ART SUNDAY - TADEUSZ MAKOWSKI

“All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once one grows up.” - PabloPicasso  

Tadeusz Makowski (29 January 1882, Oświęcim - 1 November 1932, Paris) was a Polish painter who worked in France and was associated with the School of Paris.

From 1902 to 1906, Makowski studied classical philology at the Jagiellonian University. During that time, he also began studying art at the Kraków Academy of Fine Arts with Jan Stanisławski and Józef Mehoffer. Upon completing his studies there in 1908, he moved to Paris, where he would live for the rest of his life.

Originally he painted in the relatively conservative style taught by his professors. Then, he painted some frescoes that attracted the attention of a group of Cubist painters led by Henri Le Fauconnier, who worked in Montparnasse. This had a decisive influence on his work and the paintings of the period reflect the cubist ideals. At the invitation of Władysław Ślewiński, he spent the war years in Brittany and would return there several times. These trips inspired him to depart from strict cubism and go back to studying nature; creating many stylised landscapes.

Later, his favourite subjects were carnivals, fairs and children, done in a style inspired by the old Dutch Masters, Polish folk art and naïve art. He also did woodcut book illustrations. During the 1920s, he lived briefly in the Netherlands. From 1912 to 1931, he kept a diary that was published in Warsaw in 1961 by the State Publishing Institute (PIW).

Above is his “Winter”, painted in 1918. There is an element of naïve simplification in the painting, but its overall composition, subject matter, atmosphere and palette of colours pays homage to Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s “Hunters in the Snow”. More representative of his oeuvre are the children playing and dressing up.

MUSIC SATURDAY - DOMENICO GALLO

“If I could I would always work in silence and obscurity, and let my efforts be known by their results.” - Emily Brontë

Domenico Gallo (1730 – c. 1768) was an Italian composer and violinist. Born in Venice in 1730, Gallo composed mostly church music, including a Stabat Mater. Gallo also composed violin sonatas, symphonies and possibly violin concertos.

Some trio sonatas by Domenico Gallo were long attributed to Giovanni Pergolesi, including those upon which Igor Stravinsky based his music for the ballet “Pulcinella”. In fact, half of the surviving works by Gallo were once attributed to Pergolesi, probably because Gallo was little known, Pergolesi was famous and his name would sell the music.

It is known that in 1750 Gallo composed a two-voiced oratorio, “In Celebration of the Glories of B. Giuseppe Calasanzio”, the libretto of which by G. Barsotti was published in Venice in the same year. In addition, Gallo composed six violin and cello sonatas (Venice s.d.), and six sonatas for two flute and bass flutes, published in London in 1755, which would suggest perhaps that Gallo spent some time in England. However, much about what is known of this composer is speculative.

Here are 12 Trio Sonatas by Gallo:
1. Trio sonata No 1 in G 0:00
2. Trio sonata No 2 in B flat 5:45
3. Trio Sonata No. 3 in C minor 12:03
4. Trio Sonata No. 4 in G major 17:25
5. Trio Sonata No. 5 in C major 23:52
6. Trio Sonata No. 6 in D major 30:15
7. Sonata for 2 violins & continuo No 7 in G minor 35:36
8. Trio Sonata No. 8 in E flat major 42:12
9. Trio Sonata No. 9 in A major 48:15
10. Trio Sonata No. 10 in F major 53:32
11. Trio Sonata No. 11 in D minor 58:38
12. Trio Sonata No. 12 in E major 1:03:41

FOOD FRIDAY - CAULIFLOWER SOUP

“Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.” - Mark Twain 

More cool and wet weather in Melbourne is forecast for the weekend so what better than some soup for warming away the Autumn coolness? 

Cauliflower Soup
Ingredients
1 cauliflower, washed and chopped up
2 leeks (white parts), washed and sliced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
white pepper
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander seed
1/2 teaspoon ground fenugreek powder
1 litre chicken (or vegetable) stock
Grated Parmesan cheese 

Method
Sauté leek in 2 tablespoons olive oil over medium heat until soft. Add the cauliflower and stir through until thoroughly mixed. Add the salt, pepper and spices, stirring through.
Add two cups of the stock, cover and cook until the cauliflower is tender and then remove from the heat. Purée in a good blender with remainder of the stock. Simmer until hot.
Serve soup in large bowls with grated Parmesan, on the side.

This post is part of the Food Friday meme.

ALL ABOUT LAVENDER

“Lavender’s blue, dilly dilly, lavender’s green, When I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen.” – English Folk Song 

Lavandula (common name, lavender) is a genus of 47 known species of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae. It is native to the Old World and is found from Cape Verde and the Canary Islands, Europe across to northern and eastern Africa, the Mediterranean, southwest Asia to southeast India. Many members of the genus are cultivated extensively in temperate climates as ornamental plants for garden and landscape use, for use as culinary herbs, and also commercially for the extraction of essential oils. The most widely cultivated species, Lavandula angustifolia, is often referred to as lavender, and there is a colour named for the shade of the flowers of this species.

The English word ‘lavender’ is generally thought to be derived from Old French lavandre, ultimately from the Latin lavare (to wash), referring to the use of infusions of the plants during the laundry process in order to make clothes fragrant. The botanic name Lavandula as used by Linnaeus is considered to be derived from this and other European vernacular names for the plants. However it is suggested that this explanation may be apocryphal, and that the name may actually be derived from Latin livere, ‘blueish’.

