blue - but glow with power
Favourite colours: Black
Sexually: autosexual
Libido: Medium - High
Personality: narcissistic, vanity, self centered, selfish, greedy, avarice, mean, very dominant, power-hungry, gold digger,
How she see's herself, pretty, sexy, hot, perfect, attractive lustful, beautifully alluring, seductress, divine, powerful, dominant, villainous sexy girl, naughty, provocative.
Favourite fashion: Sexy shiny latex clothing, mostly black.
Favourite clothing, very dominant latex outfits, short-skirts, skin-tight catsuits, corsets, and thigh high boots
Wish in life: To rule all have all, to be all powerful, and all beautiful, perfectly stunning in everyway,
Obsessions: World domination, higher beauty, and all power.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
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Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
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this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
Print info:
Symbol: Hg
Atomic number: 80
Atomic weight: 200.59
About the Element:
I chose to represent Mercury because I have been told I have a mercurial nature and because it's a really interesting and unique metal. I find all of the associations with Mercury; space, science, alchemy, medicine, art, gods and death interesting. I love Alexander Calder's Mercury Fountain. I think I would have an overwhelming desire to run my hands throught it if I ever saw it in person.
Mercury is found either as a native metal (rare) or in cinnibar, coderoite, livingstonite and other minerals, with cinnabar (HgS) being the most common ore. Vermilion, also spelled vermillion, is an opaque reddish orange pigment, used since antiquity, originally derived from the powdered mineral cinnibar. Like all mercury compounds it is toxic. As pure sources of cinnabar are rare, natural vermilion has always been extremely expensive. In the Middle Ages, vermilion was often as expensive as gilding. As of 2007 a 35ml tube of genuine Chinese Vermilion oil paint can cost $170 (£112). Today vermilion is most commonly artificially produced by reacting mercury with molten sulfur. Most naturally produced vermilion comes from cinnabar mined in China, giving rise to its alternative name of China red.
Mercury was known to the ancient Chinese and Hindus, and was found in Egyptian tombs that date from 1500 BC. In China, India and Tibet, mercury use was thought to prolong life, heal fractures, and maintain generally good health. The ancient Greeks used mercury in ointments and the Romans used it in cosmetics. By 500 BC mercury was used to make amalgams with other metals. Alchemists often thought of mercury as the First Matter from which all metals were formed. Different metals could be produced by varying the quality and quantity of sulphur contained within the mercury. An ability to transform mercury into any metal resulted from the essentially mercurial quality of all metals. The purest of these was gold, and mercury was required for the transmutation of base (or impure) metals into gold as was the goal of many alchemists.
Hg is the modern chemical symbol for mercury. It comes from hydrargyrum, a Latinized form of the Greek word hydrargyros, which is a compound word meaning 'water' and 'silver' — since it is liquid, like water, and yet has a silvery metallic sheen. The element was named after the Roman god Mercury, known for speed and mobility. It is associated with the planet Mercury. The astrological symbol for the planet is also one of the alchemical symbols for the metal. Mercury is the only metal for which the alchemical planetary name became the common name.
About the print:
The print is a two color monotype with foiling. The main image is of a caduceus. It is the staff of the Roman god Mercury. There are also the nine planets, Mercury being closest to the sun.
About the Printmaker:
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.
It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
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olwynion yn atseinio ar unwaith ymennydd a dreuliwyd yn allanol rhyfedd ysgogi,
conversas inimagináveis surgem sintomas penetrantes horas curva,
monotone hallucinaties breidt overgrote vreemdelingen direct omliggende verschrikkingen blast,
enunț își exprimă extremități de izolare automaton drame sălbatic,
Upp á rými fjarlægð staðföst appreciations meðvitundarlaus áhrif hátíðlega miðlað,
flashing transmutations bunúsach overwhelmed inconveniencing troscán frightens me,
utilgivelig demoner onde blodtørstige posisjoner hang,
strašan fantazam zagušen introvertiranost Sensation štrajkove,
循環輻輳リサウンド肉体礼拝は沈静化.
Steve.D.Hammond.
Amethyst is a powerful and protective stone. It guards against psychic attack, transmuting the energy into love and protecting the wearer from all types of harm, including geopathic or electromagnetic stress and ill wishes from others. Amethyst is a natural tranquiliser, it relieves stress and strain, soothes irritability, balances mood swings, dispels anger, rage, fear and anxiety. Alleviates sadness and grief, and dissolves negativity. Amethyst activates spiritual awareness, opens intuition and enhances psychic abilities. It has strong healing and cleansing powers. Amethyst encourages sobriety, having a sobering effect on overindulgence of alcohol, drugs or other addictions. It calms and stimulates the mind, helping you become more focused, enhancing memory and improving motivation. Amethyst assists in remembering and understanding dreams. It relieves insomnia. Encourages selflessness and spiritual wisdom.
Amethyst boosts hormone production, tunes the endocrine system and metabolism. It strengthens the immune system, reduces pain and strengthens the body to fight against cancer. It destroys malignant tumours and aids in tissue regeneration. Cleanses the blood. Relieves physical, emotional and psychological pain or stress. Amethyst eases headaches and releases tension. It reduces bruising, swellings, injuries, and treats hearing disorders. Amethyst heals diseases of the lungs and respiratory tract, skin conditions, cellular disorders and diseases of the digestive tract.
It's the birthstone for those born in February. Although I am a Pisces March gal I always have loved the amethyst stone so I picked this one up eons ago just because it made me smile. The added "powers" it is said to have ... well those are just a bonus in my mind :)
alchemists tried making gold by changing the proportions of the Four Elements in the base metals or by attempting to speed up natural growth of lesser metals into gold. Around 100 AD, Egyptian alchemist Maria Prophetissa used mercury and sulfur to try to make gold. Around 300 AD, the alchemist Zosimos, whose recipes often came to him in dreams, was working to transmute copper. “The soul of copper,” he wrote must be purified until it receives the sheen of gold and turns into the royal metal of the Sun." A technique known as "diplosis" (“doubling”) of gold became popular.
Mental retardation (MR) is a generalized disorder appearing before adulthood, characterized by significantly impaired cognitive functioning and deficits in two or more adaptive behaviors. It has historically been defined as an Intelligence Quotient score under 70.[1] Once focused almost entirely on cognition, the definition now includes both a component relating to mental functioning and one relating to individuals' functional skills in their environment. As a result, a person with a below-average intelligence quotient may not be considered mentally retarded. Syndromic mental retardation is intellectual deficits associated with other medical and behavioral signs and symptoms. Non-syndromic mental retardation refers to intellectual deficits that appear without other abnormalities.
The terms used for this condition are subject to a process called the euphemism treadmill. This means that whatever term is chosen for this condition, it eventually becomes perceived as an insult. The terms mental retardation and mentally retarded were invented in the middle of the 20th century to replace the previous set of terms, which were deemed to have become offensive. By the end of the 20th century, these terms themselves have come to be widely seen as disparaging and politically incorrect and in need of replacement.[2] The term intellectual disability or intellectually challenged is now preferred by most advocates in most English-speaking countries. The AAIDD have defined intellectual disability to mean the same thing as mental retardation.[3] Currently, the term mental retardation is used by the World Health Organization in the ICD-10 codes, which has a section titled "Mental Retardation" (codes F70–F79). In the future, the ICD-11 is expected to replace the term mental retardation with intellectual disability, and the DSM-5 is expected to replace it with intellectual developmental disorder.[4][5] Because of its specificity and lack of confusion with other conditions, mental retardation is still sometimes used professional medical settings around the world, such as formal scientific research and health insurance paperwork.
在香港大多數都是潮籍盂蘭勝會， 廣府的確實比較少見。
一樣是觀音化生，比起潮籍大士爺冠上有着觀音像, 這位廣府大士爺手上就捧著觀音人偶。
華人民間則多採佛教說法，無論是中元盛會，或是各種類型的超度法會與齋醮，多以佛教形式塑造大士爺神像：“頂生二角、青面獠牙，高大威武，頭上還有一尊觀世音菩薩佛像，象徵其代表慈悲的觀音大士”。
大士爺的造型也因為不同習俗而有所不同。應為造價不菲，有些比較小型的法會選擇用畫像代替，心誠責靈, 原意還是一樣的.
