Salvete Omnes,
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| Mars |
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| Marcus Curtius |
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| it reminds me of Rawicz coat of arms |
Audaces Fortuna juvat
and a period curb-bit from the Fortuna print
enjoy
Valete
Salvete Omnes,
April 1st or April Fools Day - what a Spring day to behold ..
so let me invite you to the ancient Greek mythological hero's adventure - the lion pelt clad and with armed with a bow and club Heracles, son of Alcmene and god Zeus, sailed on his quest for the belt of Hippolyte, the queen of Amazons. Accordingly the name Amazon was meant to mean ' without a breast, because the right breast was cut off, that it might not hinder the use of bow' and javelin.
According to Apollodorus, in his 9th labor Heracles was ordered by the 'evil' Eurystheus, king of Tiryns, to fetch him the belt of Hippolyte (belt of Ares), the queen of the Amazon warrior-women from the river Thermodon [in Pontus according to Strabo].
Heracles, according to Apollodorus, came by ship with his companions, and having put into the harbor of Themiscyra was visited by queen Hippolyte wearing the belt. Goddess Hera, always trying to derail Heracles in his efforts, arrived in the likeness of an Amazon warrior and went up and down the horde of Amazons saying the strangers who had arrived were carrying off the queen. So the Amazons in arms charged astride their horses down the harbor. But when Heracles saw them in arms, he suspected treachery, and killing Hippolyte stripped her of her belt. And after fighting the rest[of the Amazon host] he sailed awaya dna touched at Troy.'
Diodorus, Book II, 4-16., gives a detailed description of the battle between Heracles and the Amazons.
valete
Salvete Omnes,
so we have this brand new year, whatever... but life and Old Man Time are relentless in their going, so many thousand years ago Heraclitus of Ephesus cleverly stated - panta rhei... and some other sentences worth pondering.
My new drawing tablet has not arrived before the end of the last year, so I am looking forward to get it this year, fingers crossed.
Ad rem, the recommendation -
yesterday I finished reading a 'historical fantasy' novel by a British writer Dan Davis and it was a very enjoyable 'ride' into the Eurasian steppe some 5000 years ago, especially since his fictional story is so deeply immersed into the Yamnaya and other prehistoric cultures of our Eastern Europe, but also is based on the ancient Greek and other Indo-European mythology, including mu most favorite Greek mythology hero - Heracles.
The story titled Godborn is already the second novel in his Gods of Bronze series, and I am looking forward to read the next installment sometime this year (so many books and articles to read, especially on academia,edu and archive.org and other research and internet libraries).
And the same author Dan Davies has a channel on YT, and there you can find many interesting presentations , and one of them is this presentation on the Maykop culture in the Kuban steppe (3,700-3000 BC) and North Caucasus reaching south to the Kura River (and Kura-Araxes culture) and Transcaucasia; so the Maykop existed along the Yamnaya culture in the north, including also a separate cultural 'fusion' known in Russian archaeology as Novotitorovskaya culture (very interesting wagons that have been discovered all over the area and more about them in the future). Meantime in the south, in today's Iraq there was Uruk and the flowering of the Summerian culture (rather known via school education and multiple museum collections).
Enjoy Dan's presentation and his novels (but be forewarned that his book covers for the Gods of Bronze are pure fantasy) - note that is basically based on David Anthony's book The Horse, the Wheel et al. - which is great and it shows that our author is doing his research and is versed in the subject quite deeply. Congrats! (obviously also Mallory and others).
Nota bene from the Maykop kurgan (of the Mykop culture) comes probably the oldest image of the horse of the post-glacial period in human history.
from one of the most influential Soviet and Russian archaeologists Svetlana Alexandrovna Pletnieva's book on the cultural treasures from the Hermitage museum comes this photo of the metal(silver) vessel with a horse- above, and a drawing showing the horse with other animals (you could watch Dan's video presentation for details or read dr Anthony's chapter on the Maykop chief/king burial) from the vessel itself.
and one of the bulls from the burial.
Valete
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| schooling young riders |
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| Godess Athena in the sculptors' workshop |
