WHAT'S GOING ON? "RUIN"

“Life and death are balanced as it were on the edge of a razor.” ― Homer

After a long period of absence, and having found this site again; Hello, old friends and fellow writers! I have been busy, but I am well. I hope you are all in fine form and it is good to virtually interact with you again. I am joining you this week to take part in the prompt “Ruin”.

This poem has been inspired by Greek Mythology and comments on the ruin caused by earthquakes. Enceladus was a Giant, the son of Gaia (Earth) and Ouranos (Sky). During the Gigantomachy, where gods and giants fought for supremacy to rule over the universe, the gods won. Enceladus was defeated by Athena, the goddess of wisdom and thrown in the depths of earth, imprisoned deep in the rocks. However, Enceladus every now and then tried to escape and to shake off the mountains that held him captive. Whenever that happened, earthquakes occurred on earth.

PS: Just in case you are interested, in my absence I wrote a novel, “The Nursing Home”. More about it here.

Enceladus

Enceladus

Sleeps and his slumber’s sound –

His usual napping underground

Untroubled by dark horses…

His languor soothing mighty forces.

The frightful Giant sleeps

And his vengeful hand he keeps

Relaxed, at ease, unmoving;

His mother, Gaia, looks on approving.

His eye starts to move and roll;

A muscle twitches, then his body whole.

He turns and tosses, quite disturbed

A nightmare gallops in, fury uncurbed.

The Giant wakes, his tail uncurls

His mane of wild hair shakes and swirls.

He roars, and arms he stretches

The rocks above him crack, the ground retches.

The earth is split

Ground quakes.

A deep dark pit

Opens, soil shakes.

The houses crumble,

Walls crack and break –

His roar a mighty rumble,

Destruction in its wake.

His sleep disturbed, his pain

Anew awakened, goads him,

And his rage in frustrated strain

Exhausts. His injured limb

He stretches, and Gaia above

Him shudders; her mother’s love

In sympathy making her cry

His pain and suffering decry.

Up, down, and side to side

The ground is turned to jelly;

As Enceladus tries to hide

Deeper in his mother’s belly.

Ruin complete and utter devastation

Above him death and trepidation –

(Athena victory forswore)

All this, revenge enough for

Enceladus…

TRAVEL TUESDAY 490 - MT OLYMPUS, GREECE

“When one with honeyed words but evil mind Persuades the mob, great woes befall the state.” ― Euripides, ‘Orestes’

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.

Mount Olympus (Greek: Όλυμπος, romanized: Ólympos,) is an extensive massif near the Thermaic Gulf of the Aegean Sea, located on the border between Thessaly and Macedonia, between the regional units of Larissa and Pieria, about 80 km southwest from Thessaloniki. Mount Olympus has 52 peaks and deep gorges. The highest peak, Mytikas (Μύτικας Mýtikas), meaning "nose", rises to 2,917.727 metres and is the highest peak in Greece, and one of the highest peaks in Europe in terms of topographic prominence.

In Greek mythology, Olympus is the home of the Greek gods, on Mytikas peak. The mountain has exceptional biodiversity and rich flora. It has been a National Park, the first in Greece, since 1938. It is also a World Biosphere Reserve. Olympus remains the most popular hiking summit in Greece, as well as one of the most popular in Europe. Organised mountain refuges and various mountaineering and climbing routes are available. The usual starting point is the town of Litochoro which lies in the eastern foothills of the mountain, some 100 km from Thessaloniki.

Taking the opportunity today to direct your attention to the Greek entry for this year’s Eurovision Song Contest. It is sung by Klavdia and is called “Asteromáta” (Starry-eyed one). It’s a beautiful song and Klavdia has a rich, expressive and lucid voice. The song is about loss - loss of loved ones, loss of one’s homeland and loss of all things that one holds dear.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

TRAVEL TUESDAY 208 - ICARIA, GREECE

“Never regret thy fall, O Icarus of the fearless flight. For the greatest tragedy of them all, Is never to feel the burning light.” – Oscar Wilde

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. 

Icaria, also spelled Ikaria (Greek: Ικαρία), is a Greek island in the Aegean Sea, 10 nautical miles (19 km) southwest of Samos. According to tradition, it derives its name from Icarus, the son of Daedalus in Greek mythology, who was believed to have fallen into the sea nearby (for the myth, see here).

Administratively, Ikaria forms a separate municipality within the Ikaria regional unit, which is part of the North Aegean region. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Agios Kirykos. The historic capitals of the island include Oenoe and Evdilos (the latter shown here).

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

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

POETS UNITED - SILENCE

“Absolute silence leads to sadness. It is the image of death.” - Jean-Jacques Rousseau 

For this week’s theme Poets United has set its Midweek Motif as “Silence”. My poem refers to two Hellenistic gods: Harpocrates and Hermes – in case your mythology is rusty, here is what they stood for. 

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”). 