The Lord of All Spirits is said to be a second self of the All Merciful Kwan Yin, despite his chilling looks, he is actually the "good guy" who keeps the wandering spirits in line, and to oversee the smooth transition of events at the Hungry Ghosts Festival venue.
This paper crafted statue can reach up to 20 feet tall, it will be burnt at the end of the festival, symbolizing his return to the heavenly realm.
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The Ghost Festival, also known as the Hungry Ghost Festival, or Yu Lan is a traditional Chinese festival and holiday celebrated by Chinese in many countries. In the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in southern China).
In Chinese tradition, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm.
Distinct from both the Qingming Festival (in spring) and Chung Yeung Festival (in autumn) in which living descendants pay homage to their deceased ancestors, on Ghost Day, the deceased are believed to visit the living.
On the fifteenth day the realms of Heaven and Hell and the realm of the living are open and both Taoists and Buddhists would perform rituals to transmute and absolve the sufferings of the deceased. Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is ancestor worship, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.
Activities during the month would include preparing ritualistic food offerings, burning incense, and burning joss paper, a papier-mâché form of material items such as clothes, gold and other fine goods for the visiting spirits of the ancestors
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Follow my rediscovery of the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
For my past visits to the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival
More Chinese Temples images here:
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“Anger is a great force. If you control it, it can be transmuted into a power which can move the whole world.” –William Shenstone
A photographer friend of mine told me to try shooting myself with the 35mm at a 3200 ISO at this exposure. He told me I'd get a grain I was going to love. Oh was he right!!!
better in L
NO BANNERS, please!
The much weather-worn tombstone of Sir Daniel Wilson (January 5, 1816 - August 6, 1892). He was the third president of the University of Toronto. St. James Cemetery, Toronto, Canada. Spring afternoon, 2021. Pentax K1 II
The inscription on the tombstone appears to read:
In loving memory of my ??
Sir Daniel Wilson LL.D.
President
of the University of Toronto
From 1880 to 1892
Born 5th Jan. 1816
Died 6th August 1892
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Wilson_(academic)
Sir Daniel Wilson FRSC FSA (Scot) FRSE LLD (January 5, 1816 – August 6, 1892) was a Scottish-born Canadian archaeologist, ethnologist and author.
Life
Wilson was born at 55 Potterow[1] in Edinburgh on 3 January 1816, the son of Archibald Wilson and his wife, Janet Aitken. His father is listed in directories as a book-binder, but some records state he was a wine-dealer. He was educated at the Royal High School. He was apprenticed as an engraver around 1830 then went to London, and worked in the studio of J. M. W. Turner. His skills as a water-colour painter came back into play much later in his career.
Wilson returned to Edinburgh in 1842, and was appointed Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland in 1845. He corresponded with Christian Jürgensen Thomsen and J. J. A. Worsaae, who had established the exhibition of the prehistoric material in the Danish national museum in Copenhagen in terms of the Three-age system – the succession of a Stone Age by a Bronze Age and an Iron Age. He organized the display of the Society's museum after the same chronological scheme, the first to emulate the Copenhagen museum.
In 1845 he is listed as a "printseller and artist's colourman" with premises at 25 Hanover Street and living at 32 Broughton Place.
In 1848 Wilson published Memorials of Edinburgh in the Olden Time, of which the chief value lies in the numerous illustrations, done by himself It was an important record of the many historic buildings that were at risk or were being lost in the rapid development of central Edinburgh. In 1851 he published The Archaeology and Prehistoric Annals of Scotland, which introduced the word prehistoric into the English archaeological vocabulary – he probably translated it from the Danish word "forhistorie" as used by Thomsen and Worsaae.
His final years in Edinburgh were spent at 17 Archibald Place, near George Heriot's School.
In 1853 Wilson left Scotland to take up the post of Professor of History and English Literature in Toronto. In addition to his teaching duties, he kept up his interests in natural history, geology, and was very interested in the ethnography of the indigenous groups that he encountered on his vacation treks. Many of his watercolour sketches of landscapes and encampments of hunter-gatherer groups are now in the Canadian national archives in Ottawa. His brother George Wilson had become the first director of a new national museum in Edinburgh (now the National Museums of Scotland), and Daniel Wilson actively collected ethnographic material for the museum by means of an extensive network of contacts. He was the author of Civilisation in the Old and the New World, and a number of other books, for example, a study on Thomas Chatterton, and Caliban, the Missing Link. He was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1861.
In 1875 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Sir George Frederick Harvey, John Hutton Balfour, Sir Andrew Douglas Maclagan and Sir Robert Christison. He served as president of the Canadian Institute (later the Royal Canadian Institute) from 1878-1881.
Daniel Wilson also served as president of University College, Toronto from 1880 to 1892, and as the first president of the federated University of Toronto from 1890–1892. He asserted their claims against the sectarian universities of the province which denounced the provincial university as godless, and against the private medical schools in Toronto. He advocated what he called "the maintenance of a national system of university education in opposition to sectarian or denominational colleges". He opposed the federation of colleges, particularly that of Victoria College, as a "Methodist plot".
In 1888 Wilson was knighted by Queen Victoria for his services to education in Canada, and in 1891 given the Freedom of the City of Edinburgh.
He died in Toronto on August 6, 1892.[2] He is buried in St. James Cemetery in Toronto.
Family
His older brother was George Wilson FRSE (1818–1859).
In 1840, he married Margaret Mackay.
His sister Jessie Aitken Wilson married the biologist James Sime.
Recognition
The Sir Daniel J. Wilson Residence at the University College in University of Toronto is named in his honour.
www.biographi.ca/en/bio/wilson_daniel_12E.html
WILSON, Sir DANIEL, artist, author, ethnologist, and university teacher and administrator; b. 5 Jan. 1816 in Edinburgh, son of Archibald Wilson, a wine merchant, and Janet Aitken; m. 28 Oct. 1840 Margaret Mackay (d. 1885), and they had two daughters; d. 6 Aug. 1892 in Toronto.
After attending the Edinburgh High School, Daniel Wilson entered the University of Edinburgh in 1834 but left the next year to study engraving with William Miller. In 1837 he went to London to establish himself as an illustrator and worked briefly for the painter J. M. W. Turner. Both in London and in Edinburgh, to which he returned in 1842, Wilson eked out a living through literary hack-work, producing reviews, popular books on the Pilgrim Fathers and on Oliver Cromwell and the Protectorate, essays for magazines, and art criticism for the Edinburgh Scotsman.
While still in his teens Wilson had taken to exploring and sketching the old buildings of Edinburgh. His Memorials of Edinburgh in the olden time (2v., Edinburgh, 1848) is profusely illustrated with his own woodcuts and engravings of picturesque structures and architectural details, and it contains an evocative but rambling history of the city. Wilson’s fascination with the past expressed a romantic feeling stimulated by the novels of Sir Walter Scott as well as a patriotic pride in the indigenous antiquities of Scotland, and it extended beyond the history that could be documented by written records to encompass much earlier relics and even skeletal remains. As honorary secretary of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland from 1847, Wilson visited sites and corresponded extensively with collectors throughout the country. In 1849 he compiled a synopsis of the holdings of the society’s museum which, in turn, provided him with the outline for The archæology and prehistoric annals of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1851), the first comprehensive survey of Scottish archaeological remains and one that departed substantially from the tradition of merely gathering and cataloguing curious rarities. Wilson regarded such artefacts as weapons, ornaments, implements, and tombs as the historian’s equivalent of the geologist’s fossils: just as fossils enabled the scientist to identify and characterize eras in the earth’s history, so material remains enabled the student of prehistory (a word which he introduced into the English language) to document the sequence of ages in the human past and to infer attitudes, beliefs, and rites of long-vanished cultures. Wilson adopted the three-tiered division established by Danish antiquaries and arranged Scottish artefacts in terms of the stone, bronze, and iron ages. By connecting these ages to the Christian era, moreover, he drew links between archaeology and written history and thereby extended enormously the chronological depth of the country’s past. Through the examination of skeletal remains and the measurement of skulls Wilson showed that other peoples had lived in Scotland before the Celts. His book also constituted a protest against the tendency to attribute relics that showed skill of workmanship and invention to Roman or Scandinavian influences and to assign all that was rude to Britons, and a plea that archaeology, in order to assume the status of a science, be closely associated with ethnology and that data on Scotland be compared with material from other parts of the world.