The names widely used for some of the species, ‘English lavender’, ‘French lavender’ and ‘Spanish lavender’ are all imprecisely applied. ‘English lavender’ is commonly used for L. angustifolia, though some references say the proper term is ‘Old English Lavender’. The name ‘French lavender’ may be used to refer to either L. stoechas or to L. dentata. ‘Spanish lavender’ may be used to refer to L. stoechas, L. lanata or L. dentata.

The ancient Greeks called the lavender herb nardus, after the Syrian city of Naarda (possibly the modern town of Dohuk, Iraq). It was also commonly called nard. The species originally grown was L. stoechas. Lavender was one of the holy herbs used in the biblical Temple to prepare the holy essence, and nard (or spikenard) is mentioned in the Song of Solomon.

The genus includes annual or short-lived herbaceous perennial plants, and shrub-like perennials, subshrubs or large shrubs. Leaf shape is diverse across the genus. They are simple in some commonly cultivated species; in other species they are pinnately toothed, or pinnate, sometimes multiple pinnate and dissected. In most species the leaves are covered in fine hairs or indumentum, which normally contain the essential oils.

Flowers are borne in whorls, held on spikes rising above the foliage, the spikes being branched in some species. Some species produce coloured bracts at the apices. The flowers may be blue, violet or lilac in the wild species, occasionally blackish purple or yellowish. The calyx is tubular. The corolla is also tubular, usually with five lobes (the upper lip often cleft, and the lower lip has two clefts).

The most common form in cultivation is the common or English lavender Lavandula angustifolia (formerly named L. officinalis). A wide range of cultivars can be found. Other commonly grown ornamental species are L. stoechas, L. dentata, and L. multifida (Egyptian lavender). Because the cultivated forms are planted in gardens worldwide, they are occasionally found growing wild as garden escapes, well beyond their natural range.  Commonly such adventitious establishment is apparently harmless at best, but in some cases Lavandula species have become invasive. In Australia, Lavandula stoechas has become a cause for concern; it occurs widely throughout the continent, and has been declared a noxious weed in Victoria since 1920. It also is regarded as a weed in parts of Spain.

Lavenders flourish best in dry, well-drained, sandy or gravelly soils in full sun. All types need little or no fertiliser and good air circulation. In areas of high humidity, root rot due to fungus infection can be a problem. Organic mulches can trap moisture around the plant base, encouraging root rot. Gravelly materials such as crushed rocks give better results.

Commercially, the plant is grown mainly for the production of essential oil of lavender. This has antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties, and can be used as a natural mosquito repellent. These extracts are also used as fragrances for bath products. English lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) yields an essential oil with sweet overtones, and can be used in balms, salves, perfumes, cosmetics, and topical applications. Lavandin, Lavandula × intermedia (also known as Dutch lavender), yields a similar essential oil, but with higher levels of terpenes including camphor, which add a sharper overtone to the fragrance.

Lavender is grown as a condiment and used in salads and dressings. The flowers yield abundant nectar, from which bees make a high-quality honey. Monofloral honey is produced primarily around the Mediterranean, and is marketed worldwide as a premium product. Flowers can be candied and are sometimes used as cake decorations. It is also used to make lavender sugar. Lavender lends a floral and slightly sweet flavour to most dishes, and is sometimes paired with sheep’s-milk and goat’s-milk cheeses. A recipe for Lavender Candy can be found here.

Lavender flowers are occasionally blended with black, green, or herbal teas. Lavender flavours baked goods and desserts, pairing especially well with chocolate. In the United States, both lavender syrup and dried lavender buds are used to make lavender scones and marshmallows.  Though it has many other traditional uses in southern France, lavender is not used in traditional southern French cooking. It does not appear at all in the best-known compendium of Provençal cooking, J.-B. Reboul's Cuisinière Provençale.

In the 1970s, a blend of herbs called herbes de Provence which usually includes lavender was invented by spice wholesalers, and lavender has more recently become popular in cooking. For most cooking applications the dried buds, which are also referred to as flowers, are used. Only the buds contain the essential oil of lavender, from which the characteristic scent and flavour of lavender are derived. Lavender greens have a more subtle flavour that is compared to rosemary. The greens are used similarly to rosemary or combined with rosemary to flavour meat and vegetables in savoury dishes. They can also be used to make a tea that is milder than teas made with the flowers.

The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) states that lavender is considered likely safe in food amounts and possibly safe in medicinal amounts. NIH does not recommend the use of lavender while pregnant or breast-feeding because of lack of knowledge of its effects. It recommends caution if young boys use lavender oil because of possible hormonal effects leading to gynaecomastia, and states that lavender may cause skin irritation and could be poisonous if consumed by mouth. Employ common sense and caution when using lavender and its products!

In the language of flowers, sprigs of non-flowering lavender denote purity and caution. Fresh lavender flowers mean “encouragement” and “fortification”. Bouquets of dried lavender flower spikes carry the meaning: “Silence and devotion” – widows often took bouquets of dried lavender to the graves of their dead husbands.

This post is part of the Floral Friday Fotos meme,

and also part of the Food Friday meme.

TRAVEL TUESDAY #77 - LAUNCESTON, TASMANIA

“The hardest thing in life to learn is which bridge to cross and which to burn.” - DavidRussell 

Welcome to the Travel Tuesday meme! Join me every Tuesday and showcase your creativity in photography, painting and drawing, music, poetry, creative writing or a plain old natter about Travel.

There is only one simple rule: Link your own creative work about some aspect of travel and share it with the rest of us. Please use this meme for your creative endeavours only.

Do not use this meme to advertise your products or services as any links or comments by advertisers will be removed immediately.

Launceston is a city in the north of Tasmania, Australia at the junction of the North Esk and South Esk rivers where they become the Tamar River. Launceston is the second largest city in Tasmania after Hobart. With a population of 86,633, Launceston is the twelfth-largest non-capital city in Australia. It is the only inland city in Tasmania.

Settled by Europeans in March 1806, Launceston is one of Australia’s oldest cities and is home to many historic buildings. Like many Australian places, it was named after a town in the United Kingdom – in this case, Launceston, Cornwall. Launceston has also been home to several firsts such as the first use of anaesthetic in the Southern Hemisphere, the first Australian city to have underground sewers and the first Australian city to be lit by hydroelectricity. The city has a temperate climate with four distinct seasons. Local government is split between the City of Launceston and the Meander Valley and West Tamar Councils.

Built in two complementary sections forty years apart (1863 and 1903), King’s Bridge near Launceston, Tasmania, is a very elegant and gracefully arched, open girder steel bridge which carries Bridge Road/Trevallyn Road across the Tamar River. Built to carry main road traffic north from Launceston to the town on the coasts of Bass Strait, the bridge is now protected from heavy West Tamar traffic by the newer adjoining Paterson Bridge, which was brought into service in the 1960s. King’s Bridge is now reserved for local traffic only. Part of the bridge’s appeal is that it is the perfect terminating element to the renowned Launceston Gorge within the Trevallyn State Reserve. The reserve is bounded by the South Esk River on all but the northern side. In the east is the Trevallyn Lake, formed by the Trevallyn Dam, and in the east is Cataract Gorge. 

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme,
and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme. 

Add your own travel posts using the Linky tool below, and don't forget to be nice and leave a comment here, and link back to this page from your own post:

MYTHIC MONDAY - EGYPT 10, OSIRIS

“We only see what we want to see; we only hear what we want to hear. Our belief system is just like a mirror that only shows us what we believe.” - Don Miguel Ruiz 

Osiris, from Egyptian wsjr or jsjrt, Coptic ⲟⲩⲥⲓⲣⲉ) was an Egyptian god, usually identified as the god of the afterlife, the underworld, and the dead, but more appropriately as the god of transition, resurrection, and regeneration. He was classically depicted as a green-skinned man with a pharaoh’s beard, partially mummy-wrapped at the legs, wearing a distinctive crown with two large ostrich feathers at either side, and holding a symbolic crook and flail.

Osiris was at times considered the oldest son of the earth god Geb, though other sources state his father is the sun-god Ra, and the sky goddess Nut, as well as being brother and husband of Isis, with Horus being considered his posthumously begotten son. He was also associated with the epithet Khenti-Amentiu, meaning “Foremost of the Westerners”, a reference to his kingship in the land of the dead. As ruler of the dead, Osiris was also sometimes called “king of the living”: Ancient Egyptians considered the blessed dead “the living ones”.

Osiris was considered the brother of Isis, Set, Nephthys, and Horus the Elder, and father of Horus the Younger. Osiris is first attested in the middle of the Fifth dynasty of Egypt, although it is likely that he was worshipped much earlier; the Khenti-Amentiu epithet dates to at least the first dynasty, also as a pharaonic title. Most information available on the myths of Osiris is derived from allusions contained in the Pyramid Texts at the end of the Fifth Dynasty, later New Kingdom source documents such as the Shabaka Stone and the Contending of Horus and Seth, and much later, in narrative style from the writings of Greek authors including Plutarch and Diodorus Siculus.

Osiris was considered not only a merciful judge of the dead in the afterlife, but also the underworld agency that granted all life, including sprouting vegetation and the fertile flooding of the Nile River. He was described as the “Lord of love”, “He Who is Permanently Benign and Youthful” and the “Lord of Silence”. The Kings of Egypt were associated with Osiris in death – as Osiris rose from the dead they would, in union with him, inherit eternal life through a process of imitative magic.

By the New Kingdom all people, not just pharaohs, were believed to be associated with Osiris at death, if they incurred the costs of the assimilation rituals. Through the hope of new life after death, Osiris began to be associated with the cycles observed in nature, in particular vegetation and the annual flooding of the Nile, through his links with the heliacal rising of Orion and Sirius at the start of the new year. Osiris was widely worshipped as Lord of the Dead until the suppression of the Egyptian religion during the rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire.

Osiris is represented in his most developed form of iconography wearing the Atef crown, which is similar to the White crown of Upper Egypt, but with the addition of two curling ostrich feathers at each side. He also carries the crook and flail. The crook is thought to represent Osiris as a shepherd god. The symbolism of the flail is more uncertain with shepherds whip, fly-whisk, or association with the god Andjety of the ninth nome of Lower Egypt proposed. He was commonly depicted as a pharaoh with a complexion of either green (the colour of rebirth) or black (alluding to the fertility of the Nile floodplain) in mummiform (wearing the trappings of mummification from chest downward).