Hermes (Greek: Ἑρμῆς) is an Olympian god in Greek religion and mythology, the son of Zeus and the Pleiad Maia, and the second youngest of the Olympian gods (Dionysus being the youngest). Hermes was the emissary and messenger of the gods. Hermes was also “the divine trickster” and “the god of boundaries and the transgression of boundaries, ... the patron of herdsmen, thieves, graves, and heralds.” He is described as moving freely between the worlds of the mortal and divine, and was the conductor of souls into the afterlife. He was also viewed as the protector and patron of roads and travellers.

During Classical and Hellenistic Greece he is usually depicted young and nude, with athleticism, as befits the god of speech and of the gymnastics. When represented as Logios (Greek: Λόγιος, speaker), his attitude is consistent with the attribute, his hands often in an eloquent gesture. 

Silence Befits Harpocrates

O, Horus Child; O, Sun of dawn,

Who by the shores of mighty Nile

You grow into virile manhood,

My forebears dubbed you Harpocrates,

For your Egyptian name was too rough

For their silvery, slippery tongues.

You stand and look at me smiling,

And unlike your children friends

You hold your tongue,

Though all you know, all you’ve seen;

And yet you talk not, you keep my secrets

Betrayer you are not, my loyal friend.

Harpocrates (I too, prefer this name of yours),

You weave fine wreaths of fragrant roses

And even if sharp thorn draws blood

From your pricked finger, you let it flow

And not a word escapes your lips,

No cry of pain, no sigh of fierce frustration.

I shall my lover call Harpocrates, after you,

For he too stays silent, (too silent for my liking),

And he too betrays no confidence,

(Even his own to me he will not give);

I tell all, confide in him and expect in return a flood of words,

But like you Harpocrates, all he does is smile – silently…

To Hermes Logios I shall sacrifice three nightingales,

And hope that he will give you more words than I need;

For while Harpocrates is a fine god for friends,

I’d rather model my lover after Hermes, whose eloquence

I want filling my voids with wise words, small talk, poetry,

Entreaties, vows, idle prattle, and even more vital,

Words of love, sweet talk of passion, nothings of fond affection…

ART SUNDAY - ALESSANDRO ALLORI

“The great beauty and striking presence of Venus led to an association by the Greeks with Aphrodite, goddess of beauty and love. Inanna, Ishtar, Astarte and Venus are other names given to variations of this goddess in Western history, all associated with the planet. A knowledge of close coincidence between the cycles of Venus and human pregnancy may have contributed to the persistent, but nonexclusive of female characteristic to Venus. The Venus de Milo and Botticelli’s birth of Venus (popularly known as Venus on the Half Shell) are icons of this imagery in Western culture.” - Robert Hunter

Alessandro di Cristofano di Lorenzo del Bronzino Allori (Florence, 31 May 1535 – 22 September 1607) was an Italian portrait painter of the late Mannerist Florentine school. Mannerism is a style in European art that emerged in the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520, lasting until about 1580 in Italy, when the Baroque style began to replace it. Northern Mannerism continued into the early 17th century. Stylistically, Mannerism encompasses a variety of approaches influenced by, and reacting to, the harmonious ideals associated with artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and early Michelangelo.

Where High Renaissance art emphasises proportion, balance, and ideal beauty, Mannerism exaggerates such qualities, often resulting in compositions that are asymmetrical or unnaturally elegant. Mannerism is notable for its intellectual sophistication as well as its artificial (as opposed to naturalistic) qualities. Mannerism favours compositional tension and instability rather than the balance and clarity of earlier Renaissance painting. Mannerism in literature and music is notable for its highly florid style and intellectual sophistication.

Alessandro Allori lost his father when he was 5 years of age. In 1540, after the death of his father, he was brought up and trained in art by a close friend, often referred to as his “uncle”', the mannerist painter Agnolo Bronzino, whose name he sometimes assumed in his pictures. In some ways, Allori is the last of the line of prominent Florentine painters, of generally undiluted Tuscan artistic heritage: Andrea del Sarto worked with Fra Bartolomeo (as well as Leonardo da Vinci), Pontormo briefly worked under Andrea, and trained Bronzino, who trained Allori.

Subsequent generations in the city would be strongly influenced by the tide of Baroque styles pre-eminent in other parts of Italy. Some art critics deride Allori as derivative, claiming he illustrates the ideal of Mannerism by which art (and style) are generated out of pre-existing art. The polish of figures has an unnatural marble-like form as if he aimed for cold statuary. It can be said of late phase mannerist painting in Florence, that the city that had early breathed life into statuary with the works of masters like Donatello and Michelangelo, was still so awed by them that it petrified the poses of figures in painting.

While by 1600 the Baroque elsewhere was beginning to give life to painted figures, Florence was “painting two-dimensional statues”. Furthermore, in general, with the exception of the Contra-Maniera (Counter-Mannerism) artists, it dared not stray from high themes or stray into high emotion. Among his collaborators was Giovanni Maria Butteri and his main pupil was Giovanni Bizzelli. Cristoforo del Altissimo, Cesare Dandini, Aurelio Lomi, John Mosnier, Alessandro Pieroni, Giovanni Battista Vanni, and Monanni also were his pupils. Allori was one of the artists, working under Vasari, included in the decoration of the Studiola of Francesco I. He was the father of the painter Cristofano Allori (1577–1621).