Wilson’s book helped establish prehistory as a science in Great Britain as well as his own reputation as a scholar. In 1851 he received his only degree, an honorary lld from the University of St Andrews, and in 1853, despite slight academic experience, he was appointed to the chair of history and English literature in University College, Toronto. His application was supported by Lord Elgin [Bruce*], governor of the United Province of Canada and a fellow member of the Society of Antiquaries.
Wilson’s move to Canada accentuated some of his intellectual interests and closed off other lines of development. Although he kept abreast of discoveries in Scottish prehistory and reworked and reissued his books, he was removed from direct contact with source materials and co-workers. On the other hand he responded eagerly to the ethnological possibilities of the New World. His enthusiasm for the study of the North American Indians was reinforced if not ignited by some members of the Canadian Institute. Wilson joined this scientific society in 1853, edited its periodical, the Canadian Journal: a Repertory of Industry, Science, and Art (Toronto), between 1856 and 1859, and served it in many administrative positions, including that of president in 1859 and 1860. He was instrumental in broadening the scope of its reportage on science to include ethnology and archaeology, and even added literary criticism. Members of the institute had shown a determined interest in preserving the relics, languages, and lore of the vanishing Indians; some, such as painter Paul Kane*, explorer Henry Youle Hind*, and Captain John Henry Lefroy* of the Royal Engineers, had travelled extensively in the northwestern wilderness. Wilson grew especially fond of Kane and of his patron, George William Allan, who collected native artefacts. Wilson’s growing knowledge of the native peoples owed much more to the experiences, collections, and publications of his new acquaintances than to firsthand encounters, and he saw the native peoples in the light of his European preoccupations: they were important not in and for themselves but rather because they exemplified living, primitive cultures that had once existed in prehistoric Europe.
In his new environment Wilson’s early interests in cranial types and measurement grew into an obsession, largely in response to the controversy over whether the various races of people had separate origins (polygenesis) or had developed from a single creation (monogenesis). A group of American writers, including Philadelphia physician Samuel George Morton, an acquaintance of Wilson’s, ascribed mental and moral qualities to races on the basis of the shapes of heads, argued that races were distinct species, and contended that a single head type was to be found among all North American native peoples other than the Inuit. The implications of polygenesis, and its association with justifications of Negro servitude, offended Wilson’s moral sense as well as his scientific instincts. He had grown up in a family of pronounced anti-slavery views, and in 1853 in Philadelphia he was surprised and hurt to find that people dismissed as ridiculous the idea that “the black man is sprung from the same stock as the white.” All his life Wilson remained true to the cardinal doctrine of the philosophers of the late 18th-century Scottish Enlightenment that humankind was everywhere and in all ages the same and that variations of culture and attainments were due to the circumstances in which people were placed, not innate racial character. In a series of articles, Wilson challenged the view that a single head type characterized the North American Indian race by pointing out how varied specimens actually were and how difficult it was to generalize about skulls that had been altered by diet, deliberate deformation, and burial rites.
The twin themes of the unity of mankind and the importance of the indigenous native culture of North America for illuminating European prehistory dominated Wilson’s Prehistoric man: researches into the origin of civilisation in the Old and the New World (Cambridge, Eng., and Edinburgh, 1862). Its two discursive and synthetic volumes attempted to establish man’s innate capacity by examining how certain faculties or instincts were expressed among a great diversity of races and cultures. Thus Wilson wrote of water transport, metallurgy, architecture, fortifications, ceramic art, narcotics, and superstitions in order to illustrate the ways in which human beings revealed a common ingenuity in invention and in artistic and religious expression. His entire inquiry was based on the belief that despite an immense variety of cultures and conditions all people were capable of progress, that levels of attainment were matters of social learning and environment rather than biological destiny, and that progress was by no means inevitable because man was a free agent and could relapse into savagery. Wilson was especially intent on isolating parallels and correspondences between the cultures of North America and those of prehistoric Europe. In discussing sepulchral mounds, for example, he compared the funeral rites of an Omaha chief who was buried with his horse and those of an ancient Saxon interred with his chariot: “For man in all ages and in both hemispheres is the same; and, amid the darkest shadows of Pagan night, he still reveals the strivings of his nature after that immortality, wherein also he dimly recognizes a state of retribution.”
For Wilson there was no contradiction between the psychic unity of man and the fact that certain races, favoured by environment, were more advanced than others. He was intrigued by the cultural contacts between Amerindians and Europeans and by the resulting displacement and extinction of the weaker races. North America seemed to him a gigantic laboratory of racial intermixture, and he insisted that interbreeding had already taken place in Canada to a larger extent than was commonly recognized. Because the polygenists had argued that different species of people were incapable of perpetuating hybrids that would be permanently fertile, Wilson made much of the Métis of the Red River settlement whose offspring were, he felt, in some respects superior to the original stocks. The Métis also seemed to him to point to the fate of all the aboriginal peoples of Canada: they would ultimately disappear as distinct groups, not by extinction, but by absorption into a new type of humanity. Wilson was therefore highly critical of a policy that isolated Indians on reserves and kept them in a state of pupilage; he argued that Indians themselves should manage their reserves and resources, that they should as individuals have the right to dispose of their share of reserve lands, and that individuals should be freed to compete equally with whites.
Throughout his study Wilson dwelt upon the profound differences between human beings and animals. Unlike Charles Darwin, whose theory of evolution through natural selection attempted to explain the continuity of human and animal intelligence, Wilson contrasted man’s moral sense, and his capacity to reason, accumulate, and transmit experience, with the fixed, mechanical instincts of animals. Wilson also found fault with Darwin’s hypothetical mode of argument, pointed to the lack of geological evidence for transmutation, and objected to a scientific explanation of a reality that was both material and spiritual on material grounds alone. Though in time he accepted elements of the evolutionists’ argument – such as a vast age of the earth and a remote prehistory of man – and even conceded the possibility of man’s physical evolution, he always insisted on a special creation of man’s moral feelings, instincts, and intelligence.
A British reviewer of Prehistoric man was amazed that such a study issued from the “woody depths of Canada”; closer to home, Henry Youle Hind dismissed Wilson as an armchair anthropologist who relied excessively upon the observations of others. But, though Wilson did almost no field-work in Upper Canada’s prehistory (apart from a trip to Lake Superior in 1855 to examine ancient workings of copper deposits), he did travel to museums in Philadelphia, New York, and Boston to study Indian skulls. He also visited the impressive earthworks in the American Midwest which he, like most others, concluded were the products of a race of mound-builders who had been displaced by the Indians, and he made determined efforts to gather information by sending questionnaires to Indian agents. Still, Wilson’s originality lay more in calling the attention of European scholars to the evidences of the prehistory of the Old World that could be seen in North America, and in making the ideas of European anthropology better known in Canada. His book, however, appeared at a time when Darwin shifted the terms of the debate about man from the multiple or single creation controversy to the question of man’s descent from brutish ancestors. Wilson never fully engaged this problem, nor did he ever follow other anthropologists and ethnologists inspired by the theory of evolution in constructing stages of lineal social progress along which peoples were assigned positions on the grounds of racial capacity. His reluctance to pursue these lines of argument is perhaps why one of his students, the poet William Wilfred Campbell*, judged Wilson too old and conservative to be affected by the growth of science in the latter decades of the century. On the other hand modern anthropologists, who have freed themselves from the post-Darwinian obsessions with race, have found Wilson’s work refreshing and forward-looking precisely because he was in his own time so reactionary.
Prehistoric man drew together the main elements in Wilson’s eclectic anthropological and ethnological thought, and in his later papers, some of which were collected in The lost Atlantis, and other ethnographic studies (Edinburgh, 1892), he refined and qualified ideas already set out in it. He continued to write about migration and racial intermingling, the aesthetic faculty in aboriginal people, and the relationship of the size of the brain to intellectual vigour. He came to doubt that cranial capacity offered any reliable measure of intelligence. One of his minor interests was why most people were right-handed (Wilson was left-handed and became ambidextrous) and whether this preference was due to social habit or physiology. This seemingly trivial inquiry led him to consider evidence from archaeology, philology, literature, and anatomy, and to the conclusion that the left hemisphere of the brain, which controlled the right side of the body, developed earlier than the right hemisphere.
