Faith · Books · Mores · Ethnography

Saint Lucy of Syracuse, her iconography, her role in Dante and the dessert of 13 December

In Italy there is a famous festive dessert called Saint Lucy's eyes. The iconography of the early Christian patron saint of the blind characteristically shows eyes, which she holds in her hands or on a small dish. According to variants of the hagiographic legend, Saint Lucy, who lived

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Mood: Roast Capybara at the Last Supper

Faith · Art · Museums · Observations · Heritage · People · Humour

Sister Plautilla Nelli’s “Last Supper” shown again to the public after restoration

I Cannot Work Out Who Was Roasted for Christ at the Last Supper of the Self-Taught Florentine Artist-Nun Plautilla Nelli (1524–1588): a Capybara or a Monkey? In the Renaissance, women were still barred from studying art, anatomy and the construction of the male figure, so the skill

Faith · Art · Maps · Humour

Three Roads to Eternity: A French Map of 1825

Three Roads to Eternity: a French map of 1825. The journey to Heaven and Hell is based on verse 12 of chapter 7 of the Gospel of Matthew: "Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction,

Faith · Art · Observations

The legend of Saint Narcissus's flies that saved Girona from French sieges

Saint Narcissus and the Miracle of the Flies. Francesc Joan, 16th century. During the siege of Girona in 1285, the troops of the French king Philip the Bold desecrated the tomb of Saint Narcissus of Girona, the city's bishop in the 4th century. The next morning an enormous

Faith · Art · Museums

Unknown 17th-century French painter known as the Master of Processions

The Flagellation of Christ, a painting by the Master of the Processions, sold only recently for more than 160,000 euros. The Master of the Processions is the conventional name of an unknown French painter of the mid-seventeenth century. At various times some of this artist's pictures

Faith · Art

Giotto depicts Sylvester driving demons out of Arezzo at the request of Francis

The Expulsion of the Demons from Arezzo. Scenes from the Life of Saint Francis. Giotto (1266-1337). The life of Francis of Assisi contains a story of how, on approaching the city of Arezzo, whose inhabitants were gripped by mutual enmity, Francis saw the walls and buildings of the city

Faith · People · Rome

Benedict XVI, 95, who abdicated in 2013, photographed in the Vatican gardens

The 95-year-old Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI strolling through the Vatican Gardens, in one of his most recent photographs. As you can see from this picture from the Joseph Ratzinger Foundation, Benedict, though very frail, is nonetheless in tolerable health for a man of his venerable age. Let me

Black-and-white engraving of a creature with a horse's head and a human torso, arms raised, with hoofed legs.

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Orobas, a spirit of King Solomon, in Collin de Plancy’s “Dictionnaire infernal”

Orobas, one of the spirits of King Solomon, appears when conjured in the form of a man with a horse's head and gives answers to questions about the past, present and future. Illustration from Collin de Plancy's "Dictionnaire Infernal"

Gilded pulpit shaped like a ship with a mast, sail, anchor and angels against the white walls of a Baroque church.

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Art

Baroque pulpit shaped like a ship with an anchor and Archangel Michael, Irsee Abbey

A pulpit symbolising hope, in the form of a ship's prow with a raised anchor and a golden sculpture of the Archangel Michael, in Irsee Abbey, Germany. Church Baroque: a love for all time

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Saint Michael, Piero della Francesca

NB! · Archaeology · Architecture · Faith · The East · Heritage

The ruins of the 6th-century Church of Saint John the Theologian in Selçuk, Turkey

The ruins of the 6th-century Church of Saint John the Theologian in Selçuk, Turkey. According to one version, the church stands on the site of the burial of John the Theologian