Friday, October 25, 2019

Persian Book of Monsters


People who love monsters will enjoy these watercolor drawings from a treatise on spells and demons compiled by an Iranian soothsayer. According to the Public Domain Review:
"Most of the figures shown are far from ordinary or angelic. A blue man with claws, four horns, and a projecting red tongue is no less frightening for the fact that he’s wearing a candy-striped loincloth. In another image we see a moustachioed goat man with tuber-nose and polka dot skin maniacally concocting a less-than-appetising dish. One recurring (and worrying) theme is demons visiting sleepers in their beds, scenes involving such pleasant activities as tooth-pulling, eye-gouging, and — in one of the most engrossing illustrations — a bout of foot-licking (performed by a reptilian feline with a shark-toothed tail)."
"The wonderful images draw on Near Eastern demonological traditions that stretch back millennia — to the days when the rabbis of the Babylonian Talmud asserted it was a blessing demons were invisible, since, 'if the eye would be granted permission to see, no creature would be able to stand in the face of the demons that surround it.'"
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2 comments:

gronkchicago said...

The guy was no Hieronymus Bosch....

Rich said...

Why they all grow horns is another mystery.

The cross-reference to the Talmud was very interesting reading.

Islam has got such figures as well: the Djinns.