Wilson always seemed to have several projects under way simultaneously, not all of them tangential to the subjects he taught as professor of history and English literature. Though Caliban: the missing link (London, 1873) has most often been described as a playful comparison of Shakespeare’s imaginary creation, a being between brute and man, and the fanciful inventions of modern evolutionary science, it is no less a study of the dramatist’s artistry, the supernatural creatures in his plays, and the intellectual milieu in which he wrote. In Chatterton: a biographical study (London, 1869) Wilson documented the life of the young poet who had like himself sought fame and fortune in London but who had met only despair and death by his own hand. Of these two books and the third edition of Prehistoric man, published in 1876, Wilson said in 1881 that Chatterton was his favourite.
By this date Wilson’s energies were absorbed in university administration and academic politics. He misled his friends and possibly deluded himself when he confessed a preference for the quiet scholarly life, for he relished and excelled in the affairs of the University College council and the University of Toronto senate. His prominence in the university was already established in 1860, seven years after his arrival, when he, rather than the president of University College, John McCaul*, appeared with the vice-chancellor of the university, John Langton, before a select committee of the Canadian assembly to defend the college. In his testimony Wilson adumbrated the principles of higher education that would guide him as president of University College after 1 Oct. 1880 and as president of the University of Toronto from 1887 to 1892.
Under the University Act of 1853 the University of Toronto had become solely an examining and degree-granting institution with teaching being delegated to University College and to such denominational colleges as Victoria at Cobourg and Queen’s at Kingston which were expected to affiliate with it. The University of Toronto and University College had prior claims upon the revenues from the endowment first established for King’s College; any remaining surplus was to be divided by the government among the denominational institutions. However, with the construction from 1856 to 1859 of the quasi-Gothic University College building [see Frederic William Cumberland*], to which Wilson contributed designs for gargoyles and carvings, no funds were left to be shared. The cause of the denominational institutions was taken up by the Wesleyan Methodist Church which in 1859 requested the Legislative Assembly to investigate the alleged mismanagement of University College. At the select committee hearings held the next year, before which Wilson and Langton appeared, Egerton Ryerson*, the superintendent of education for Upper Canada, denounced the unjust monopoly of revenues intended for all colleges by this “temple of privilege” run by a “‘family compact’ of Gentlemen”; censured the wastage of public funds on a needlessly elaborate building; upheld as models the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, which concentrated on the classics and mathematics, in contrast to University College, which offered too many optional subjects in the sciences, history, and modern languages; and doubted that a Christian education was attainable in a godless institution in which teachers were not imbued with the feelings and principles of religion. Ryerson hardly endeared himself to Wilson by also mentioning that there was no need to teach history and English literature at the college level since these subjects were covered in the grammar schools.
In his response on 21 April 1860 Wilson endorsed the Scottish model of higher education, especially the teaching of abroad range of subjects and the provision of options that would help prepare students in practical ways for particular professions. Wilson was contemptuous of appeals to the examples of the two old English universities which were accessible only to a privileged class and some of whose graduates struck him as men who had “just emerged from the cloister.” Both he and Langton pointed to the unmistakable trend in Britain towards severing the denominational associations of universities and the removal of all restrictions on faculties other than the theological. On this matter Wilson spoke with considerable feeling: his brother George, a chemist, had for years been kept from a university position because he could not in good conscience sign the confession of faith and the formula of obedience of the established church in Scotland. Wilson detested the sectarianism of colonial society. He argued that public financial support for the religious colleges would perpetuate class and denominational differences, whereas in a non-denominational system people with different religious convictions would intermingle and be trained to cooperate.
Wilson’s support for the principle of nondenominationalism did not mean that he wanted to divorce religion in general from higher learning or that he was an outright secularist. He believed profoundly that, though there were many ways of attaining an understanding of God and nature, truth itself was one, and that science would supplement, not challenge, the essential teaching of Scripture. Thus, far from promoting an indifference to religion, Wilson attacked ecclesiastical interference in the teaching of science precisely because such intervention in the past had impeded the discovery of truth which was both secular and spiritual.
Like Ryerson, Wilson could not refrain from mixing statements of principle with personal abuse. He insinuated that since Ryerson did not possess a university degree he could not be taken as an informed witness on higher education, to which Ryerson replied that Wilson’s own academic experience in Scotland had been brief and his only degree was an honorary one. As for Wilson’s scholarship he added that Wilson had a particular affinity for relics and that “in his leisure moments in this Country [he] has devoted himself to disembowelling the Cemeteries of the Indian Tribes, in seeking up the Tomahawks, Pipes and Tobacco which may be found there, and writing essays upon them.”
Though the select committee issued no recommendations, the hearings left a lasting impression on Wilson. He conceived an intense distaste for Ryerson in particular – “the most unscrupulous and jesuitically untruthful intriguer I ever had to do with,” he confided in his journal – and a suspicion of Methodist designs against University College in general. All subsequent proposals for a closer association of the religious colleges, especially the Methodist Victoria, with the University of Toronto, appeared to Wilson as a revival of the attempt of 1860 to despoil University College. Wilson played no role in initiating in the mid 1880s the proposals for the federation of denominational colleges with the university and, had he had his way, University College would have remained the primary teaching arm of the university with the denominational colleges becoming merely centres for theological instruction. In the difficult and protracted negotiations over the terms upon which Victoria College would enter federation, Wilson’s role was one of obstruction and resistance. He had no appreciation for the creative possibilities of the principle of university federation (which in any case was only fully realized after his death) and little understanding of the risks its Methodist supporters undertook. For him federation was a Methodist plot abetted by politicians out to secure the Methodist vote.
Wilson’s life as president of University College and later of the University of Toronto was complicated by the fact that all appointments to the teaching staff were made by the government on the recommendation of the minister of education for Ontario, and that university statutes could take effect only with the minister’s approval. These arrangements maximized the opportunities for intrigue and interference both on the part of politicians responsive to the critics of the college and university and on the part of disaffected academics who could and did take their complaints to the minister. Wilson was frequently challenged on appointments by those who advocated the hiring of native-born Canadians (or even exclusively Toronto graduates), but the most illuminating example of the cross-pressures under which he worked was the issue of the admission of women to classes at University College. Their status was quite anomalous: after 1877 they could write the matriculation examinations but they could not attend classes or obtain degrees. In 1883 Wilson cavalierly rejected applications for admission by five women. Their cause was taken up by Emily Howard Stowe [Jennings*] and the Women’s Suffrage Association, by William Houston*, legislative librarian and a member of the University of Toronto senate, and by two members of the legislature, John Morison Gibson* and Richard Harcourt*, both of whom were also members of the university’s senate. On 5 March 1884 the legislature approved a motion that provision be made for the admission of women to University College. Wilson attempted to overturn this decision by publishing on 12 March an open letter to the minister of education, George William Ross*. Wilson declared himself in favour of the higher education of women and pointed out that in 1869 he had helped found the Toronto Ladies’ Educational Association in which, until its dissolution in 1877, he had given virtually the same lectures to large groups of women that he had delivered to men at University College. He believed, however, that mixing young men and women in their most excitable years would only distract their attention from their studies. Wilson preferred the establishment of a college for women in Toronto modelled on Vassar or Smith in the United States. For Wilson coeducation was simply a cheaper and inferior alternative to these models. He later admitted privately that lecturing on Shakespeare to young men in the presence of young women would be a trying ordeal because of the sexual allusions in some of the plays.
Wilson had great faith in the powers of passive resistance and he informed the premier, Oliver Mowat*, that he would do nothing unless forced to act by an order in council. Though Ross had assured him that the government would back up its commitment with additional financial support and give the college adequate time to make adjustments, an order in council on 2 Oct. 1884, one day after the start of classes, compelled him to admit female students. To Wilson this action was not only a personal betrayal but another instance of the politicians caving in to pressure.
