Observations · Palaeontology · Nature · Ethnography

I read a post on an anthropology channel about Elliot Smith and hyperdiffusionism, which among other things hints at the penetration of Egyptian culture into America, explained by the presence of images of elephants in Mesoamerican art…

I shall not hold forth at length on Mesoamerican art and Egypt, still less on the views of Elliot Smith. I will say only that there were, of course, elephants in America. And of the most various kinds. If we speak of the family Elephantidae proper, America was widely populated

Faith · Ethnography · Humour

The Slavic household spirit that brought wealth, hatched from a black hen's egg

In principle, anyone at all might hatch from such an egg. The Slavs, for instance, had a deity of sorts: a house spirit and enricher that served people entangled with sorcery and brought them riches taken from other people. It was called the shkryatok, the khovanets or the rarasek, it

Art · Moscow · Observations · Society Pages · Ethnography

Seychelles coral amulet by Chanel Alphonse at Hide Gallery in Cube.Moscow

At a tiny exhibition at Hide Gallery in Cube.Moscow I came across this island talisman. The sculpture has a most interesting history: the gallerists found it in the studio of an artist who carves such figures from coral in some little village in the Seychelles, to protect his family

Archaeology · Museums · Ethnography

Funerary wreaths of ancient Greece and their place in the rites of farewell to the dead

The funerary rites of Ancient Greece bear some resemblance to the customs of bidding farewell to the dead in many modern cultures. The dead were washed and dressed, a wreath or a precious headband was placed on the head, and only then could one take leave of the deceased at

Faith · Art · Mores · Ethnography

Easter Subjects in Kustodiev's Paintings and “Khristosovanie” of 1916

Kustodiev's Easter paintings: The Exchange of Easter Greetings, Bright Resurrection, Easter Day, The Easter Service, Easter Eve. The most famous, of course, is The Exchange of Easter Greetings of 1916, with a merchant and his wife kissing before a rich festive table laid with kulich, paskha, eggs, meat,

Faith · Books · Moscow · Mores · People · Ethnography

Artist Boris Kustodiev on Easter in Moscow, the Kremlin cathedrals and the sound of bells

“And on the first day of Easter, after that great and joyous night, you go to the Kremlin, and there, in a sheltered spot, in the sun, sit the pilgrim wanderers, resting. They peel crimson-dyed eggs, and the coloured shells lie scattered all around, and somehow this goes so

Faith · Observations · Ethnography

Red eggs for Easter, blue and violet ones for memorial days, yellow for Trinity

Warmest congratulations to all on the approaching feast of Easter! For those who are only now getting ready to dye their eggs, I remind you of the custom of dyeing Easter eggs red. Violet and blue, however, are for a family that has lost someone in the course of the

Monarchies · Observations · Mores · Ethnography

Prince Albert's Balmoral tartan and the rules of wearing it, broken at Zara Phillips's wedding

The English royal family often dresses in ancestral tartans, each with its own history and owner. The Balmoral tartan, for instance, invented by Prince Albert, may apparently be worn by no one but the Queen, members of the royal family and the Queen's personal piper. True, the rule

Art · Monarchies · Ethnography

Albert Edward, Prince of Wales (the future King Edward VII), and Prince Alfred in Highland dress, with a little dog at their feet and a mountain landscape behind

Albert Edward, Prince of Wales (the future King Edward VII), and Prince Alfred in Highland dress, with a little dog at their feet and a view of a mountain landscape in the background. The portrait, by Franz Xaver Winterhalter, is in the Royal Collection. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were

Books · Mores · Ethnography

European legend of the wealthy pig-faced heiress and its French origins

The tale of the girl with a pig's features has been current in Europe since time out of mind. The urban legend, in one version or another, told of a pregnant woman cursed by a beggar-woman because the haughty rich lady had likened the beggar's

NB! · Observations · Science · Ethnography · Humour

What talent and imagination Soviet scholars must have possessed to contrive to insert a quotation from Lenin into, say, an article on the social anthropology of pre-class societies

Archaeology · Science · Ethnography

Theories of the origin of the Karakachans and the view of Aris Poulianos

Many of the Greek shepherds belong to the once numerous Karakachan or Sarakatsani people, settled from Epirus and the Peloponnese to North Macedonia, Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania. There are several versions of the origin of the Sarakatsani. Their history is traced back to the Middle Ages and linked with a