Illustrated above is his “Venus and Cupid” c.1580-c.1607. Venus lies full-length, her head to the right, on blue-grey drapery. She teases Cupid by refusing him his bow and arrow, which she holds in her left hand. He leans across her right shoulder in an attempt to recover them, knowing that even Venus is susceptible to the irresistible power of his arrows that cause whoever is struck to fall in love. There are two doves, pink roses and a golden orb in the right foreground. These are all symbols of Venus, the doves being her sacred bird because of the pair bonding between them; the roses her sacred flowers as a symbol of love; and the golden ball being the prize Paris gave Venus as the most beautiful goddess when she was competing with Juno and Minerva (his prize being Venus’ promise to make Helen of Troy fall in love him).

The painting is a replica of a composition of which better versions are the small painting in the Uffizi (1512; 29 x 38 cm) and a large panel in the Kress Collection (County Museum, Los Angeles, K. 224: 143.5 x 227.3 cm). There are minor differences in the landscape background, and in colour, and in the Kress picture Venus's nakedness is partly covered by veils and roses, apparently later additions. At Montpellier (Musée Fabre) there is a large version, signed by Alessandro Allori, in which the lower limbs of Venus are differently disposed, and again some colours are different. A similar painting, perhaps the same, was in the Orléans Collection until 1792. The technique is close to that of Allori and it was probably painted in his workshop. This shows that successful and popular paintings were often copied in the past so that wealthy patrons could be satisfied even if they were unable to obtain the original.

ALL ABOUT VIOLETS

“Cold blows the wind against the hill, And cold upon the plain; I sit me by the bank, until The violets come again.” - Richard Garnett

Viola odorata is a species of the genus Viola native to Europe and Asia, but has also been introduced to North America and Australia. It is commonly known as wood violet, sweet violet, English violet, common violet, florist's violet, or garden violet. It is a hardy herbaceous flowering perennial.

Several cultivars have been selected for garden use, of which V. odorata ‘Wellsiana’ has gained the Royal Horticultural Society’s Award of Garden Merit. The sweet scent of this flower has proved popular throughout the generations particularly in the late Victorian period, and has consequently been used in the production of many cosmetic fragrances and perfumes. The scent of violet flowers is distinctive with only a few other flowers having a remotely similar odour. References to violets and the desirable nature of the fragrance go back to classical sources such as Pliny and Horace when the name ‘ion’ was in use to describe this flower from which the name of the distinctive chemical constituents of the flower, the ionones is derived.

In 1923 Poucher wrote that the flowers are widely cultivated both in Europe and the East for their fragrance, with both the flowers and leaves being separately collected and extracted for fragrance, and flowers also collected for use in confectionery galenical syrup and in the production of medicine. There is some doubt as to whether the true extract of the violet flower is still commercially available at all. It certainly was in the early 20th Century, but by the time Steffen Arctander was writing in the late 1950s and early 1960s production had “almost disappeared”. The violet leaf absolute however remains widely used in modern perfumery.

The combination of α-ionone and β-ionone is characteristic of the scent of violets and used with other components in perfumery and flavouring to recreate their scent. Ionones can be made synthetically in the laboratory and nowadays most perfumes using ionones use the synthetic form.

The French were known for their violet syrup, most commonly made from an extract of violets. In the United States, this French violet syrup was used to make violet scones and marshmallows. Once again most violet flavourings that one can obtain for culinary use are synthetic. However, if one grows fragrant violets in one’s garden, both flowers and leaves of the violet are edible and can be used in the kitchen.

The violet flower was a favourite in ancient Greece and became the symbol of Athens. Scent suggested sex, so the violet was an emblematic flower of Aphrodite and also of her son Priapus, the deity of gardens, fertility and generation. Iamus was a son of Apollo and the nymph Evadne, a daughter of sea-god Poseidon. He was abandoned by his mother at birth as she was ashamed of her pregnancy. She left him lying in the Arcadian wilds on a bed of violets where he was fed honey by serpents. Eventually, he was discovered by passing shepherds who named him Iamus after the violet (ion) bed he lay in. When he grew up, he descended into the waters of Alpheios and invoked Poseidon, his grandfather, and Apollo, his father, asking them to reveal his destiny to him. Apollo instructed him to go to Olympia. Granted the gift of prophecy by Apollo, he founded the Iamidae, a family of priests and seers in Olympia.

In the language of flowers violet flowers symbolise delicate love, affection, modesty, faith, nobility, intuition and dignity. The meaning of the violet changes depending on the colour of the flower and the person the flower is sent to. Blue violet flowers symbolises love and faithfulness, white violets represent purity and chastity, and yellow violets symbolise high worth and goodness. Violet flowers are often sent to commemorate a couple’s 50th wedding anniversary.