As the result of such experiences as these Wilson developed a hypersensitivity to even the most trivial matters as potential points of criticism or political trouble. When he learned that someone had made measurements for a five-foot-high mirror for the female students’ toilet-room he protested to the minister that it was not necessary (an ordinary mirror was sufficient for brushing hair and adjusting neckties) and might arouse unfriendly comment. In June 1886 Wilson prevented the trade union leader Alfred F. Jury* from speaking at the Political Science Club because he loathed the “communist” and “infidel” and feared that by providing a platform for the controversial figure to address students the university would invite criticism, most likely from Methodists. He constantly fretted about other opportunities for politicians to meddle in the university, and much of his surviving official correspondence with Ross is devoted to defending professors’ long summer holidays and instructing the minister on such matters as the evil effects of political appointments.
Wilson’s last years as president were hardly uneventful. On the evening of 14 Feb. 1890 fire gutted the eastern half of the University College building, destroying the library and all of Wilson’s lecture notes. In addition to dealing with restoration and reconstruction, Wilson, haunted by the spectre of total blindness from cataracts, began to rewrite his notes. During his years as a university administrator Wilson made repeated visits to Edinburgh, wrote a warm memoir of publisher William Nelson, who had helped him in the days when he had tried to make a living as a writer, and kept abreast of the activities of the Society of Antiquaries. He also closely followed developments in North American Indian ethnology and prehistory. Usually away from the university from mid July to mid September, Wilson spent many summers with his daughter Jane (Janie) Sybil sketching and executing water-colours of the natural scenery in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Upon his death he left her an estate valued in excess of $76,000, over half of which was in the form of bank shares and debentures. Following her father’s instructions, she destroyed his papers except for a diary.
Aside from the astonishing diversity of his intellectual interests, the most arresting feature of Wilson’s temperament was a romantic, poetic streak that rejoiced in ancient ruins, valued the sheer variety of cultures, and emphasized the mysterious and unknowable elements in life. Raised as a Baptist, Wilson became an Anglican evangelical; in Toronto he supported the Church of England Evangelical Association, which campaigned against ritualism, and he was one of the founders in 1877 of the Protestant Episcopal Divinity School (later Wycliffe College). He was involved in the Young Men’s Christian Association in Toronto, serving as president from 1865 to 1870, and was instrumental in establishing a Newsboys’ Lodging and Industrial Home for young street urchins, giving public lectures to raise funds to maintain it.
There was a combative element in Wilson’s character. His biographer, Hugh Hornby Langton*, who knew him well in his last years, judged that Wilson was of “an irascible disposition” but that he had learned to control his temper in public. Certainly his journal and his many letters to his friend Sir John William Dawson, principal of McGill University, bear witness to a character that did not easily suffer fools, particularly if they were clerics or politicians. In the privacy of his journal he usually referred to his political opponents in the university as “Moloch” or “the snake” and he was utterly contemptuous of politicians in general. This was one reason why he at first declined (but later accepted) a knighthood at the rank of knight bachelor, which the government of Sir John A. Macdonald announced in June 1888: since politicians were honoured with higher orders of knighthood, Wilson regarded his own as a slight to all men of letters and science. He passed acerbic judgements on the latter too. When he was requested to advise the Marquess of Lorne [Campbell*] on nominations for the Royal Society of Canada (of which he became a charter member in 1882 and president in 1885), he told Dawson he considered the whole idea premature. Although he admitted that the scientific sections of the society might do creditable work, the section on English literature and history appeared ridiculous. Wilson had written encouraging reviews of Canadian poetry in the 1850s but 30 years later he felt that, apart from Goldwin Smith*, all the prospective candidates in the men of letters category were mediocrities. “As for this Canadian Academy,” he exploded, “call it the A.S.S. or noble order of nobodies.”
Time has played strange tricks with the reputation of this self-taught, eclectic polymath. Wilson has been remembered in Britain as a man of science and letters and as a radical pioneer in Scottish prehistory, but in Canada his career as a university statesman who fought against denominational control and political interference was judged most important, while his scholarship in history, anthropology, and ethnology was treated as incidental. Thus, mainly through Langton’s biography, Wilson became primarily a university figure – indeed, the tall, spare, erect old man with a luxuriant white beard was a local character. After 1960 both historians interested in the impact of Darwin in Canada and anthropologists concerned with the indigenous roots of their discipline paid far more serious attention to his scientific writings which can no longer be dismissed as the dabblings of a dilettante.
Waxed-paper lanterns written with the words "慈航普渡" bringing upon the well-wishes of salvation for the hungry spirits to pass on to the other side where they will no longer suffer.
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** Origin and facts of the Hungry Ghost Festival:
The Ghost Festival, also known as the Hungry Ghost Festival, or Yu Lan is a traditional Chinese festival and holiday celebrated by Chinese in many countries. In the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in southern China).
In Chinese tradition, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm.
Distinct from both the Qingming Festival (in spring) and Chung Yeung Festival (in autumn) in which living descendants pay homage to their deceased ancestors, on Ghost Day, the deceased are believed to visit the living.
On the fifteenth day the realms of Heaven and Hell and the realm of the living are open and both Taoists and Buddhists would perform rituals to transmute and absolve the sufferings of the deceased. Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is ancestor worship, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.
Activities during the month would include preparing ritualistic food offerings, burning incense, and burning joss paper, a papier-mâché form of material items such as clothes, gold and other fine goods for the visiting spirits of the ancestors
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More images of the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival
More Chinese Temples images here:
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Photo shot with Nikon D600 + AF-S NIikkor 50mm f/1.8G
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If you are interested in purchasing this image, please visit Getty Images page at:
UPDATED
Presented by Infinite Productions,
Join us for an unforgettable experience:
ERASERHEAD @ LynchLand
Date: Saturday, January 20, 2024
Venue: The Brand New Eraserhead Build
Dress Code: Black/White/Grey ONLY!! (NO COLORS, please!)
(Eraserhead-themed avatars would be absolutely fantastic!! 😜)
Event Schedule:
3:00-5:00 pm: DJ Sabbian
5:00-7:00 pm: DJ Khaos
7:00-9:00 pm: DJ Aisling
9:00-11:00 pm: DJ Seventh
Poster & Visual FX by Myrdin Sommer
Don't miss out on the magic as we dive into the world of ERASERHEAD in this cutting-edge new venue! Remember to adhere to the dress code and let the MONOCHROMATIC vibes immerse you in the ultimate Lynchian experience. We can't wait to see you there!
Taxi: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Pearl%20Coast/188/214/4052
P.S. Please set your Windlight to "Shared Environment" and don't wear bright lights such as big facelights etc. Also be respectful to the FX, so please don't use your own particles!
"Welcome to LynchLand, where the magic never sleeps! Our enchanting locations are open 24/7, inviting everyone to indulge in their splendor. Feel free to meander through picturesque landscapes, capturing moments with your camera, or discovering the perfect nook to relax, embrace, dance, or simply bask in the soothing and eccentric melodies of our land radio. For an even more unforgettable experience, I extend a warm invitation to stay in our exquisitely adorned cabins and motel. Unleash laughter and camaraderie with friends in our vibrant Fun&Games Hall. Let's unite to infuse life and boundless joy into the heart of LynchLand!"
What is Eraserhead?
In David Lynch's cinematic enigma, "Eraserhead," we are immersed in the disquieting psyche of Henry Spencer, a man navigating a surreal and nightmarish urban labyrinth. Thrust into the perplexities of fatherhood through the birth of a grotesque, otherworldly infant, Henry grapples with existential dread amid the eerie echoes of industrial decay. Lynch artfully spins a disconcerting narrative, where the line between reality and the bizarre blurs, and the ordinary transmutes into the macabre. As industrial hums and haunting soundscapes envelop the story, "Eraserhead" emerges as a Lynchian parable, beckoning viewers to ponder the elusive boundaries between reality and nightmare, the familiar and the unknown. In this cinematic reverie, Lynch invites us to navigate the disquieting corridors of the mind, where every frame resonates with a haunting and transformative ambiguity. - Cate Infinity
What is LynchLand?