Eventually, in Egypt, the Hellenic pharaohs decided to produce a deity that would be acceptable to both the local Egyptian population, and the influx of Hellenic visitors, to bring the two groups together, rather than allow a source of rebellion to grow. Thus Osiris was identified explicitly with Apis, while really an aspect of Ptah, who had already been identified as Osiris by this point, and a syncretism of the two was created, known as Serapis, and depicted as a standard Greek god.

The cult of Osiris continued until the 6th century AD on the island of Philae in Upper Nile. The Theodosian decrees of the 390s, to destroy all pagan temples, were not enforced there. The worship of Isis and Osiris was allowed to continue at Philae until the time of Justinian I, by treaty between the Blemmyes-Nobadae and Diocletian. Every year they visited Elephantine, and at certain intervals took the image of Isis up river to the land of the Blemmyes for oracular purposes. The practices ended when Justinian sent Narses to destroy sanctuaries, arrest priests, and seize divine images, which were taken to Constantinople.

MUSIC SATURDAY - MICHEL BLAVET

“Life is like a flute. It may have many holes and emptiness but if you work on it carefully, it can play magical melodies.” - Evan Carmichael

Michel Blavet (March 13, 1700 – October 28, 1768) was a French composer and flute virtuoso. Although Blavet taught himself to play almost every instrument, he specialised in the bassoon and the flute which he held to the left, the opposite of how most flautists hold theirs today. Quantz writes of Blavet: “His amiable disposition and engaging manner gives rise to a lasting friendship between us and I am much indebted to him for his numerous acts of kindness.”

Born in Besançon as the son of wood turner Jean-Baptiste Blavet, a profession which he followed for some time, he accidentally became the possessor of a flute and soon became the finest player in France. Blavet was famous for maintaining impeccable intonation, even when he played in difficult keys, and for the beauty of his tone. Voltaire expressed his admiration for his playing and Marpurg spoke of him as a virtuoso of the highest excellence who preserved his innate modesty despite his unbroken popularity.

In 1721, Blavet entered the service of Louis, Count of Clermont and became his steward of music. In 1726 he joined the Duke of Carignan and took part in the newly formed Concert Spirituel for the first time. In 1728 he published his first book of flute music, containing six sonatas for two flutes without bass. From 1731 to 1735, he performed at the Concert Spirituel with Jean-Marie Leclair, Jean-Pierre Guignon, Jean-Joseph de Mondonville, Jean-Baptiste Senaillé, and Jacques Aubert.

In 1738, Blavet became the principal flute in Louis XV’s personal musical ensemble, the “Musique du Roi”, and in 1740 at the Paris Opera orchestra. He played in the quartet (flute – Blavet, violin – Guignon, viola da gamba – Forqueray the younger, cello – Édouard) that played the premiere performance of the Paris quartets by Telemann. Blavet turned down a post in Frederick the Great’s court, which Quantz eventually accepted after the pay had been increased significantly.

In 1752 Blavet modelled on Italian interludes the first French comic opera, ‘Le Jaloux corrigé’. He also wrote a march for the Grande-Loge, having joined the Masons under the influence of the Comte de Clermont who was Grand Master of the Order in France. Blavet’s three ‘Recueils’ for two flutes are undated, but internal evidence suggests that they come from the early 1750s. The breathing marks (h, for haleine) indicated in the ‘Recueils’ and his op. 2 remain an invaluable aid in understanding eighteenth-century French musical phrasing. He died in Paris in 1768.

Blavet wrote primarily for the transverse flute, in the so-called ‘Italian’ as well as the French style. His surviving works include a concerto and three books of sonatas (1740). His surviving works are written only in the easiest keys, since he published them for amateurs to play.

Here is a selection of flute music by Blavet, played by Frank Theuns, Marc Hantaï, Martin Bauer, Ewald Demeyere, and Wim Maeseele.

FOOD FRIDAY - HOT BREAD!

“There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.” - Mahatma Gandhi 

Nothing better on a cold wet day like fresh, crusty bread well-baked from scratch in the oven. Fortunately, the easy recipe we have allows this indulgence. We have never invested in a bread making machine and probably this is wise given the number of people that have and rarely use them. I have seen countless such machines being sold for peanuts in garage sales...

 Easy Bread
Ingredients
Shortening or oil, for greasing and brushing
250g plain white flour
250g plain wholemeal flour
1/2 tsp ground cardamon seed
1/2 tsp dried mixed herbs
1/2 tsp ground dry mustard
1/2 tsp onion powder
2 tsp (7g/1 sachet) dried yeast
1 tsp sugar
1.5 tsp salt
175ml lukewarm water
100 ml lukewarm milk
1/2 cup olive oil
Extra water, for brushing
1 tsp nigella seeds, for sprinkling (optional)

Method
Brush a 10 x 20cm loaf pan with the shortening to lightly grease. Measure all your ingredients.
Dissolve the yeast and sugar in the lukewarm water and stir to mix. Add the milk and stir well.
Place the flour, herbs and spices and salt in a large bowl and mix well to combine. Make a well in the centre and add the water/milk/yeast mixture and oil to the dry ingredients and mix well.
Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 8-10 minutes or until smooth and elastic.
Shape the dough into a ball. Brush a large bowl with the shortening or oil to grease. Place the dough into the bowl and turn it over to lightly coat the dough surface with the butter. Cover the bowl with a damp tea towel and then place it in a warm, draught-free place to allow the dough to rise.
Leave the dough to prove until it is double its size, between 45-75 minutes at 30˚C. When the dough is ready, it will retain a finger imprint when lightly pressed.
Once the dough has doubled in size, punch it down in the centre with your fist and knead on a lightly floured surface again for 2-3 minutes or until smooth and elastic and returned to its original size.
Preheat oven to 200°C.
Divide the dough into 2 equal portions and shape each into a smooth round. Place the portions of dough side by side in the greased loaf pan. Brush lightly with the melted butter. Stand the pan in a warm, draught-free place, as before, for about 30 minutes or until the dough has risen about 1cm about the top of the pan.
Gently brush the loaf with a little water and then sprinkle with the nigella seeds if desired. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes or until golden and cooked through.
Turn the loaf immediately onto a wire rack and allow to cool.
Once cool, store the loaf in a well-ventilated place at room temperature.