Crystallised violet flowers are used as an edible decoration for cakes, pastry and cupcakes. You will need the white of an egg, caster sugar and fresh, clean, whole violets (leaving the stalk on them helps you handle them). Place the clean dry flowers on a baking tray. Beat the egg white to a light foam. Brush the flowers all over with beaten egg white, using a soft pastry brush. Sprinkle flowers all over with the caster sugar immediately. The sugar needs to stick to the egg white before it dries. Leave for approximately one hour or more until fully set. You can also sit the finished flowers on a baking tray lined with ovenproof paper in a warm oven (switched off). Once they have dried, they will be hard and brittle; store them carefully in an airtight tin for up to 2 months.

This post is part of the Floral Friday Fotos meme,
and also part of the Friday Greens meme,
and also part of the Food Friday meme.

POETS UNITED - TWO SOULS

“Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.” - Aristotle

In ancient Greek the word for butterfly is “psyché”, the same word for “soul”. Psyche was also the name of Eros’ human lover (see the myth here). The Koiné Greek word ψυχή (psychē), “life, spirit, consciousness”, is derived from a verb meaning “to cool, to blow”, and hence refers to the breath, as opposed to σῶμα (sóma), meaning “body”.

This week in Poets United, the theme for the Midweek Motif is “Two Souls: Caged and Free”. Here is my poem:

Liebe

Liebe (leeb-e, f): Love, affection, fondness.

First entry on page 162 of my “Deutsch-Englisches Wörtebuch”

Just as you left it open for me to discover...

“Liebe” is what you feel and you tremble in its grip,

Enjoying the sweet pain of its discovered existence,

Being tortured by the bitter pleasures of its awakening.

“Liebe” in the first sense is what you feel for me,

“Liebe” in the third sense is what I feel for you,

Our “Liebe” for one another so different...

“Liebe” you cry out to me silently and you hope for me to understand

Your insistent sweet melodies, the blooming gardens of your captive soul;

You hope to wake in me the same sweet “Liebe” that consumes you...

“Liebe” will bring us tears, so smile now while we still can,

Enjoy the bright sunshine of this southern Spring,

Banish the thoughts of approaching northern Winter.

Ach! Liebe! Die Liebe hat gelogen!*

Do not believe her secret, syrupy whisperings…

Your soul a prisoner of love’s enthralment;

My soul restless, free to roam – for fondness does not bind it.

Refrain, restrain yourself!

Don’t let your heart be broken!

(*Oh! Love! Love has lied)

ALL ABOUT ROSEMARY

“There’s rosemary and rue. These keep Seeming and savour all the winter long. Grace and remembrance be to you.” - William Shakespeare (Winter’s Tale, Act 4, Scene 4)

Rosmarinus officinalis, commonly known as rosemary, is a woody, perennial herb with fragrant, evergreen, needle-like leaves and white, pink, purple, or blue flowers, native to the Mediterranean region. It is a member of the mint family Lamiaceae, which includes many other herbs. The name “rosemary” derives from the Latin for ‘dew’ (ros) and ‘sea’ (marinus), or ‘dew of the sea’. The plant is also sometimes called anthos, from the ancient Greek word ἄνθος, meaning “flower”.

Rosemary is an aromatic evergreen shrub that has leaves similar to eastern hemlock (Tsuga canadensis) needles. The leaves are used as a flavouring in foods such as stuffings and roast lamb, pork, chicken and turkey. It is native to the Mediterranean and Asia, but is reasonably hardy in cool climates. It can withstand droughts, surviving a severe lack of water for lengthy periods. Forms range from upright to trailing; the upright forms can reach 1.5 m tall, rarely 2 m. The leaves are evergreen, 2–4 cm long and 2–5 mm broad, green above, and greyish-white below, with dense, short, woolly hair. It has a fibrous root system. The plant flowers in spring and summer in temperate climates, but the plants can be in constant bloom in warm climates; flowers are white, pink, purple or deep blue. Rosemary also has a tendency to flower outside its normal flowering season; it has been known to flower as late as early December, and as early as mid-February.

Since it is attractive and drought-tolerant, rosemary is used as an ornamental plant in gardens and for xeriscape landscaping, especially in regions of Mediterranean climate. It is considered easy to grow and pest-resistant. Rosemary can grow quite large and retain attractiveness for many years, can be pruned into formal shapes and low hedges, and has been used for topiary. It is easily grown in pots. The groundcover cultivars spread widely, with a dense and durable texture.

Rosemary grows on friable loam soil with good drainage in an open, sunny position. It will not withstand waterlogging and some varieties are susceptible to frost. It grows best in neutral to alkaline conditions (pH 7–7.8) with average fertility. It can be propagated from an existing plant by clipping a shoot (from a soft new growth) 10–15 cm long, stripping a few leaves from the bottom, and planting it directly into soil.

According to legend, rosemary was draped around the Greek goddess Aphrodite when she rose from the sea, born of Uranus’s semen. Hence the herb was sacred to this goddess and was planted around her temples. In Christian tradition, the Virgin Mary is said to have spread her blue cloak over a white-blossomed rosemary bush when she was resting, and the flowers turned blue. The shrub then became known as the “Rose of Mary”. In the Middle Ages, rosemary was associated with wedding ceremonies. The bride would wear a rosemary headpiece and the groom and wedding guests would all wear a sprig of rosemary. From this association with weddings, rosemary was thought to be a love charm.

