It's actually a Goldcrest. Siskins are gorgeous little birds, too, though.

Thank you for the compliment, and yes they are adorable little birds.

In past times Welsh children who loaned something to a friend would sometimes say:

'Give a thing,
Take a thing,
Wear the bwgan's ring.'

The rhyme seems to be a curse-in-advance: if you don't give it back, a bwgan (ghost/goblin) will get you.
#WyrdWednesday #folklore #Wales

"As I leukit our ma father's castle,
I saw a bodie stanin;
I took aff's head and drank's bleed,
And left's body stanin?"
"A bottle."
Old Scottish Riddle.

#WyrdWednesday @wyrdwednesday.bsky.social

A photo taken by me of a Goldcrest perched among a tangle of branches in early spring.

For #WordlessWednesday.
#birds #birdsky

Ludwig Hesshaimer, 'Paranoia', 1920s.
#weird #weirdart #Austria #1920s

In a woodcut by John Lawrence, a flying old woman has sliced a leaping horse in half. The forequarters and the man riding the pony are landing on the other further side of a stream. The story and illustration can be found in 'Everyman's Book of English Folk Tales' by Sybil Marshall, 1981.

Female bogles are scarce in #folklore. Jeannie lived in a cave near Whitby, #Yorkshire. A farmer was foolish enough to taunt her and she chased him with her wand. The bogle couldn't cross running water, so he spurred his horse over a brook. She lashed out, slicing the horse in half, but he was safe.

Something witchy for #ThickTrunkTuesday

In a filling bathtub, there is a large flatfish with a woman's face on its side.

Another weird picture: 'A Sole In A Bathtub' by Domenico Gnoli.
#weirdart #artsky

Margery Allingham's Campion, the apparently equable but ruthless crime-fighter with a genius for self-effacement when evil plots are being quietly discussed, surprises a suspect in The Strand Magazine for June 1937. The story is 'Danger Point', the illustrator Clive Uptton.
#detection #crime #1930s

I have an ancient Kindle that gives me no idea of a book's length until I'm 1% through it. For me, this is reckless behaviour. Who needs drugs, eh? Or a social life?

Title: Easter Egg Hunt techniques inspired by great detectives Panel 1: Sherlock Holmes. Deduce the exact location of every egg from seemingly unrelated details without leaving your room. Send your amazed sidekick to fetch them. Panel 2: Jack Reacher Hit the garden hard and fast. Take no prisoners Get back on the road. This approach results in a thrillingly intense hunt, but very few intact eggs. Panel 3: George Smiley Meticulously assess documents, people and motives. Then scrupulously collect the eggs and dejectedly wonder if any of it was worthwhile.

My Easter books cartoon for @theguardian.com

A poster (probably American) from 1903 warning of the dangers of alcoholism. Under the banner headline 'Ten nights in a bar-room' we see a man sitting at a bar stool manically trying to fight off imaginary monsters. Below him are the words: 'Keep them off! Keep them off! Oh horror! Horror!'

I hope you're all enjoying the holidays!
#weird #posters #posterart #monsters

Something for Easter Sunday (sort of): 'The Gates Of Heaven' by Sidney Sime, reproduced in The Strand Magazine for April 1908.
#illustration #weirdart #fantasyart #artsky #SidneySime

Easter Folklore and THREE Haunted Co-ops in Swindon Weird Wiltshire published a post on Ko-fi

Just when you thought you'd heard it all, Wiltshire surprises us again. We have three haunted Co-ops in Swindon. THREE! All haunted! Find out more here along with some Easter folklore! 👻🌻👻

ko-fi.com/post/Easter-...

While we often associate the works of MR James with the Yuletide season, one of his most celebrated tales takes place in the spring at Easter, a story of an ill fated hunt for the lost crowns of Anglia - A Warning to the Curious!

#podcast #GhostStories #MRJames #horror

Foliate head roof boss, Holy Trinity, Skipton.

Apologies for the quality, taken at the absolute limit of my hand held phone for zooming and for light.

Church guide says C16 but with later restorations, notably after the Civil War when the nearby castle was besieged and the church damaged.

Mandragora. Tacuinum sanitatis, Rhineland 15th century. BnF, Latin 9333, fol. 37r. #medieval #MedievalArt

Mandragora. Tacuinum sanitatis, Rhineland 15th century. BnF, Latin 9333, fol. 37r.
#medieval #MedievalArt

#Dragon-eater. bestiary, England c. 1200. Aberdeen University Library, MS 24, fol. 47r. #medieval #MedievalArt

#Dragon-eater. bestiary, England c. 1200. Aberdeen University Library, MS 24, fol. 47r.
#medieval #MedievalArt

It seems to have started with some reference in an Anglo-Saxon book but I don't know the details. Maybe there's an Old Testament reference to the mouth of Hell... dunno.

“Nor ear can hear nor tongue can tell
The tortures of that inward hell!”

(Lord Byron)

🎨 Eugène Delacroix “The Confession of the Giaour” (c 1830)

#bookwormsat

Painting. A setting sun, a castle in the distance. A man on horseback looks down from a bank near a body of water. Various fairies are sleeping in the boughs of the trees, gathered around the water's edge, and flying in the sky in the distance.

'And pleasant is the fairy land,
But, an eerie tale to tell,
Ay at the end of seven years,
We pay a tiend to hell'
~'Tam Lin', Scottish Ballad

🎨 'Fairy Land' by Gustave Doré
#BookWormSat

I've not see enough colour work by Dore - I must seek out more.

Pan playing his pipes surrounded by the damned.

'The Magician' is a 1908 novel by Somerset Maugham. It features an occultist named Oliver Haddo (modelled on Aleister Crowley), who seduces a young woman. In the 1926 film adaptation, she experiences a terrifying vision of Pan in Hell. #BookWormSat

📷 Hubert Stowitts as Pan.

Want to SEE that. Er, actually, I want to read that then see that!

According to 'The Devil's Atlas' by Edward Brooke-Hitching, the idea of a beast's mouth goes back to the Anglo-Saxon period. He reproduces a depiction from the 12thC Winchester Psalter. In the pic I used, it appears as much owl as cat - both linked to witches since at least the 14thC witch trials.

"The mind is in its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n."

- John Milton, 'Paradise Lost'
#BookWormSat #Milton #poetry #poetrysky

"There is only one principle in Hell. Bring back food or be food yourself."
- C S Lewis, 'The Screwtape Letters'

#BookWormSat #CSLewis #demonology #BookChatWeekly
(I had to repost this because a Renaissance painting of Hell was AdultContent-ed. *sigh* So here's 'Calvin In Hell' by Heemskerck)

Fontana paperback cover of The Labours of Hercules by Agatha Christie, a short story collection that includes The Capture of Cerberus.

"Chère Madame—where can I find you?"

Her reply came to him faintly from the depths. It was unexpected, yet seemed at the moment strangely apposite.

"In Hell…"

Hercule Poirot blinked. He blinked again.

#BookWormSat

Poirot catcalls Countess Vera Rossakoff in The Capture of Cerberus (1947)

Those Fontana covers were just great.