This post is part of the Food Friday meme.

TRAVEL TUESDAY #76 - ANZAC SHRINE, BRISBANE

“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.” - Laurence Binyon

Welcome to the Travel Tuesday meme! Join me every Tuesday and showcase your creativity in photography, painting and drawing, music, poetry, creative writing or a plain old natter about Travel.

There is only one simple rule: Link your own creative work about some aspect of travel and share it with the rest of us. Please use this meme for your creative endeavours only.

Do not use this meme to advertise your products or services as any links or comments by advertisers will be removed immediately.  

The Shrine of Remembrance is located in ANZAC Square, between Ann Street and Adelaide Street, in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. With its 'Eternal Flame', the Shrine is a war memorial dedicated to the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (Anzacs).

The Shrine of Remembrance is a major Brisbane landmark of cultural, architectural and historic importance and is a key component of the Queensland Heritage listed square and annually hosts ceremonies for ANZAC Day and Armistice Day (now referred to as Remembrance Day). A service marking Singapore Day (The Fall of Singapore, 15 February 1942) is held annually on the closest Sunday to the 15th, in remembrance of the losses of the 8th Division during World War 2.

Funds were raised by public subscription for a memorial to fallen soldiers in World War I and in 1928 a competition was held for its design. The competition was won by Sydney architects Buchanan and Cowper who proposed a Greek Revival structure. The Shrine took two years to build and was dedicated on Armistice Day 11 November 1930 by Governor John Goodwin with a dedication plaque.

Designed in the Greek Classic Revival style, the columns of the Shrine of Remembrance are built of Helidon sandstone, and the Eternal Flame is kept in a brass urn within the Shrine. The steps leading to the Shrine of Remembrance from ANZAC Square are made of Queensland granite. The 18 columns of the Shrine symbolise the year 1918, when hostilities ceased.

There is a crypt in the lower section of the Shrine of Remembrance which contains the World War I and World War II Shrine of Memories, which contains memorial plaques to numerous Australian regiments who fought during these campaigns. There is also a World War I memorial sculpture on the Shrine of Memories external wall.

Each year, on ANZAC Day, on 25 April, a Dawn memorial service is held at the Shrine of Remembrance, with wreaths being laid around the 'Eternal Flame' in memory of those who died in conflict. There is also a memorial service held each year on Remembrance Day, 11 November and wreaths are again laid at the 'Eternal Flame'.

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme,
and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

Add your own travel posts using the Linky tool below, and don't forget to be nice and leave a comment here, and link back to this page from your own post:

MYTHIC MONDAY - EGYPT 9, SEKHMET

“A lioness has got a lot more power than the lion likes to think she has.” - Jacki Weaver 

In Egyptian mythology, Sekhmet (or Sachmis, meaning “the powerful one”) is a warrior goddess as well as goddess of healing. She is depicted as a lioness, the fiercest hunter known to the Egyptians. It was said that her breath formed the desert. She was seen as the protector of the pharaohs and led them in warfare. Her cult was so dominant in the culture that when the first pharaoh of the twelfth dynasty, Amenemhat I, moved the capital of Egypt to Itjtawy, the centre for her cult was moved as well. Religion, the royal lineage, and the authority to govern were intrinsically interwoven in ancient Egypt during its approximately three millennia of existence.

Sekhmet is also a Solar deity, sometimes called the daughter of the sun god Ra and often associated with the goddesses Hathor and Bast. She bears the Solar disk and the uraeus which associates her with Wadjet and royalty. With these associations she can be construed as being a divine arbiter of the goddess Ma’at (Justice, or Order) in the Judgment Hall of Osiris, associating her with the Wadjet (later the Eye of Ra), and connecting her with Tefnut as well.

In order to placate Sekhmet’s wrath, her priestesses performed a ritual before a different statue of the goddess on each day of the year. This practice resulted in many images of the goddess being preserved. Most of her statuettes were rigidly crafted and do not exhibit any expression of movements or dynamism; this design was made to make them last a long time rather than to express any form of functions or actions she is associated with. It is estimated that more than seven hundred statues of Sekhmet once stood in one funerary temple alone, that of Amenhotep III, on the west bank of the Nile.

She was envisioned as a fierce lioness, and in art, was depicted as such, or as a woman with the head of a lioness, who often was dressed in red, the color of blood. Sometimes the dress she wears exhibits a rosetta pattern over each breast, an ancient leonine motif, which can be traced to observation of the shoulder-knot hairs on lions. Occasionally, Sekhmet was also portrayed in her statuettes and engravings with minimal clothing or naked. Tame lions were kept in temples dedicated to Sekhmet at Leontopolis.

