![]() In Celtic mythology, the severed head becomes a symbol of power. Bran’s head helps repel invasion from Europe You can read about other religious relics here. You can see her head (safely ensconced behind glass) in her home church in Siena. When the guards peered inside, they saw only a pile of rose petals. Guards stopped them, demanding to see inside the bag. They left the tomb to smuggle the head out of Rome in a bag. By Giovanni Cerretani (Own work), via Wikimedia CommonsEither way, the Siena locals succeeded in their task. The head of St Catherine of Siena in a procession. Some legends even say her body was so badly decomposed by the conditions in the tomb that she was almost headless anyway. They realised how difficult it would be to smuggle a whole body out of the tomb and decided to decapitate her instead. Roman officials refused.Ī few townspeople from Siena travelled to Rome to steal her remains. She lived during the 14th century, and legends attribute her with stigmata and even levitation. She died in Rome at the age of 33, and the people of Siena wanted her body back for burial. St Catherine of Siena has a truly memorable story. I’ve long been fascinated by religious relics (and not just because of the first series of Blackadder). The transformative powers of St Catherine’s severed head ![]() In the most famous legend, Apollo tires of its incessant chatter and tells it to shut up. As the son of a muse himself, Orpheus needed no muse, and he eventually became more popular than the oracles of Lesbos. Orpheus continued to sing and the Lesbians created a shrine for it in a cave. After it fell into the ocean, it washed up on the island of Lesbos. Someone nailed his severed head to his lyre. The stories differ about what he did when he left the underworld. His pursuit of his wife, Eurydice, ends in tragedy. Orpheus is most famous within Greek mythology for his descent into the underworld. (Leave a comment below for casting ideas to play Mimir’s head!) The head of Orpheus continued to sing after death Georg Pauli, via Wikimedia CommonsThat’s something you don’t see in Marvel’s Thor films. He kept it by the well of wisdom so he could ask Mimir for counsel whenever he needed him. Mourning the loss of a great advisor, Odin ended up with Mimir’s severed head and pickled it. The other was equally wise, but ended up being decapitated by the Vanir for continually acting as an advisor by his dim-witted brother. But either way, one of the versions of Mimir guarded the well of wisdom. No one knows if Mimir is a single figure or two. Norse legends sometimes become difficult to follow when texts refer to a range of characters, often with the same name. A severed head in a jar dispenses advice to Odin He wrote it in 1824 so the French Revolution was still in living memory for some. Washington Irving (yep, he of the Headless Horseman fame) even wrote a short story about it, ‘The Adventures of a German Student’. A young man takes her home, only to discover her headlessness the following morning. One tale appears several times, that of the ghostly woman who holds her decapitated head in place with a choker. And you might wonder what it has to do with folklore.Īs with any event whose impact is far-reaching and based on fear, several urban legends sprang up around the guillotine and her bloodlust. You can’t talk about decapitation and not mention the French Revolution. Let’s get cracking… The French Revolution But after posting a discussion around the Headless Horseman last week, I decided to focus on the head itself this week! By Jebulon (Own work), via Wikimedia CommonsI originally did a lot of research into severed heads for a forthcoming book on the Gothic nature of body parts in literature and film. Perseus holding the head of Medusa, by Benvenuto Cellini. This ultimately makes them so much more horrific than a severed foot or a section of an arm.īut what do they have to do with folklore? Surprisingly, quite a lot. An obvious example would be Perseus cutting off Medusa’s head. Heads made excellent display objects if you wanted to warn your enemies that you meant business. People recognise severed heads and only one conclusion can be drawn.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |