Max Gierymski's horses

 Salvate Omnes,

just to start your day - 
Polish painter (or going via current American parlance, then he was a Polish Russian painter) Maksymilian Giermyski painted lots of horse in his short life.

there are photos and scans of his art, and Polish National Library - Polona- has some old albums digitized .

Unfortunately most of those single canvases are not available in color, yet there are some - two of them I have attached here.
Also sketches and details of his painting - Insurgent Patrol.(1863-4 January Uprising in Polish Russia aka Congress Kingdom).

Valete

Ambrogio Spinola Doria - maestro of war

 Salvete Omnes,

the clouds of war seem, according to the msn media and respective governments, to be hanging menacing low over the steppes  and shores of Ukraine, Belarus and Russian Federation in the east of Europe (and east of that funny union), and with mysharonacirrus-19 laid to rest (tell it to a certain, fancy socks wearing, prime minister of Canada and his afficionados ), let me share some images showing  one hell of a command master - XVII century condottiero/condottiere Ambrogio Spinola Doria from Genoa and in the service of the Crown of Spain. 

early (1609AD) portrait by Michiel Jansz. van Mierevelt

  - surrender of Breda detail - by Diego de Velazquez, 

Surrender of Julich/Juliers details - by Jose Leonardo

and another surrender of Julich by Peter Snayers

and a print by Crispin de Passe

and another, later  1628AD,  portrait by maestro van Dyck

Valete

Maksymilian Gierymski - some sketches

 Salvete Omnes,

there was this uprising in Polish Russia back in 1863 - and the hopeless struggle known as January Uprising drew 200,000 young men to the guerilla-like armies of the Polish insurgents. One of these soldiers was a very young student Maksymilian Gierymski from Warsaw, the capital of Russian Poland (Congress Kingdom). 

Young Giermyski, born in 1846 AD, participated in the guerilla warfare against the Russian Imperial army, and this more than a year long field service must have been imprinted in his mind's eye, and thus influenced his art too - as evidenced by his sketches and paintings. Maestro Gierymski did not live long and tragically succumbed to tuberculosis in 1874AD, his untimely death cut down his developing artistic career .  But that is every Earthling's destiny - to live and to  die one day for certain. C'est la vie.

Here are some of his sketches  - horses, Russian Cossacks, uhlans and Polish guerillas. 

In the future I will share some more of Max Giermyski's works - eg as related to Mazepa, both the Byron's poem and historic Mazepa in the certain Polish 17th century memoir.

Valete

Winged Hussar from De Re Miltiari

 Salvete Omnes,

happy to announce that the Polish publisher Infort Edition has published the new volume of their De Re Militari magazine - 172 page of military history.
It can be had from their Wanax store page.

And on the front cover my winged hussar companion with of the Cecora-Chocim 1620-21 A.D. period.

The back cover has the winged hussar retinue with camp servants, horses, wagons , and oxen. 

Nowy numer De Re Miltiari - nr 6 (2022-1)  

 Valete

Baba Yaga

 Salvete Omnes,

I do like fairy and folk tales, and some of the best ones are our old pre- and post-Christian Slavic tales,  while the Russian folk tales are my favorites (especially Konik Garbunok).
But there are lots of similarities between all Slavic fairy tales when comes to the demon-witch and other dark characters,  that goes back to the pagan beliefs and customs; also many tales across the great Eurasian steppe share similarities and common characters, even some relate Baba Yaga (Baba Jaga in Polish) with ancient Greek Kirke...  so this is a field that has been the subject of many studies, as this list from Academia can exemplify.

While drawing and seeking for something good to listen I came across this YT channel - The Histocrat - and I listened to one of their productions - Baba Yaga - Mythillogical (I was interested in the Heracles story but that 2 part presentation will be for later days).

So I rather enjoyed their, Charles and Crofty, presentation - they center on the Russian Baba Yaga stories and place it more within the Russian and eastern Slavic tradition, but that is not a big deal, becasue hat is material to the story of Baba Yaga and various tales they go over, that they do this tale with style and gusto, and keep the listener, in my case at least, interested.  Which makes this presentation quite a feast I must add. 

In order to make the post more colorful and more lively below  I am adding  some images of Baba Yaga, Bogatyr-witez created by famous Russian illustrator Ivan Bilibin.

enjoy the presentation

In Polish short film production there is a fun feature film titled Jaga (Yaga) which is a take on the old tales and fables, and quite enjoyable -

 

nota bene, in the second season of Netflix Witcher there is a house or hut on chicken legs, but the series season 1 and 2 are not as enjoyable as the books by Sapkowski have been to me. C'est la vie

Valete

Terracotta horseman from Greek Sicily - Boston MFA

 Salvete Omnes,

In this post we will yet again canter to Magna Graecia, where Greek colonists from the ancient Greece proper, between the XI through V century BC, migrated and established city states all over  southern Italy and Sicily, in process of settling, expanding, conquering the native population and/ or merging with the indigenous people (the best example might be the kingdom of Bosporus in Crimea) and  creating great civilization and  plenty of great art.

Allegedly from the beautiful island of Sicily comes one of the extraordinary late VI century BC sculptures - a hunter on horseback with a dog, Sculpted in terracotta, a bit restored, and still beautiful. 

 
Boston Museum of Fine Arts is the owner of this figure. On the linked page there is a bit of information about this piece and its peculiarities.

for further study, drawing and interpreting 

Valete