To pacify Sekhmet, festivals were celebrated at the end of battle, so that the destruction would come to an end. During an annual festival held at the beginning of the year, a festival of intoxication, the Egyptians danced and played music to soothe the wildness of the goddess and drank great quantities of wine ritually to imitate the extreme drunkenness that stopped the wrath of the goddess—when she almost destroyed humanity. This may relate to averting excessive flooding during the inundation at the beginning of each year as well, when the Nile ran blood-red with the silt from up-stream and Sekhmet had to swallow the overflow to save humankind.

In a myth about the end of Ra’s rule on the earth, Ra sends Hathor or Sekhmet to destroy mortals who conspired against him. In the myth, Sekhmet’s blood-lust was not quelled at the end of battle and led to her destroying almost all of humanity, so Ra poured out beer dyed with red ochre or haematite so that it resembled blood. Mistaking the beer for blood, she became so drunk that she gave up the slaughter and returned peacefully to Ra. The same myth was also described in the prognosis texts of the Calendar of Lucky and Unlucky Days of papyrus Cairo 86637, where the actions of Sekhmet, Horus, Ra and Wadjet were connected to the eclipsing binary Algol.

Sekhmet later was considered to be the mother of Maahes, a deity who appeared during the New Kingdom period. He was seen as a lion prince, the son of the goddess. The late origin of Maahes in the Egyptian pantheon may be the incorporation of a Nubian deity of ancient origin in that culture, arriving during trade and warfare or even, during a period of domination by Nubia. During the Greek dominance in Egypt, note was made of a temple for Maahes that was an auxiliary facility to a large temple to Sekhmet at Taremu in the delta region (likely a temple for Bast originally), a city which the Greeks called Leontopolis, where by that time, an enclosure was provided to house lions.

MUSIC SATURDAY - CARLO FARINA

“There is nothing more to be said or to be done tonight, so hand me over my violin and let us try to forget for half an hour the miserable weather and the still more miserable ways of our fellowmen.” ― Arthur Conan Doyle 

Carlo Farina (ca. 1600 – July 1639) was an Italian composer, conductor and violinist of the Early Baroque era. Farina was born at Mantua. He presumably received his first lessons from his father, who was sonatore di viola at the court of the Gonzaga in that city. Later he was given further education probably by Salomone Rossi and Giovanni Battista Buonamente.

From 1626 to 1629, he worked as concertmaster in Dresden. In Dresden he worked with Heinrich Schütz, who interested him in composing. From 1629 to 1631, he was a prominent member of the electoral court orchestra in Bonn, until he returned to Italy, where he worked in Parma and later in Lucca until 1635. In 1635 he held position at the court of Carlo I Cybo-Malaspina, Prince of Massa, and between 1636 and 1637 in Gdańsk. From 1638 he lived in Vienna, where he died of the plague probably a year later.

He is considered to be one of the earliest violin virtuosos and he made many contributions to violin technique. For example, in his work Capriccio Stravagante (1627) he used the violin to imitate animal sounds like dogs barking or cats fighting. According to Cecil Forsyth’s Orchestration, he “is generally credited” with “the invention of the double-stop” (although nearly a century earlier Ganassi’s Regola rubertina (1542–3) describes the technique, suggesting it was common among contemporary viol players). Musical lineage aside, Carlo Farina was granted the title of Count of Reggio di Calabria by Charles Emmanuel II, Duke of Savoy. He was head of music for the Royal Court of the Prince of Messa from 1626-1630.

During his stay in Dresden he published five volumes, among them sonatas for 2, 3, 4 instruments and basso continuo. The pieces have often the same program as the title. Thus he uses Polish dance rhythms in the sonata La Polacca or Hungarian motifs in La Cingara.

Here are some of his violin sonatas played by Lukas Friedrich and Christine Busch (violins); Barbara Noeldecke (cello); Hubert Hoffmann (archlute); Jörg Hannes Hahn (harpsichord and organ):

Sonata detta ‘La Polacca’ – 9:11

Sonata detta ‘La Capriola’ – 8:19

Sonata detta ‘La Moretta’ – 11:56

Sonata detta ‘ La Franzosina’ – 9:26

Sonata detta ‘La Farina’ – 6:12

Sonata detta ‘La Greca’ – 7:46

Sonata detta ‘La Cingara’ – 5:40

Sonata detta ‘La Fiama’ – 2:20

Sonata detta ‘La Semplisa’ – 3:47

Sonata detta ‘La Desperata’ – 8:33

FOOD FRIDAY - PUMPKIN SOUP

“Only the knife knows what goes on in the heart of a pumpkin.” - Simone Schwarz-Bart 

We harvested some butternut pumpkins from our garden today, so pumpkin soup is on the menu. 

Pumpkin Soup

Ingredients

2 + 2 tablespoons olive oil

1 onion, finely chopped

1 leek, white part only, finely sliced

1 garlic clove, crushed

1/2 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon white pepper

1 kg pumpkin

1 large potato, peeled, grated

1L vegetable stock

1/2 cup cream

Method 
Cut pumpkin in half and microwave the two halves for three minutes to soften slightly. This makes peeling and cutting easy. Scoop out seeds and cut into thick slices. Rub 2 tbsp oil and salt on the pumpkin slices and bake on baking tray in a hot oven until pumpkin is cooked and browned on both sides. Remove from oven, mash and reserve.
Heat oil in a large saucepan over low heat, add onion and leek and cook for 2-3 minutes, until softened but not coloured. Add garlic and spices and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds. Add potato and stir thoroughly until softened. Add pumpkin and stock and bring to the boil. Turn heat to low, cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Allow to cool slightly, then blend in batches.
Return soup to pan, stir through cream and reheat gently. Season and add a little more nutmeg if desired.
Serve with toasted slices of crusty bread and some grated parmesan for those that want to sprinkle on top of the soup.

