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Roc (mythology)
The roc is an enormous legendary bird of prey in the popular mythology of the Middle East. The roc appears in Arab geographies and natural history, popularized in Arabian fairy tales and sailors' folklore. Ibn Battuta tells of a mountain hovering in the air over the China Seas, which was the roc. The story collection ''One Thousand and One Nights'' includes tales "Abd al-Rahman the Maghribi's Story of the Rukh" and "Sinbad the Sailor", both of which include the roc. Etymology The English form ''roc'' originates via Antoine Galland's French from Arabic ''ruḵḵ'' () and that from Persian language, Persian ''ruḵ'' ().roc /[phonetic transcription]/ n. Also (earlier) ✝roche, ✝rock, ✝ruc(k), ✝rukh. L16 [Sp. ''rocho'', ''ruc'' f. Arab. ''ruḵḵ'', f. Pers. ''ruḵ''.] A mythical bird of Eastern legend, imagined as being of enormous size and strength (''The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary'', Clarendon Press, Oxford, Volume 2 N-Z, 1993 edition, page 2614) In both lang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Julius Detmold
Edward Julius Detmold (21 November 1883 Putney, Wandsworth District (Metropolis), Wandsworth, Surrey - 1 July 1957 Montgomery, Powys, Montgomery) and his twin brother Charles Maurice Detmold (1883-1908) were prolific Victorian era, Victorian and early twentieth-century book illustrators. Biography and works Their parents were Edward Detmold and Mary Agnes Luck. Their father, an electrical engineer was absent for much of their childhood, and they lived with their uncle and guardian, Dr. Edward Barton Shuldham, who saw to their tuition and was a noted collector of porcelain and Woodblock printing in Japan, Japanese woodblock prints of plants and animals. Dr. Shuldham occupied a house in Upper Richmond Road, Putney, where the twins had been born. He ensured their interest in natural history and art and created a nurturing environment for their precocious talents. They also spent time with another uncle, the painter Henry E. Detmold, who encouraged them in their art. Most of their pr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Griffin
The griffin, griffon, or gryphon (; Classical Latin: ''gryps'' or ''grypus''; Late and Medieval Latin: ''gryphes'', ''grypho'' etc.; Old French: ''griffon'') is a -4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ...: ''griffon'') is a legendary creature with the body, tail, and Hindlimb">back legs of a lion, and the head and wings of an eagle">lion.html" ;"title="Hindlimb">back legs of a lion">Hindlimb">back legs of a lion, and the head and wings of an eagle with its talons on the front legs. Overview Because the lion was traditionally considered the king of the beasts and the eagle the king of the birds, by the Middle Ages, the griffin was thought to be an especially powerful and majestic creature. Since classical antiquity, griffins were known for guarding treasures and priceless possessions. In Greek and Roman texts, griffins and Arimaspians were associated with gold deposits of Central Asia. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Benjamin Of Tudela
Benjamin of Tudela (), also known as Benjamin ben Jonah, was a medieval Jewish traveler who visited Europe, Asia, and Africa in the twelfth century. His vivid descriptions of western Asia preceded those of Marco Polo by a hundred years. With his broad education and vast knowledge of languages, Benjamin of Tudela is a major figure in medieval geography and Jewish history. ''The Travels of Benjamin'' is an important work not only as a description of the Jewish communities, but also as a reliable source about the geography and ethnography Ethnography is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. It explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject of the study. Ethnography is also a type of social research that involves examining ... of the Middle Ages. Some modern historians credit Benjamin with giving accurate descriptions of everyday life in the Middle Ages. Originally written in Hebrew, his itinerary was translated into Latin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Earth After The Fall Of Man
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all of Earth's water is contained in its global ocean, covering 70.8% of Earth's crust. The remaining 29.2% of Earth's crust is land, most of which is located in the form of continental landmasses within Earth's land hemisphere. Most of Earth's land is at least somewhat humid and covered by vegetation, while large sheets of ice at Earth's polar deserts retain more water than Earth's groundwater, lakes, rivers, and atmospheric water combined. Earth's crust consists of slowly moving tectonic plates, which interact to produce mountain ranges, volcanoes, and earthquakes. Earth has a liquid outer core that generates a magnetosphere capable of deflecting most of the destructive solar winds and cosmic radiation. Earth has a dynamic atmosphere, which sustains Earth's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sinbad The Sailor (5th Voyage)
Sinbad the Sailor (; or Sindbad) is a fictional mariner and the hero of a story-cycle. He is described as hailing from Baghdad during the early Abbasid Caliphate (8th and 9th centuries A.D.). In the course of seven voyages throughout the seas east of Africa and south of Asia, he has fantastic adventures in magical realms, encountering monsters and witnessing supernatural phenomena. Origins and sources The tales of Sinbad are a relatively late addition to the ''One Thousand and One Nights''. They do not feature in the earliest 14th-century manuscript, and they appear as an independent cycle in 18th- and 19th-century collections. The tale reflects the trend within the Abbasid realm of Arab and Muslim sailors exploring the world. The stories display the folk and themes present in works of that time. The Abbasid reign was known as a period of great economic and social growth. Arab and Muslim traders would seek new trading routes and people to trade with. This process of growth i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Embekka Devalaya