In the ethereal realm of LynchLand, our events transcend mere gatherings, morphing into living tapestries that breathe life into David Lynch's surrealistic and uncanny dreams. Each gathering is a mobile canvas, painted with the avant-garde strokes of brilliant DJs crafting cool soundtracks. But it doesn't end there; the pièce de résistance unfolds under the enchanting wizardry of Myrdin Sommer's lights, a spectacle that spoils the senses with brilliance. Prepare to be perpetually entranced and bewildered as you step into the enigma of LynchLand's events. We revel in the embrace of the macabre and the strange, standing as torchbearers for creativity that defies the conventional. Our purpose is to not only entertain but to spark the fires of inspiration, encouraging the birth of unforgettable events, extraordinary venues, and experiences that linger in the recesses of the mind. In LynchLand, we beckon you to traverse the borderlands of the bizarre and to witness the birth of a creative alchemy that transcends the ordinary. - Cate Infinity
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
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Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
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this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
It is believed that the soul contains elements of both yin and yang. The yin is the kui, or demon part, and the yang is the shin, or spirit part. When death occurs, the kui should return to earth, and the shin to the grave or family shrine. If a spirit is neglected, it will become a kui. The shin, or ancestral spirit watches over its descendants, and can bring good fortune if properly worshiped.
Through out the ceremony, different levels of monks will take turns to chant the "prayers of relief" for the hungry ghosts, hope to cleanse their guilt during life and provide them with sense of relief.
=====
Origin and facts of the Hungry Ghost Festival:
The Ghost Festival, also known as the Hungry Ghost Festival, or Yu Lan is a traditional Chinese festival and holiday celebrated by Chinese in many countries. In the Chinese calendar (a lunisolar calendar), the Ghost Festival is on the 15th night of the seventh month (14th in southern China).
In Chinese tradition, the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar is called Ghost Day and the seventh month in general is regarded as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm.
Distinct from both the Qingming Festival (in spring) and Chung Yeung Festival (in autumn) in which living descendants pay homage to their deceased ancestors, on Ghost Day, the deceased are believed to visit the living.
On the fifteenth day the realms of Heaven and Hell and the realm of the living are open and both Taoists and Buddhists would perform rituals to transmute and absolve the sufferings of the deceased. Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is ancestor worship, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.
Activities during the month would include preparing ritualistic food offerings, burning incense, and burning joss paper, a papier-mâché form of material items such as clothes, gold and other fine goods for the visiting spirits of the ancestors
=====
More images of the Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival here:
Hungry Ghosts "Yu Lan" Festival
More Chinese Temples images here:
=====
Photo shot with Photo shot with Nikon D600 + + AF-S NIikkor 50mm f/1.8G
=====
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
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questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
St Lawrence Jewry, Gresham Street, London
If a Martian came down to the City and was shown around the churches of the Square Mile, there is no doubt that he would think St Lawrence Jewry quite the most important. This wouldn't be just because of its perfect setting facing down Gresham Street across the square from the Guildhall, although of course that would contribute. And it certainly isn't the biggest of the City churches. But you step into an interior which is without parallel in the City for dark-wooded, serious-windowed gravitas. There is a palpable sense of patronage, of the power of conservative institutions transformed and transmuted into brass and banners, into solemn words and ethereal music. This is a place where the Church of England knows its friends, draws a line, and stands firm.
And yet, it is all an illusion, for on the night of 29th December 1940 St Lawrence was completely gutted by German incendiaries and high explosive bombs. Nothing survived except for the lower part of the tower and walls. It was, in its way, the perfect firestorm. It was a Sunday evening. The churches had been locked after the services that morning in direct contravention of the request of the City authorities for buildings to be left accessible to firefighters. Because it was Christmas week there were hardly any firewatchers on duty in the area north of Cheapside. There was a strong wind blowing, to fan the flames. And as the fires joined together covering an area of almost fifty acres, the rising heat began to draw in air from below the flames from all sides. The air drawn into the furnace was running at more than fifty miles an hour, and the result was the largest bomb site in the whole of the British Isles - although nothing to compare with anything in almost any large German city, of course.
The medieval church had been gutted in the Great Fire, and the rebuilding was one of the most expensive of all the Wren churches. As Simon Bradley points out, St Lawrence was unusual in that its walls were exposed on all sides, it wasn't jammed in among other buildings, and so attention had to be paid to the exterior. The facing in Portland stone added to its grandeur.
The architect chosen for the post-war rebuilding was Cecil Brown, with a brief to provide a church fitting for pomp and circumstance, for ceremony and seriousness. St Lawrence therefore has none of the light-wooded Festival of Britain jollity you find at Lawrence King's St Mary le Bow, or the quiet candle-lit introspection of Dykes Bowers' St Vedast. This is church as theatre. Instead of the uplifting thrill of the John Hayward and Brian Thomas glass at St Mary le Bow and St Vedast, here Christopher Webb contributed a scheme which Simon Bradley rightly describes as unobtrusive. But it all works. There is a great harmony, and a sense of a church much greater than its individual parts.
Have I made this church sound unwelcoming? It isn't. Almost every time I've been here I've found stewards inside, and they are always pleased to see visitors. And, of course, they have a lot to be pleased about.
(c) Simon Knott, December 2015
Dundas Street West, Toronto
"Otis Ray Redding, Jr. (September 9, 1941 – December 10, 1967) was an American soul singer. Often called the 'King of Soul', he is renowned for an ability to convey strong emotion through his voice. According to the website of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (where he was inducted in 1989), Redding's name is 'synonymous with the term soul, music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm and blues into a form of funky, secular testifying.' In addition, rock critic Jon Landau said in 1967 that 'Otis Redding is rock & roll'. Redding died in a plane crash at the age of 26, one month before his biggest hit, '(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay', was released.
On December 9, 1967, Redding and his backup band, The Bar-Kays, made an appearance in Cleveland, Ohio on the local "Upbeat" television show. The next afternoon, Redding, his manager, the pilot, and four members of The Bar-Kays were killed when his Beechcraft 18 airplane crashed into Lake Monona in Madison, Wisconsin, on December 10, 1967. The two remaining Bar-Kays were Ben Cauley and James Alexander. Cauley was the only person aboard Redding's plane to survive the crash. Alexander was on another plane, since there were eight members in Redding's party and the plane could only hold seven, and it was Alexander's turn in the rotation to take a commercial flight. Cauley reported that he had been asleep until just seconds before impact, and recalled that upon waking he saw bandmate Phalon Jones look out a window and say, 'Oh, no!' Cauley said the last thing he remembered before the crash was unbuckling his seatbelt. He then found himself in the frigid waters of the lake, grasping a seat cushion to keep afloat.
Redding's body was recovered the next day when the lake bed was searched. He was entombed on his private ranch in Round Oak, Georgia, 23 miles (37 km) north of Macon. The cause of the crash was never precisely determined.
'(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay' was recorded only three days before Redding's death. According to Nashid Munyan, curator of the Stax Museum of American Soul Music, Redding considered the song unfinished, having whistled the tune of one verse for which he intended to compose lyrics later. The song was released (with the place-holding whistling intact) in January 1968 and became Redding's only number-one single on the Billboard Hot 100, and the first posthumous single in U.S. chart history. '(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay' was a significant stylistic departure from the bulk of his previous work, and might have presaged a change in direction for the singer.
Shortly after Redding's death, Atlantic Records, distributor of the Stax/Volt releases, was purchased by Warner Bros. Stax was required to renegotiate its distribution deal, and found that Atlantic actually owned the entire Stax/Volt back catalog. Stax was unable to regain the rights to their recordings, and severed their relationship with Atlantic. Atlantic also retained the rights to all unreleased Otis Redding masters.
Redding had recorded a massive amount of material in late 1967 just before his death (it was from these sessions that '(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay' emerged). Atlantic had enough material for three new Redding studio albums - The Immortal Otis Redding (1968), Love Man (1969), and Tell the Truth (1970) - which were all issued on Atlantic's Atco Records. A number of successful singles emerged from these LPs, among them 'Amen' (1968), 'Hard to Handle' (1968), 'I've Got Dreams to Remember' (1968), 'Love Man' (1969), and 'Look at That Girl' (1969). Singles were also lifted from two live Atlantic-issued Redding albums, In Person at the Whisky a Go Go, recorded in 1966 and issued 1968 on Atco, and Monterey International Pop Festival, a Reprise Records release featuring the live Monterey Pop Festival performances of The Jimi Hendrix Experience on side one and Redding on side two." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otis_Redding
A person Searching for the philosophers stone and trying to transmute base metals
into gold or silver
Hunterian Art Gallery, University of Glasgow.
"The Entombment" (detail).
After RAPHAEL, Raffaello Santi; (Italian; 1483-1520)
oil on canvas 174.6 x 170.0 .This is a full-scale copy, by an unknown artist, of one of Raphael's major panel pictures, finished in 1507 (Galleria Borghese, Rome). A fine painting, it was bought by the Foulis brothers for their Academy of Fine Arts, Glasgow's first art academy, so that students could learn from an important example of the master's work. This picture was rescued by the Friends of College in 1776 from the Foulis bankruptcy sale in London. It was finally sold to the University of Glasgow in 1779. The work is an accomplished copy, by an unknown hand, of Raphael's dymanic response to Atalanta Baglioni's 1505 commission for an altar piece for San Francesco del Prato in Perugia. Robert Foulis, who inaugurated the Academy in 1754, made copious purchases of casts and 'Old Masters' - genuine or not - to support the teaching role of the school. Raphael seems to have been held in dutiful regard by the Academy, which possessed a few good copies of the master, and which issued sets of engravings after certain of his most celebrated works. Yet Raphael's position was equivocal within the fledgling Academies of Britain - he represented the epitome of 'high taste', yet could be lampooned mercilessly for that very rigidity : witness Joshua Reynolds' caricature of the 'School of Athens' of 1751, now in the National Gallery of Ireland. It indeed transpired that the Foulis Raphaels had little role in the formation of subsequent trends in Scottish art. Genre, portraiture and landscape were too important to the Scots, as was the desirability of evolving a distinctive personal style. Nevertheless, the average Foulis student may have gained from the 'Entombment' an insight into the mechanics of high art, namely, the absorption of great example transmuted by highly developed personal taste. For has not Raphael himself, in this composition, adapted, in the most cunningly surreptitious way, both the Christ figure of Michelangelo's 'Pieta' of 1497-1500 and the Virgin of Michelangelo's Doni Tondo (1503-4) for the figure supporting the swooning Virgin on the right? The Scottish artist doubtless acknowledged this complexity, but resolved ultimately to resist its convolutions. After the dissolution of the Foulis Academy, this fine copy was rescued by the 'Friends of College', who purchased it at sale in London in 1776. It was finally sold to the University of Glasgow in 1779, and remains as memorial to Glasgow's precocious artistic life in the latter half of the 18th century. Text Copyright : Marion Lawson, History of Art Department, University of Glasgow, 1984. Our painting was among the works acquired by the Glasgow University Printer Robert Foulis to hang in the Academy of painting and used by students for copying. For another of the paintings formerly in the Foulis collection see 43521, the Martyrdom of St Catherine by Cossiers. In 1768 Robert Paul, a Foulis Academy pupil, engraved a Raphael drawing for the picture then owned by Crozat. Oil copies of the heads of Saint Mary Magdalen and of Nicidemus appear in p. 3 of A Catalogue of Pictures, Drawings, Prints, Statues and Busts in Plaster of Paris done at the Academy in Glasgow, c.1763 (Duncan p.113). Another same size copy, attributed to Cavaliere d'Arpino, is in the National Gallery of Umbria in Perugia. Purchased, 1779.
www.huntsearch.gla.ac.uk/cgi-bin/foxweb/huntsearch/Detail...
My friend gailpiland told me a nice thing today
to transmute good energy around me
This is for you my friends
Have a Mery Mery Christmas !!
Thank you for your support, love and friendship XXX
Simone XXXXX
Photo edited with www.tuxpi.com
Done in Ai, Finalized in Photoshop
Inspired by and Reimagined
"From the ashes of industry, he rises unbroken."
Forged in fire and scarred by steel, the Ashborn Revenant walks the ruins of a world that once thrived. His gaze burns like molten embers, cutting through the smoke and sparks of collapsed empires. Every spike, every brand, every fracture of flesh tells the story of torment transmuted into power. He does not serve—he endures. He does not forgive—he becomes the flame.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
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Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
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this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.
It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
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questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
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questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.
The complex make-up takes many hours to complete before the participant can transmute into his ritual deity.
Hunterian Art Gallery, University of Glasgow.
"The Entombment" (detail).
After RAPHAEL, Raffaello Santi; (Italian; 1483-1520)
oil on canvas 174.6 x 170.0 .This is a full-scale copy, by an unknown artist, of one of Raphael's major panel pictures, finished in 1507 (Galleria Borghese, Rome). A fine painting, it was bought by the Foulis brothers for their Academy of Fine Arts, Glasgow's first art academy, so that students could learn from an important example of the master's work. This picture was rescued by the Friends of College in 1776 from the Foulis bankruptcy sale in London. It was finally sold to the University of Glasgow in 1779. The work is an accomplished copy, by an unknown hand, of Raphael's dymanic response to Atalanta Baglioni's 1505 commission for an altar piece for San Francesco del Prato in Perugia. Robert Foulis, who inaugurated the Academy in 1754, made copious purchases of casts and 'Old Masters' - genuine or not - to support the teaching role of the school. Raphael seems to have been held in dutiful regard by the Academy, which possessed a few good copies of the master, and which issued sets of engravings after certain of his most celebrated works. Yet Raphael's position was equivocal within the fledgling Academies of Britain - he represented the epitome of 'high taste', yet could be lampooned mercilessly for that very rigidity : witness Joshua Reynolds' caricature of the 'School of Athens' of 1751, now in the National Gallery of Ireland. It indeed transpired that the Foulis Raphaels had little role in the formation of subsequent trends in Scottish art. Genre, portraiture and landscape were too important to the Scots, as was the desirability of evolving a distinctive personal style. Nevertheless, the average Foulis student may have gained from the 'Entombment' an insight into the mechanics of high art, namely, the absorption of great example transmuted by highly developed personal taste. For has not Raphael himself, in this composition, adapted, in the most cunningly surreptitious way, both the Christ figure of Michelangelo's 'Pieta' of 1497-1500 and the Virgin of Michelangelo's Doni Tondo (1503-4) for the figure supporting the swooning Virgin on the right? The Scottish artist doubtless acknowledged this complexity, but resolved ultimately to resist its convolutions. After the dissolution of the Foulis Academy, this fine copy was rescued by the 'Friends of College', who purchased it at sale in London in 1776. It was finally sold to the University of Glasgow in 1779, and remains as memorial to Glasgow's precocious artistic life in the latter half of the 18th century. Text Copyright : Marion Lawson, History of Art Department, University of Glasgow, 1984. Our painting was among the works acquired by the Glasgow University Printer Robert Foulis to hang in the Academy of painting and used by students for copying. For another of the paintings formerly in the Foulis collection see 43521, the Martyrdom of St Catherine by Cossiers. In 1768 Robert Paul, a Foulis Academy pupil, engraved a Raphael drawing for the picture then owned by Crozat. Oil copies of the heads of Saint Mary Magdalen and of Nicidemus appear in p. 3 of A Catalogue of Pictures, Drawings, Prints, Statues and Busts in Plaster of Paris done at the Academy in Glasgow, c.1763 (Duncan p.113). Another same size copy, attributed to Cavaliere d'Arpino, is in the National Gallery of Umbria in Perugia. Purchased, 1779.
www.huntsearch.gla.ac.uk/cgi-bin/foxweb/huntsearch/Detail...
---- Angels & Demons (devil tries to tempt Saint Lucia, August 2018, Savoca - Sicily) ----
---- Angeli & Demoni (il demonio tenta Santa Lucia, agosto 2018, Savoca - Sicilia) ----
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Qi Bo's photos on Flickr Hive Mind
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
this is a photographic narration that speaks of the eternal struggle that takes place between good and evil, which speaks of a dark period of history, speaks of the violence suffered by women but also by those who belonged to the poorest social classes, historical facts that have been handed down to us in the form of a story and associated-transmuted in the martyrdom of Saint Lucia, this is what happens in the town of Savoca (Sicily). This is a short and long report, I did in Savoca on August 2018 about the living representation of the martyrdom of Saint Lucia (patron saint of the city of Savoca); the cult of the young Saint of Syracuse seems to date back to the fifteenth century, under the influence of Spanish traditions. The commemoration of the history of St. Lucia occurs in two consecutive days, Saturday and Sunday: here I try to tell some times of the day on Sunday, a day during which the festival is held at the height of her beauty. And 'This is a historical event which speaks of Demons and Angels: Saint Lucy refused to marry a rich and powerful suitor (Lucy declared She was married in Christ), which reported the Christian faith of Lucia to prefect Pascasio that ordered his Praetorian Guard to drag Lucia with a rope to a place of prostitution; legend has it that the Holy became heavy, they then tried to drag it with the help of oxen, but it was impossible to move it from where he stood; failing in this, it was then given the order to cavarle eyes, but the young martyr (native of Syracuse) her eyes reappeared.
In the village of Savoca a young girl, affectionately called the "Lucy" is carried on the shoulder of a porter along the streets of the country (sitting on a pillow tied on the shoulder of a man, but in fact men are two); the young Saint remains impassive in the face of demonic temptations: the Devil, called in Sicilian dialect "u Diavulazzu, shake, shakes, turns his pitchfork in an attempt to "distract" the Saint.
The first day of this representation, on Saturday, in an old church in Savoca, the two girls who impersonate the Lucia, of the current year and the previous year, meet with the delivery of palm; the traditional event which we witness on Saturday, has all the appearance of an important rehearsal for the next day, on Sunday when the traditional festival will take place in all its beauty.
Sunday: on top of the procession there are the "Jews" (the emissaries of the prefect Pascasio) along with some Angels, is located immediately after the wagon drawn by two cows from which branches off a rope that will arrive to Saint Lucia (a girl of six years); between her and the cows there are Roman soldiers, who make their way through the crowd squirming like crazy; to hold the rope there are also male figures; the job of Devil (his mask is made of wood, whose invoice is dated, it seems, of the 400') is to distract the little Saint with the help of a long stick equipped of curved points, called "u 'croccu": Lucia hardly is deceived by the promises of the evil one, she will not abandon the state of her property concentration, aided in this by staring, almost in a trance, a small palm branch in silver , she brings devoutly in her hands.It's very important to mention the Baron Baldassarre (nicknamed Baron Altadonna), who applied without any hesitation the practice of Jus de seigneur: using this law the Baron obliged the young brides to spend the wedding night in his alcove. It 'very possible that in the representation of Saint Lucia of Savoca the character of the Devil tempting young Santa with his pitchfork, in reality is nothing but himself, Baron Altadonna, so allegorically described in this traditional Sicilian feast: the figure of the Devil if one takes into account what historians relate, does not belong more to the legend, but sadly to actual event happened. Post scriptum: the photographs, realized both on Saturday and Sunday, were organized and posted without taking into account the temporal chronology of what happened during the two days of the event; two photos of the mummy of Baron Altadonna have been included, which is located in the crypt of the Capuchin Fathers of Savoca; the portraits of two "Lucie" from previous editions, grandfather and great-grandfather of the "DIAVOLI" dynasty were included; the "silver palm" was delivered by Lucia of 2016 (Valentina), to the current Lucia (Miriana), in 2017 the event was not performed.
Ezio Famà.
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questa è una narrazione fotografica che parla dell'eterna lotta che avviene tra il bene ed il male, che parla di un periodo buio della storia, che parla delle violenze subite dalle donne ma anche da coloro che appartenevano alle classi sociali più povere, fatti storici che sono stati tramandati fino a noi in forma di racconto ed associati-trasmutati nel martirio di Santa Lucia, questo è quanto accade nel paese di Savoca (Sicilia). Questo è un report corto e lungo, che ho realizzato in quel di Savoca lo scorso mese di Agosto 2018, su quella che è la rappresentazione vivente del martirio di Santa Lucia (Santa patrona della città di Savoca); il culto della giovane Santa di Siracusa sembra risalire al XV secolo, sotto l'influenza delle tradizioni spagnole. La rievocazione vivente della storia di S.Lucia avviene in due giornate consecutive, il sabato e la domenica: qui tento di raccontare alcuni momenti della giornata della domenica, giorno durante il quale la festa si svolge nel pieno della sua bellezza. E' questa una rievocazione storica che parla di Demoni ed Angeli: la storia rievoca di quando la Santa, si rifiutò di andare in sposa ad un suo ricco e potente pretendente (essendosi dichiarata Cristiana e sposa in Cristo), il quale per vendetta riferì della fede Cristiana di Lucia al prefetto Pascasio; costui diede ordine ai suoi pretoriani di trascinare Lucia con una corda fino ad un lupanare, un luogo di prostituzione; la leggenda narra che la Santa divenne pesantissima, si tentò allora di trascinarla con l'ausilio dei buoi, ma fu impossibile smuoverla da dove si trovava; non riuscendo in ciò, fu allora dato l'ordine di cavarle gli occhi, ma alla giovane martire (nativa di Siracusa) gli occhi le rispuntarono. Nel paese di Savoca una giovane ragazza, chiamata con affetto "la Lucia" viene portata in spalla lungo le vie del paese (seduta su di un cuscino legato sulla spalla di un uomo; in realtà gli uomini portatori sono due, dandosi il cambio l'un l'altro); la giovane Santa rimane impassibile di fronte alle tentazioni demoniache: il Diavolo, chiamato in dialetto siciliano "u Diavulazzu, agita, scuote, fa ruotare il suo forcone nel tentativo di "distrarre" la Santa ma, vani saranno i suoi tentativi. Il primo giorno di questa rappresentazione, il sabato, in una vecchia chiesa di Savoca, le due bambine che impersonano la Lucia, dell'anno in corso e dell'anno precedente, si incontrano con la consegna della palma da una bimba all'altra; l'evento tradizionale al quale si assiste il sabato, ha tutto l'aspetto di una importante prova generale per il giorno dopo, quando la domenica la festa tradizionale avverrà in tutta la sua bellezza.La domenica: in cima alla processione ci sono i "Giudei" (gli emissari del prefetto Pascasio) insieme ad alcuni Angeli, subito dopo si trova il carro tirato da due giumente dalle quali si diparte una corda che giungerà fino a cingere il fianco della bimba che impersona Santa Lucia (una bambina di sei anni); tra lei e le giumente ci sono i soldati Romani, che si fanno largo tra la folla dimenandosi a più non posso; a tenere la corda ci sono anche delle figure maschili che evitano che gli strattonamenti dei soldati romani possano giungere fino alla Santa (ricordiamolo, che è legata a quella corda); davanti alla Santa piroetta il diavolo tentatore, u' Diavulazzu (la maschera è in legno, la cui fattura è datata, sembra, del 400'), il cui compito è quello di distrarre la piccola Santa con l'aiuto di un lungo bastone dotato di punte ricurve, chiamto dialettalmente "u' croccu": Lucia difficilmente si lascerà ingannare dalle promesse del Maligno, non abbandonerà quel suo stato di immobile concentrazione, aiutata in ciò dal fissare, quasi in stato di trance, un piccolo ramo di palma in argento, che lei strige devotamente tra le sue mani. E’ fondamentale menzionare tra i vari personaggi storici della tradizione, il barone Baldassarre, vissuto in Savoca in epoca medioevale, soprannominato barone Altadonna, che applicava senza remora alcuna la pratica della Jus primae noctis: avvalendosi di questa legge il barone obbligava le giovani spose a trascorrere la prima notte di nozze nella sua alcova. E’ fortemente ipotizzabile che nella rappresentazione di Santa Lucia di Savoca il personaggio del Diavolo che tenta la giovane Santa col suo forcone, in realtà non sia altro che egli stesso, il barone Altadonna, così allegoricamente descritto nella festa tradizionale siciliana: la figura del Diavolo, se si tiene conto di quanto narrano gli storici, non apparterrebbe più alla leggenda, ma a questo tristo personaggio realmente vissuto, che usava quotidianamente la moneta della prepotenza. Post scriptum: le fotografie, realizzate sia il sabato che la domenica, sono state organizzate e postate senza tenere conto della cronologia temporale di quanto avvenuto nei due giorni della manifestazione; sono state inserite due foto della mummia del barone Altadonna, che si trova nella cripta dei Padri Cappuccini di Savoca; sono stati inseriti i ritratti di due "Lucie" delle precedenti edizioni, del nonno e del bisnonno della dinastia dei "DIAVOLI"; la "palma d'argento" è stata consegnata dalla Lucia del 2016 (Valentina), alla attuale Lucia (Miriana); nel 2017 la manifestazione non è stata eseguita.
Ezio Famà.