This post is part of the Food Friday meme.

TRAVEL TUESDAY #75 - PUEBLO TAOS, USA

“Beauty Way: Today my heart will have harmony; My spirit singing the songs of happiness. My mind will seek balance, one with Mother Earth and the Creator. My eyes will look for good and there I will find it. My mouth will whisper the words of gratitude. Today I will walk the beauty way.” ― Howard T. Rainer 

Welcome to the Travel Tuesday meme! Join me every Tuesday and showcase your creativity in photography, painting and drawing, music, poetry, creative writing or a plain old natter about Travel.

There is only one simple rule: Link your own creative work about some aspect of travel and share it with the rest of us. Please use this meme for your creative endeavours only.

Do not use this meme to advertise your products or services as any links or comments by advertisers will be removed immediately. 

Taos Pueblo (or Pueblo de Taos) is an ancient pueblo belonging to a Tiwa-speaking Native American tribe of Puebloan people. It lies about 1.6 km north of the modern city of Taos, New Mexico, USA. The pueblos are considered to be one of the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the United States. This has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Taos Pueblo is a member of the Eight Northern Pueblos, whose people speak two variants of the Tanoan language. The Taos community is known for being one of the most private, secretive, and conservative pueblos. A reservation of 38,000 hectare is attached to the pueblo, and about 4,500 people live in this area.

The pueblo was constructed in a setting backed by the Taos Mountains of the Sangre de Cristo Range. The settlement was built on either side of Rio Pueblo de Taos, also called Rio Pueblo and Red Willow Creek, a small stream that flows through the middle of the pueblo compound. Its headwaters come from the nearby mountains. Taos Pueblo’s most prominent architectural feature is a multi-storied residential complex of reddish-brown adobe, built on either side of the Rio Pueblo. The Pueblo’s website states it was probably built between 1000 and 1450. The pueblo was designated a National Historic Landmark on October 9, 1960. In 1992 it was designated as a UNESCO Heritage Site. As of 2006, about 150 people live in the historic complex full-time.

The north-side Pueblo is said to be one of the most photographed and painted buildings in North America. It is the largest multistoried Pueblo structure still existing. It is made of adobe walls that are often several feet thick. Its primary purpose was for defence. Up to as late as 1900, access to the rooms on lower floors was by ladders on the outside to the roof, and then down an inside ladder. In case of an attack, outside ladders could easily be pulled up.

The homes in this structure usually consist of two rooms, one of which is for general living and sleeping, and the second of which is for cooking, eating, and storage. Each home is self-contained; there are no passageways between the houses. Taos Indians made little use of furniture in the past, but today they have tables, chairs, and beds. In the pueblo, electricity, running water, and indoor plumbing are prohibited.

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme.

Add your own travel posts using the Linky tool below, and don't forget to be nice and leave a comment here, and link back to this page from your own post:

MYTHIC MONDAY - EGYPT 8, HORUS

“A falcon is the perfect hunter.” - Jean Craighead George

Horus is one of the most significant ancient Egyptian deities. He was worshipped from at least the late prehistoric Egypt until the Ptolemaic Kingdom and Roman Egypt. Different forms of Horus are recorded in history and these are treated as distinct gods by Egyptologists. These various forms may possibly be different perceptions of the same multi-layered deity in which certain attributes or syncretic relationships are emphasised, not necessarily in opposition but complementary to one another, consistent with how the Ancient Egyptians viewed the multiple facets of reality.

He was most often depicted as a falcon, most likely a lanner falcon or peregrine falcon, or as a man with a falcon head. The earliest recorded form of Horus is the tutelary deity of Nekhen in Upper Egypt, who is the first known national god, specifically related to the king who in time came to be regarded as a manifestation of Horus in life and Osiris in death. The most commonly encountered family relationship describes Horus as the son of Isis and Osiris, and he plays a key role in the Osiris myth as Osiris’s heir and the rival to Set, the murderer of Osiris. In another tradition Hathor is regarded as his mother and sometimes as his wife. Horus served many functions, most notably being a god of the sky, war and hunting.

Horus was born to the goddess Isis after she retrieved all the dismembered body parts of her murdered husband Osiris, except his penis, which was thrown into the Nile and eaten by a catfish (or sometimes by a crab), and according to Plutarch’s account used her magic powers to resurrect Osiris and fashion a golden phallus to conceive her son (older Egyptian accounts have the penis of Osiris surviving). Once Isis knew she was pregnant with Horus, she fled to the Nile Delta marshlands to hide from her brother Set, who jealously killed Osiris and who she knew would want to kill their son. There Isis bore a divine son, Horus.

Horus was told by his mother, Isis, to protect the people of Egypt from Set, the evil god of the desert, who had killed Horus’ father, Osiris. Horus had many battles with Set, not only to avenge his father, but to choose the rightful ruler of Egypt. In these battles, Horus came to be associated with Lower Egypt, and became its patron. Egyptologists have often tried to connect the conflict between the two gods with political events early in Egypt’s history or prehistory. The cases in which the combatants divide the kingdom, and the frequent association of the paired Horus and Set with the union of Upper and Lower Egypt, suggest that the two deities represent some kind of division within the country.

