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Urthona
In the mythological writings of William Blake, Urthona is one of the four Zoas, who were created when Albion, the primordial man, was divided fourfold. Specifically, he is the Zoa of inspiration and creativity, and he is a blacksmith god. His female counterpart is Enitharmon. Urthona usually appears in his "fallen" form, that of Los. Character Urthona (likely intended to imply "earth owner") is one of the Four Zoas and represents both the north and imagination within the individual. He is aligned with the Christian Trinity in the aspect of the Holy Ghost and is opposed to Urizen, the Zoa of reason. He is the last to be created, and his corresponding element is Earth. In his eternal form, he is portrayed as a blacksmith, working in his forge in Golgonooza. In terms of senses, he is represented by the ear, in terms of art he is represented by poetry, and in his fallen form, his profession is religion. He and Luvah are the guardians of the gates of heaven. Unlike the other Zoas, he d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Enitharmon
Enitharmon is a major female character in William Blake's mythology, playing a main part in some of his prophetic books. She is, but not directly, an aspect of the male Urthona, one of the Four Zoas. She is in fact the Emanation of Los, also male. There is a complex verbal nexus attached. The Zoa Tharmas has emanation Enion, and Eni-tharm(as)-on is one derivation of her name. That should perhaps be read in the inverse direction though, as a construction of the Tharmas/Enion pair's names. Within Blake's myth, she represents female domination and sexual restraints that limit the artistic imagination. She, with Los, gives birth to various children, including Orc. Background It is possible that the character Enitharmon was based on Blake's wife, Catherine Blake. In a letter from Blake to his friend Thomas Butts, Jr. on 22 November 1802, he claimed that his place at Surrey had "Enitharmon's bower". S. Foster Damon explained the name Enitharmon as a derivation or an elision of (z)enit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vala, Or The Four Zoas
''Vala, or The Four Zoas'' is one of the uncompleted prophetic books by the English poet William Blake, begun in 1797. The eponymous main characters of the book are the Four Zoas (Urthona, Urizen, Luvah and Tharmas), who were created by the fall of Albion in Blake's mythology. It consists of nine books, referred to as "nights". These outline the interactions of the Zoas, their fallen forms and their Emanations. Blake intended the book to be a summation of his mythic universe but, dissatisfied, he abandoned the effort in 1807, leaving the poem in a rough draft and its engraving unfinished. The text of the poem was first published, with only a small portion of the accompanying illustrations, in 1893, by the Irish poet W. B. Yeats and his collaborator, the English writer and poet Edwin John Ellis, in their three-volume book '' The Works of William Blake''. Background Blake began working on ''Vala, or The Death and Judgement of the Eternal Man: A Dream of Nine Nights'' while he wa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Blake's Mythology
The prophetic books of the English poet and artist William Blake contain an invented mythology, in which Blake worked to encode his spiritual and political ideas into a prophecy for a new age. This desire to recreate the cosmos is the heart of his work and his psychology. His myths often described the struggle between enlightenment and free love on the one hand, and restrictive education and morals on the other. Sources Among Blake's inspirations were John Milton's ''Paradise Lost'' and ''Paradise Regained'', the visions of Emanuel Swedenborg and the near-cabalistic writings of Jakob Böhme. Blake also included his own interpretations of druidism and paganism. The Fall of Albion The longest elaboration of this private myth-cycle was also his longest poem, '' The Four Zoas: The Death and Judgment of Albion The Ancient Man'', written in the late 1790s but left in manuscript form at the time of his death. In this work, Blake traces the fall of Albion, who was "originally fourfold b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Los (Blake)
In the mythological writings of William Blake, Los is the fallen (earthly or human) form of Urthona, one of the four Zoas. He is referred to as the "eternal prophet" and creates the visionary city of Golgonooza. Los is regularly described as a smith, beating with his hammer on a forge, which is metaphorically connected to the beating of the human heart. The bellows of his forge are the human lungs. Los's emanation, Enitharmon, represents spiritual beauty and embodies pity, but at the same time creates the spatial aspect of the fallen world, weaving bodies for men and creating sexual strife through her insistence upon chastity. In the ''Book of Urizen'' (1794), Los and Enitharmon have a child, Orc, who is the embodiment of the spirit of revolution. The name ''Los'' is, by common critical acceptance, an anagram of '' Sol'', the Latin word for "sun". ''Los'' is also the plural form of ''El'', an ancient Hebrew deity. Such innovations are common in many of Blake's prophetic poems. B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zoas
In the mythology of William Blake, Albion is the primeval man whose fall and division results in the Four Zoas: Urizen, Tharmas, Luvah/Orc and Urthona/Los. The name derives from the ancient and mythological name of Britain, Albion. Sources In the mythical story of the founding of Britain, Albion was a Giant son of Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea. He was a contemporary of Heracles, who killed him. Albion founded a country on the island and ruled there. Britain, then called Albion after its founder, was inhabited by his Giant descendants until about 1100 years before Julius Cæsar's invasion of Britain, when Brutus of Troy came and defeated the small number of Giants that remained (as a group of the Giants had killed all the others). According to another account, Noah's son Japhet had a son named Histion, who had four sons. Their names were Francus, Romanus, Brittos and Alemannus, and the French, Roman, British and German people are descended from them. Brittos divided Brit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albion (Blake)