In myths and folklore, rosemary has a reputation for improving memory and has been used as a symbol for remembrance during war commemorations and funerals in Europe and Australia. Mourners would throw it into graves as a symbol of remembrance for the dead. In Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”, Ophelia says: ‘There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance.’ (Hamlet, iv. 5.) In Australia, sprigs of rosemary are worn on ANZAC Day and sometimes Remembrance Day to signify remembrance; the herb grows wild on the Gallipoli Peninsula.

Hungary water was first prepared for the Queen of Hungary Elisabeth of Poland to “... renovate vitality of paralysed limbs...” and to treat gout. It was used externally and prepared by mixing fresh rosemary tops into spirits of wine. Recipes for this call for: Distilling fresh rosemary (and possibly thyme) with strong brandy, while later formulations also contain lavender, mint, sage, marjoram, costus, orange blossom and lemon. Don Quixote (Part One, Chapter XVII) mixes it in his recipe of the miraculous balm of Fierabras. Rosemary oil is used for purposes of fragrant bodily perfumes or to emit an aroma into a room. It is also burnt as incense, and used in shampoos and cleaning products.

Fresh or dried rosemary leaves are used in traditional Italian, Spanish and Greek cuisine. They have a bitter, astringent taste and a characteristic aroma, which complements many cooked foods. When roasted with meats or vegetables, the leaves impart a mustard-like aroma with an additional fragrance of charred wood compatible with barbecued foods. In Greece, rosemary is often used to flavour baked or fried fish. In amounts typically used to flavour foods, such as one teaspoon (1 gram), rosemary provides no nutritional value. Rosemary extract has been shown to improve the shelf life and heat stability of omega 3-rich oils, which are prone to rancidity. A herbal tisane can be made from the leaves of rosemary.

In the language of flowers, rosemary sprigs (without flowers) stand for “remembrance. Rosemary in flower stands for “nostalgia and sweet memories.”

This post is part of the Floral Friday Fotos meme,
and also part of the Food Friday meme.

ALL ABOUT THE BAY LAUREL

“Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” - Confucius

Laurus nobilis is an aromatic evergreen tree or large shrub with green, glossy leaves, native to the Mediterranean region and belongs to the Lauraceae family. It is one of the plants used for bay leaf seasoning in cooking. It is known as bay laurel, sweet bay, bay tree (esp. United Kingdom), true laurel, Grecian laurel, laurel tree or simply laurel. Laurus nobilis figures prominently in classical Greek, Roman, and Biblical culture. Worldwide, many other kinds of plants in diverse families are also called “bay” or “laurel”, generally due to similarity of foliage or aroma to Laurus nobilis, and the full name is used for the California bay laurel (Umbellularia), also in the family Lauraceae.

The laurel can vary greatly in size and height, sometimes reaching 10–18 metres tall. The laurel is dioecious (unisexual), with male and female flowers on separate plants. Each flower is pale yellow-green, about 1 cm diameter, and they are borne in pairs beside a leaf. The leaves are 6–12 cm long and 2–4 cm broad, with an entire (untoothed) margin. On some leaves the margin undulates. The fruit is a small, shiny black berry-like drupe about 1 cm long that contains one seed.

Laurus nobilis is a widespread relic of the laurel forests that originally covered much of the Mediterranean Basin when the climate of the region was more humid. With the drying of the Mediterranean during the Pliocene era, the laurel forests gradually retreated, and were replaced by the more drought-tolerant sclerophyll plant communities familiar today. Most of the last remaining laurel forests around the Mediterranean are believed to have disappeared approximately ten thousand years ago, although some remnants still persist in the mountains of southern Turkey, northern Syria, southern Spain, north-central Portugal, northern Morocco, Canary Islands and in Madeira.

The plant is the source of several popular herbs and one spice used in a wide variety of recipes, particularly among Mediterranean cuisines. Most commonly, the aromatic leaves are added whole to Italian pasta sauces and Greek pulse dishes. However, even when cooked, whole bay leaves can be sharp and abrasive enough to damage internal organs, so they are typically removed from dishes before serving, unless used as a simple garnish. Whole bay leaves have a long shelf life of about one year, under normal temperature and humidity. Whole bay leaves are used almost exclusively as flavour agents during the food preparation stage. Ground bay leaves, however, can be ingested safely and are often used in soups and stocks, as well as being a common addition to a Bloody Mary. Dried laurel berries and pressed leaf oil can both be used as robust spices, and the wood can be burnt for strong smoke flavouring.

Bay laurel was used to fashion the laurel wreath of ancient Greece, a symbol of highest status. A wreath of bay laurels was given as the prize at the Pythian Games because the games were in honour of Apollo, and the laurel was one of his symbols. The oracle in Delphi used to chew bay leaves while she delivered her prophecies. The symbolism attached tot he laurel carried over to Roman culture, which held the laurel as a symbol of victory. It is also the source of the words “baccalaureate” and “poet laureate”, as well as the expressions “assume the laurel” and “resting on one’s laurels”.