Egyptian tradition and archaeological evidence indicate that Egypt was united at the beginning of its history when an Upper Egyptian kingdom, in the south, conquered Lower Egypt in the north. The Upper Egyptian rulers called themselves “followers of Horus’, and Horus became the tutelary deity of the unified nation and its kings. Yet Horus and Set cannot be easily equated with the two halves of the country. Both deities had several cult centers in each region, and Horus is often associated with Lower Egypt and Set with Upper Egypt.

Horus the Younger, Harpocrates to the Ptolemaic Greeks, is represented in the form of a youth wearing a lock of hair (a sign of youth) on the right of his head while sucking his finger. In addition, he usually wears the united crowns of Egypt, the crown of Upper Egypt and the crown of Lower Egypt. He is a form of the rising sun, representing its earliest light.

Harpocrates (Ancient Greek: Ἁρποκράτης) was the god of silence, secrets and confidentiality in the Hellenistic religion developed in Ptolemaic Alexandria (and also an embodiment of hope, according to Plutarch). Harpocrates was adapted by the Greeks from the Egyptian child god Horus. To the ancient Egyptians, Horus represented the newborn sun, rising each day at dawn. When the Greeks conquered Egypt under Alexander the Great, they transformed the Egyptian Horus into the Hellenistic god known as Harpocrates, a rendering from Egyptian Har-pa-khered or Heru-pa-khered “Horus the Child”.

ART SUNDAY - VICTOR BORISOV-MUSATOV

“All the real things in Russia are done in the villages.” - Ernest Poole 

VictorElpidiforovich Borisov-Musatov (Russian: Ви́ктор Эльпидифо́рович Бори́сов-Муса́тов; April 14 [O.S. April 2] 1870 - November 8 [O.S. October 26] 1905) was a Russian painter, prominent for his unique Post-Impressionistic style that mixed Symbolism, pure decorative style and realism. Together with Mikhail Vrubel he is often referred as the creator of Russian Symbolism style.

Victor Musatov was born in Saratov, Russia (he added the last name Borisov later). His father was a minor railway official who had been born as a serf. In his childhood he suffered a spinal injury, which made him humpbacked for the rest of his life. In 1884 he entered Saratov real school, where his talents as an artist were discovered by his teachers Fedor Vasiliev and Konovalov. He was enrolled in the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in 1890, transferring the next year to the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint-Petersburg, where he was a pupil of Pavel Chistyakov. The damp climate of Saint-Petersburg was not good for Victor’s health and in 1893 he was forced to return to Moscow and re-enrol in the Moscow School of painting, sculpturing and architecture.

His earlier works like “May Flowers” of 1894, were labelled decadent by the school administration, who sharply criticised him for making no distinction between the girls and the apple trees in his quest for a decorative effect. The same works however were praised by his peers, who considered him to be the leader of the new art movement. In 1895 Victor once again left Moscow School of painting, sculpture and architecture and enrolled in Fernand Cormon’s school in Paris. He studied there for three years, returning in summer months to Saratov. He was fascinated by the art of his French contemporaries, and especially by the paintings of ‘the father of French Symbolism’ Pierre Puvis de Chavannes and by the work of Berthe Morisot.

In 1898 Borisov-Musatov returned to Russia and almost immediately fell into what it is called ‘fin de siècle nostalgia’. He complained about ‘the cruel, the truly iron age’, ‘dirt and boredom’, ‘devil’s bog’, and he had acute money problems that were somewhat alleviated only in the last years of his life when collectors started to buy his paintings. Musatov’s response was creating a half-illusory world of the 19th century nobility, their parks and country-seats. This world was partially based on the estate of princes Prozorvky-Galitzines Zubrilovka and partially just on Musatov’s imagination. Borisov-Musatov also abandoned oil paintings for the mixed tempera and watercolour and pastel techniques that he found more suitable for the subtle visual effects he was trying to create.

Borisov-Musatov was a member of the Union of Russian Artists and one of the founders and the leader of the Moscow Association of Artists, a progressive artistic organization that brought together Pavel Kuznetsov, Peter Utkin, Alexander Matveyev, Martiros Saryan, Nikolai Sapunov, and Sergei Sudeikin. The most famous painting of that time is “The Pool” of 1902 (see above). The painting depicts two most important women in his life: his sister, Yelena Musatova and his bride (later wife), artist Yelena Alexandrova. The people are woven into the landscape of an old park with a pond. Another famous painting is “ThePhantoms” of 1903, depicting ghosts on the steps of an old country manor. The painting was praised by the contemporary Symbolist poets Valery Bryusov and Andrey Bely.

In 1904 Borisov-Musatov had a very successful solo exhibition in a number of cities in Germany, and in the spring of 1905 he exhibited with Salon de la Société des Artistes Français and became a member of this society. The last finished painting of Borisov-Musatov was “Requiem”, which was devoted to the memory of Nadezhda Staniukovich, a close friend of the artist. The painting may indicate Borisov-Musatov’s evolution towards the Neo-classical style. Borisov-Musatov died on October 26, O.S. 1905 of a heart attack and is buried on a bank of Oka River near Tarusa. On his tomb there is a sculpture of a sleeping boy by Musatov’s follower Alexander Matveyev.