''Embekka Devalaya'' (Embekka Temple) was built by the King Vikramabahu III of Gampola Era (AD 1357–1374) in Sri Lanka. The Devalaya is dedicated to Kataragama deviyo, a form of Kartikeya. A local deity called Devatha Bandara is also worshiped at this site. The shrine consists of three sections, the "Sanctum of Garagha", the "Digge" or "Dancing Hall" and the "Hevisi Mandapaya" or the "Drummers' Hall". The Drummers' Hall has drawn the attention of visitors to the site, due to the splendid wood carvingsBooklet ''Kandy Embekke Wood Carvings'' by M. W. E. Karunaratna of its ornate pillars and its high pitched roof. Location Embekke Devalaya is situated in Medapalata Korale of Udunuwara in Kandy District. This is a sheltered place used to rest during long pilgrimage or long journeys in ancient days of Sri Lanka. This Ambalama is said to be built during AD 1341–1357 by the King Bhuwanekabhahu IV. Carvings and woodwork It is said that some of the wood work utilized for th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ramayana
The ''Ramayana'' (; ), also known as ''Valmiki Ramayana'', as traditionally attributed to Valmiki, is a smriti text (also described as a Sanskrit literature, Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epic) from ancient India, one of the two important epics of Hinduism known as the ''Itihasas'', the other being the ''Mahabharata''. The epic narrates the life of Rama, the seventh ''avatar'' of the Hindu deity Vishnu, who is a prince of Ayodhya (Ramayana), Ayodhya in the kingdom of Kosala. The epic follows Exile of Lord Rama, his fourteen-year exile to the forest urged by his father King Dasharatha, on the request of Rama's stepmother Kaikeyi; his travels across the forests in the Indian subcontinent with his wife Sita and brother Lakshmana; the kidnapping of Sita by Ravana, the king of Lanka, that resulted in bloodbath; and Rama's eventual return to Ayodhya (Ramayana), Ayodhya along with Sita to be crowned as a king amidst jubilation and celebration. Scholarly estimates for the earliest stage ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mahabharata
The ''Mahābhārata'' ( ; , , ) is one of the two major Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epics of ancient India revered as Smriti texts in Hinduism, the other being the ''Ramayana, Rāmāyaṇa''. It narrates the events and aftermath of the Kurukshetra War, a war of succession between two groups of princely cousins, the Kauravas and the Pandava, Pāṇḍavas. It also contains Hindu philosophy, philosophical and devotional material, such as a discussion of the four "goals of life" or ''puruṣārtha'' (12.161). Among the principal works and stories in the ''Mahābhārata'' are the ''Bhagavad Gita'', the story of Damayanti, the story of Shakuntala, the story of Pururava and Urvashi, the story of Savitri and Satyavan, the story of Kacha (sage), Kacha and Devayani, the story of Rishyasringa and an Ramopakhyana, abbreviated version of the ''Rāmāyaṇa'', often considered as works in their own right. Traditionally, the authorship of the ''Mahābhārata'' is attributed to Vyasa, Vy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mytheme
In structuralism-influenced studies of mythology, a mytheme is a fundamental generic unit of narrative structure (typically involving a relationship between a character, an event, and a theme) from which myths are thought to be constructed—a minimal unit that is always found shared with other, related mythemes and reassembled in various ways ("bundled") or linked in more complicated relationships. For example, the myths of Greek Adonis and Egyptian Osiris share several elements, leading some scholars to conclude that they share a source, i.e. images passed down in cultures or from one to another, being ascribed new interpretations of the action depicted, as well as new names in various readings of icons. Overview Claude Lévi-Strauss (1908–2009), who gave the term wide circulation, wrote, "If one wants to establish a parallel between structural linguistics and the structural analysis of myths, the correspondence is established, not between mytheme and word but between mytheme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nāga
In various Asian religious traditions, the Nāgas () are a divine, or semi-divine, race of half-human, half-serpent beings that reside in the netherworld (Patala), and can occasionally take human or part-human form, or are so depicted in art. Furthermore, nāgas are also known as Dragon, dragons and Water spirit, water spirits. A female nāga is called a Nagin, or a Naiṇī Devī, Nagini. According to legend, they are the children of the sage Kashyapa and Kadru. Rituals devoted to these supernatural beings have been taking place throughout South Asia for at least 2,000 years. They are principally depicted in three forms: as entirely human with snakes on the heads and necks, as common serpents, or as half-human, half-snake beings in Hinduism and Buddhism. ''Nagaraja'' is the title given to the king of the nāgas. Narratives of these beings hold cultural significance in the mythological traditions of many South Asian and Southeast Asian cultures, and within Hinduism and Buddhism ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
