Aodhán makes art

I've wanted it all my life. I can now have it. But do I want it anymore?

Little tragedies (commemorative votives from St. Brigid's Well in Kildare).

The Waiting Room / Good with Children

Expressions practice time with Captain Alan Moran, @sorrows-hand's and mine rapparee OC! From left to right, top to bottom:

cuteness and concentration

the last thing many a secondary character sees

infuriatingly conveying (obviously fake) innocence - Captain's missing tooth and broken nose betray that he had thus sufficiently infuriated people more than once

bored and disgusted (for REASONS)

Hide the Pain No More Harold

I was a bit overwhelmed with life, so very belatedly posting about the fact that I made it to the finals of fionnfolklore.org art competition!

#irishmythtober Day 5: Dobhar-chú

Aka the Loughrea otter-fox, this particular creature was being reported in local newspapers and eyewitness accounts as recently as in the 1930s, earning a £50 bounty on its head from the county hunt club for shamelessly eating and maiming cattle, dogs, and the beloved, well-behaved swan Old Tom who had resided at the lake for 30+ years (before this thing broke out of some sídhe lab or whatever and went on a rampage).

I was afraid I'd have to skip this day of the challenge because of work and studies and stuff, but the prompts are. Just. Too. Good.

The girl on the picture is a very specific one-of-a-kind mermaid-like character known as Lí Ban, born as one of the Tuatha Dé Danann. Her father Eochaid got on the bad side of Aengus Óg (yes, THAT Aengus Óg), and, long story short, everyone in their síd but Lí Ban was drowned. It is said in the Annals of the Four Masters that she survived underwater for a year thanks to an air pocket, after which she was transformed into a half-human half-salmon creature (along with her pet dog, who became an otter). She's spent 300 years in that state after finally being captured by monks, interviewed, welcomed and baptised, upon which she opted for an immediate natural death with a guarantee of salvation instead of another 300 years of existence.

In many folk traditons mermaids and merfolk are none other but restless souls of the dead. Of course Irish merrow are a different story, but since Lí Ban was not exactly a merrow but an ex-human, my head canon is that no, she did not survive after the air pocket ran out, and that the story of her baptism and (second) death is not some standard 'Christianity vs Pagan nature' morality tale but a story of a soul choosing to be finally laid to rest instead of more centuries of lonely un-life.

#irishmythtober Day 3 - Knots

Probably not the knots that everyone would expect (because I can't properly draw them!) but the knots of Cú Chulainn's belt with which he tied himself to a standing stone in the battle of Mag Muirthemne so that he could die standing upright and facing his foes. Aided Chon Culainn in the Book of Leinster has it that the victors were so afraid of Cú Chulainn in death as well as in life that they only dared to approach the body after a raven sat on it and got ready to feed.