Ovid retells the Greek myth in his Metamorphoses that laurel tree was first formed when the nymph Daphne was changed into a laurel tree because of Apollo’s pursuit of her. Daphne is the Greek name for the tree. In the Bible, the laurel is often an emblem of prosperity and fame. In Christian tradition, it symbolises the resurrection of Christ. In Italy, graduating college students wear crowns of laurel instead of the normal graduation hat, hence “baccalaureate”, from which the term “Bachelor” is derived.

Aqueous extracts of bay laurel can be used as astringents and even as a reasonable salve for open wounds. In massage therapy, the essential oil of bay laurel is reputed to alleviate arthritis and rheumatism, while in aromatherapy, it is used to treat earaches and high blood pressure. A traditional folk remedy for rashes caused by poison ivy, poison oak, and stinging nettle is a poultice soaked in boiled bay leaves. The chemical compound lauroside B isolated from Laurus nobilis is an inhibitor of human melanoma (skin cancer) cell proliferation at high concentrations in-vitro.

In the language of flowers, a laurel sprig stands for “glory”, while a flowering branch stands for “I change but in death”. A laurel wreath means “noble and exalted”.

This post is part of the Floral Friday Fotos meme,
and also part of the Friday Greens meme,
and also part of the Food Friday meme.

ART SUNDAY - RAPHAEL

“It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” - Pablo Picasso

Raphael (Italian in full, Raffaello Sanzio or Raffaello Santi; born April 6, 1483, Urbino, Duchy of Urbino, Italy – died April 6, 1520, Rome, Papal States Italy), master painter and architect of the Italian High Renaissance. Raphael is best known for his Madonnas and for his large figure compositions in the Vatican. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Early years at Urbino Raphael was the son of Giovanni Santi and Magia di Battista Ciarla; his mother died in 1491.

Italian Renaissance painter and architect Raphael was born Raffaello Sanzio on April 6, 1483, in Urbino, Italy. At the time, Urbino was a cultural centre that encouraged the Arts. Raphael’s father, Giovanni Santi, was a painter for the Duke of Urbino, Federigo da Montefeltro. Giovanni taught the young Raphael basic painting techniques and exposed him to the principles of humanistic philosophy at the Duke of Urbino’s court. In 1494, when Raphael was just 11 years old, Giovanni died. Raphael then took over the daunting task of managing his father’s workshop. His success in this role quickly surpassed his father’s; Raphael was soon considered one of the finest painters in town. As a teen, he was even commissioned to paint for the Church of San Nicola in the neighbouring town of Castello.

In 1500 a master painter named Pietro Vannunci, otherwise known as Perugino, invited Raphael to become his apprentice in Perugia, in the Umbria region of central Italy. In Perugia, Perugino was working on frescoes at the Collegio del Cambia. The apprenticeship lasted four years and provided Raphael with the opportunity to gain both knowledge and hands-on experience. During this period, Raphael developed his own unique painting style, as exhibited in the religious works the Mond "Crucifixion" (circa 1502), "The Three Graces" (circa 1503), "The Knight’s Dream" (1504) and the "Oddi altarpiece, Marriage of the Virgin", completed in 1504.

In 1504, Raphael left his apprenticeship with Perugino and moved to Florence, where he was heavily influenced by the works of the Italian painters Fra Bartolommeo, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Masaccio. To Raphael, these innovative artists had achieved a whole new level of depth in their composition. By closely studying the details of their work, Raphael managed to develop an even more intricate and expressive personal style than was evident in his earlier paintings. From 1504 through 1507, Raphael produced a series of "Madonnas," which extrapolated on Leonardo da Vinci's works. Raphael's experimentation with this theme culminated in 1507 with his painting, La belle jardinière. That same year, Raphael created his most ambitious work in Florence, the Entombment, which was evocative of the ideas that Michelangelo had recently expressed in his Battle of Cascina.

Raphael moved to Rome in 1508 to paint in the Vatican “Stanze” (Room), under Pope Julius II’s patronage. From 1509 to 1511, Raphael toiled over what was to become one of the Italian High Renaissance’s most highly regarded fresco cycles, those located in the Vatican's Stanza della Segnatura (“Room of the Signatura”). The Stanza della Segnatura series of frescos include The Triumph of Religion and The School of Athens. In the fresco cycle, Raphael expressed the humanistic philosophy that he had learned in the Urbino court as a boy. In the years to come, Raphael painted an additional fresco cycle for the Vatican, located in the Stanza d'Eliodoro (“Room of Heliodorus”), featuring The Expulsion of Heliodorus, The Miracle of Bolsena, The Repulse of Attila from Rome and The Liberation of Saint Peter. During this same time, the ambitious painter produced a successful series of “Madonna” paintings in his own art studio. The famed Madonna of the Chair and Sistine Madonna were among them.