In the William Blake's mythology, mythology of William Blake, Albion is the primeval man whose fall and division results in the Four Zoas: Urizen, Tharmas, Luvah/Orc (Blake), Orc and Urthona/Los (Blake), Los. The name derives from the ancient and mythological name of Britain, Albion. Sources In the mythical story of the founding of Prehistoric Britain, Britain, Alebion, Albion was a Gigantes, Giant son of Poseidon, the Greek mythology, Greek god of the sea. He was a contemporary of Heracles, who killed him. Albion founded a country on the island and ruled there. Britain, then called Albion after its founder, was inhabited by his Giant descendants until about 1100 years before Julius Cæsar's invasion of Britain, when Brutus of Troy came and defeated the small number of Giants that remained (as a group of the Giants had killed all the others). According to another account, Noah's son Japhet had a son named Histion, who had four sons. Their names were France, Francus, Rome, Romanus ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jerusalem The Emanation Of The Giant Albion
''Jerusalem'', subtitled ''The Emanation of the Giant Albion'' (1804–1820, with additions made even later), is the last, longest and greatest in scope of the prophetic books written and illustrated by the English poet, artist and engraver William Blake. Etched in handwriting, accompanied by small sketches, marginal figures and huge full-plate illustrations, it has been described as "visionary theatre". The poet himself believed it was his masterpiece and it has been said that "of all Blake's illuminated epics, this is by far the most public and accessible". Nonetheless, only six copies were printed in Blake's lifetime and the book, like all of Blake's prophetic works, was all but ignored by his contemporaries. The lyric to the famous hymn ''Jerusalem'' (text also by Blake, with music by Sir Hubert Parry) is not connected to this poem. It is in fact taken from the preface to another of Blake's "prophetic books", ''Milton''. Production technique The poem, which was produced be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Blake
William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his life, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual art of the Romantic Age. What he called his " prophetic works" were said by 20th-century critic Northrop Frye to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language". His visual artistry led 21st-century critic Jonathan Jones to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". In 2002, Blake was placed at number 38 in the BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons. While he lived in London his entire life, except for three years spent in Felpham, he produced a diverse and symbolically rich collection of works, which embraced the imagination as "the body of God" or "human existence itself". Although Blake was considered mad by contemporaries for his idiosyncratic views, he is held in high regard b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Golgonooza
Golgonooza is a mythical city in the work of William Blake. Golgonooza is a ''City of Imagination'' built by Los, ''the spiritual Four-fold London'', a vision of London and also linked to Jerusalem and is ''Blake's great city of art and science''. The city consists of the physical bodies of man and woman. There is Los's palace (the intellect) in the South and his forge with furnaces in the middle called Bowlahoola (the organs of the animal man). "In the North Gate, in the West of the North, toward Beulah" there is the golden hall of Cathedron that contains the Enitharmon's looms (the womb), where the physical body of man is woven. There is the Gate of Luban (the vagina) in the middle of the city. All these is surrounded with a moat of fire. Golgonooza is walled against Satan and his wars. Around the city there is the land of Allamanda (the nervous system of the vegetated man) in the forests of Entuthon Benython with the Lake of Udan Adan. Fourfold internal structure of the city re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vulcan (mythology)
Vulcan ( la, Vulcanus, in archaically retained spelling also ''Volcanus'', both pronounced ) is the god of fire including the fire of volcanoes, deserts, metalworking and the forge in ancient Roman religion and myth. He is often depicted with a blacksmith's hammer. The Vulcanalia was the annual festival held August 23 in his honor. His Greek counterpart is Hephaestus, the god of fire and smithery. In Etruscan religion, he is identified with Sethlans. Vulcan belongs to the most ancient stage of Roman religion: Varro, the ancient Roman scholar and writer, citing the Annales Maximi, records that king Titus Tatius dedicated altars to a series of deities including Vulcan. Etymology The origin of the name is unclear. Roman tradition maintained that it was related to Latin words connected to lightning (), which in turn was thought of as related to flames. This interpretation is supported by Walter William Skeat in his etymological dictionary as meaning ''lustre''. It has be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
America A Prophecy
''America a Prophecy'' is a 1793 prophetic book by the English poet and illustrator William Blake. It is engraved on eighteen plates, and survives in fourteen known copies. It is the first of Blake's ''Continental prophecies''. Background During autumn 1790, Blake moved to Lambeth, Surrey (today within the bounds of Greater London). He had a studio at the new house that he used while writing what were later called his "Lambeth Books", which included ''America'' in 1793. Like the others under the title, all aspects of the work, including the composition of the designs, the printing of them, the colouring of them, and the selling of them, happened at his home. ''America'' was the first book printed by Blake to include the place of origin and Blake's full name on the title page, which showed that Blake would continue to expound his visions of revolution even though parliament had passed acts against seditious writings earlier that year.Damon 1988 p. 20 Blake wrote in his notebo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Europe A Prophecy
''Europe a Prophecy'' is a 1794 prophetic book by the British poet and illustrator William Blake. It is engraved on 18 plates, and survives in just nine known copies. It followed ''America a Prophecy'' of 1793. Background During autumn 1790, Blake moved to Lambeth, Surrey. He had a studio at the new house that he used while writing what were later called his "Lambeth Books", which included ''Europe'' in 1794. Like the others under the title, all aspects of the work, including the composition of the designs, the printing of them, the colouring of them, and the selling of them, happened at his home. Early sketches for ''Europe'' were included in a notebook that contained images were created between 1790 until 1793. Only a few of Blake's works were fully coloured, and only some of the editions of ''Europe'' were coloured. When ''Europe'' was printed, it was in the same format as Blake's ''America'' and sold for the same price. It was printed between 1794 and 1821 with only 9 copi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