By 1514, Raphael had achieved fame for his work at the Vatican and was able to hire a crew of assistants to help him finish painting frescoes in the Stanza dell’Incendio, freeing him up to focus on other projects. While Raphael continued to accept commissions -- including portraits of popes Julius II and Leo X -- and his largest painting on canvas, The Transfiguration (commissioned in 1517), he had by this time begun to work on architecture. After architect Donato Bramante died in 1514, the pope hired Raphael as his chief architect. Under this appointment, Raphael created the design for a chapel in Sant’ Eligio degli Orefici. He also designed Rome’s Santa Maria del Popolo Chapel and an area within Saint Peter’s new basilica. Raphael’s architectural work was not limited to religious buildings. It also extended to designing palaces. Raphael’s architecture honoured the classical sensibilities of his predecessor, Donato Bramante, and incorporated his use of ornamental details. Such details would come to define the architectural style of the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods.

On April 6, 1520, Raphael’s 37th birthday, he died suddenly and unexpectedly of mysterious causes in Rome, Italy. He had been working on his largest painting on canvas, The Transfiguration (commissioned in 1517), at the time of his death. When his funeral mass was held at the Vatican, Raphael's unfinished Transfiguration was placed on his coffin stand. Raphael’s body was interred at the Pantheon in Rome, Italy. Following his death, Raphael's movement toward Mannerism influenced painting styles in Italy’s advancing Baroque period. Celebrated for the balanced and harmonious compositions of his "Madonnas," portraits, frescoes and architecture, Raphael continues to be widely regarded as the leading artistic figure of Italian High Renaissance classicism.

The painting above is the “Parnassus” a fresco painting in the Raphael Rooms (Stanze di Raffaello), in the Palace of the Vatican in Rome, painted at the commission of Pope Julius II. It was probably the second wall of the Stanza della segnatura to be painted, in about 1511, after “La disputa” and before “The School of Athens”, which occupy other walls of the room. The whole room shows the four areas of human knowledge: philosophy, religion, poetry and law, with The Parnassus representing poetry.

The fresco shows the mythological Mount Parnassus where Apollo dwells; he is in the centre playing an instrument (a contemporary lira da braccio rather than a classical lyre), surrounded by the nine muses, nine poets from antiquity, and nine contemporary poets. Apollo, along with Calliope, the muse of epic poetry, inspired poets. Raphael used the face of Laocoön from the classical sculpture “Laocoön and His Sons”, excavated in 1506 and also in the Vatican for his Homer (in dark blue robe to the left of centre), expressing blindness rather than pain.

Two of the female figures in the fresco have been said to be reminiscent of Michaelangelo's Creation of Adam, Euterpe and Sappho, who is named on a scroll she holds. Sappho is the only female poet shown, presumably identified so that she is not confused with a muse; she is a late addition who does not appear in the print by Marcantonio Raimondi that records a drawing for the fresco. The window below the fresco Parnassus frames the view of Mons Vaticanus, believed to be sacred to Apollo. Humanists, such as Biondo, Vegio, and Albertini, refer to the ancient-sun god of the Vatican.

MOVIE MONDAY - COCTEAU'S ORPHÉE

“Film will only became an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper.” - Jean Cocteau

Jean Cocteau was a French poet, librettist, novelist, actor, director and artist (born July 5, 1889, Maisons-Laffitte, near Paris, France - died October 11, 1963, Milly-la-Forêt, near Paris). Some of his most important works include the poem L’Ange Heurtebise (1925; “The Angel Heurtebise”); the play Orphée (1926; Orpheus); the novels Les Enfants terribles (1929; “The Incorrigible Children”) and La Machine infernale (1934; The Infernal Machine); and his surrealistic motion pictures Le Sang d’un poète (1930; The Blood of a Poet) and La Belle et la bête (1946; Beauty and the Beast).

Cocteau grew up in Paris and always considered himself Parisian by speech, education, ideas, and habits. His family was of the solid Parisian bourgeoisie (cultivated, wealthy, and interested in music, painting, and literature). Cocteau’s earliest memories had to do with the theatre, in popular forms, such as the circus and the ice palace, as well as serious theatre, such as the tragedies performed at the Comédie-Française. At age 19 he published his first volume of poems, La Lampe d’Aladin (“Aladdin’s Lamp”).

Cocteau was the product of the years immediately preceding World War I, years of refined artistic taste that were devoid of political turmoil. His real exploration of the world of the theatre began when he encountered the Ballets Russes, then under the direction of Sergey Diaghilev. When Cocteau expressed a desire to create ballets, Diaghilev challenged him by saying: ‘Étonne-moi’ (“surprise me”). This famous remark seems to have guided the poet not only in his ballets, such as Parade (1917), with music by Erik Satie, and Le Boeuf sur le toit (1920; “The Ox on the Roof”), with music by Darius Milhaud, but also in his other works; and it is sometimes quoted in his plays and films.

During World War I, Cocteau served as an ambulance driver on the Belgian front. The landscape he observed there was later used in his novel Thomas l’imposteur (1923; “Thomas the Imposter”). He became a friend of the aviator Roland Garros and dedicated to him the early poems inspired by aviation, Le Cap de Bonne-Espérance (1919; The Cape of Good Hope). At intervals during the years 1916 and 1917, Cocteau entered the world of modern art, then being born in Paris; in the bohemian Montparnasse section of the city, he met painters such as Pablo Picasso and Amedeo Modigliani and writers such as Max Jacob and Guillaume Apollinaire.

Soon after the war, Max Jacob introduced Cocteau to the future poet and novelist Raymond Radiguet. The 16-year-old Radiguet, who appeared to be a prodigy, advocated an aesthetic of simplicity and of classical clarity, qualities that would become characteristic of Cocteau’s own work. The example of Radiguet counted tremendously for Cocteau; and when Radiguet died in 1923, at age 21, the older man felt bereft of a friendship that had been based upon a constant interchange of ideas, encouragement, and enthusiasms. An addiction to opium, brought on by Cocteau’s grief over his lover’s death, necessitated a period of cure. Jacques Maritain, a French Thomist philosopher, paid his first visit to Cocteau in the sanatorium. Through Maritain, Cocteau returned briefly to religious practice.

These complex experiences initiated a new period in his life, during which he produced some of his most important works. In the long poem L’Ange Heurtebise the poet engages in a violent combat with an angel that was to reappear continually in his works. His play Orphée, first performed in 1926, was destined to play a part in the resurrection of tragedy in contemporary theatre; in it, Cocteau deepened his interpretation of the nature of the poet. The novel Les Enfants terribles, written in the space of three weeks in March 1929, is the study of the inviolability of the character of two adolescents, the brother and sister Paul and Elisabeth. In 1950 Cocteau prepared the screenplay for a film of this work, and he was also the film’s narrator.

Cocteau had enlarged the scope of his work by the creation of his first film, Le Sang d’un poète, a commentary on his own private mythology; the themes that then seemed obscure or shocking seem today less private and more universal because they have appeared in other works. Also in the early 1930s Cocteau wrote what is usually thought to be his greatest play, La Machine infernale, a treatment of the Oedipus theme that is very much his own. In these two works he moved into closer contact with the great myths of humanity.

In the 1940s Cocteau returned to filmmaking, first as a screenwriter and then also as a director in La Belle et la bête, a fantasy based on the children’s tale, and Orphée (1950), a re-creation of the themes of poetry and death that he had dealt with in his play. Also a visual artist of significance, Cocteau in 1950 decorated the Villa Santo Sospir in Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat and began a series of important graphic works: Frescoes on the City Hall in Menton, the Chapel of Saint-Pierre in Villefranche-sur-Mer, and the Church of Saint-Blaise-des-Simples in Milly-la-Forêt. His adopted son, the painter Édouard Dermit, who also appears in his later films, continued the decoration of a chapel at Fréjus, a work Cocteau had not completed at his death at age 74.

We recently watched again his 1950 film “Orphée” (Orpheus), starring Jean Marais, François Périer and María Casares. The film appeared as striking and as poetic as the first time I had watched it. While based on the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, Cocteau makes of this an allegorical and magical tale of love, death and the meaning of life. It is a surrealistic masterpiece and one can become immersed in it again and again, becoming lost in its symbols, drawing new meaning with each viewing and enjoying again and again the amazing images.

The film is set in post-war, bomb-damaged France of the late 1940s. Orphée (Marais) is a self-absorbed poet, living in splendid isolation with his beautiful wife Eurydice in. Times are changing and Orphée’s popularity is waning as a new wave of poets is winning the new generation. As a poet he feels slighted and he goes into town with the intention of facing the new age. However, he is snubbed and he becomes enraged. The leader of the new poets, the young Jacques Cegeste, is caught up in a brawl in a bar, which spills out into the street and he is killed by a motorcyclist. Orphée, an innocent bystander, is taken away in a black limousine with the lifeless body of Cegeste by a beautiful and mysterious Princess to a deserted house.

Time runs backwards in this house and the way into the underworld lies through mirrors. Orphée falls in love with the Princess (and so falls in love with his own death). Cegeste’s followers advise the police that Orphée is responsible for the young poet’s death. Ultimately Orphée has to choose between between the Princess and Eurydice, his wife.

Marais was Cocteau’s lover for a time and that’s why he probably landed the role of Orphée. He looks quite like the aesthete poet – self-admiring and narcissistic, obsessed with his reflection in the many mirrors of the film. Maria Casares steals every scene she is in as the Princess/Death, playing her role with aplomb and great gusto. François Périer does a marvellous job as Heurtebise, the Princess’s assistant who “breaks the rules” and falls in love with Orphée’s wife. Juliette Greco plays a small but memorable role, and Maria Dea as Eurydice seems rather insignificant in the film’s main themes – or rather her death is quite the catalyst…

It is an amazing film, the closest poetry comes being filmed. A brilliant masterpiece of a complex and wonderfully creative mind. If you are interested in art, poetry, literature, philosophy, myth and symbolism, you will simply love this film!