
An Artist’s Mission to Illustrate All the World’s Mythical Beasts - prismatic
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/mythological-beasts-illustrations
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JasonFruit
Bad news for the artist: seeing her pictures excited my daughter so much that
she promptly invented two new creatures. This may be an intrinsic flaw in the
project concept.

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Tade0
I wondered if I could recognize any of those creatures taken from slavic
mythology and, surprisingly, I could.

The Ovinnik is called "Gumiennik" in Poland, but I know this only because back
when we were teenagers my sister brought a book about slavic mythology with
her on a trip to the mountains and read it aloud.

"Zmey" in turn is spelled "żmij" in Polish and this is the term my grandmother
used exclusively to describe a snake(any proper snake) even though there are
many more words, specifically e.g. "żmija", which means "viper".

Anyway, nice project. Brought back some childhood memories.

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bfung
She's got the catalog of beasts - maybe she can partner w/J.K. Rowling to tell
us where to find them. =P

FYI, the Chinese stamp of her name had someone Cantonese phonetically put her
name together, it doesn't like her name right when pronounced in Mandarin.

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11thEarlOfMar
Would like to see Tikoloshe (Tokoloshe) from Zulu culture:

"In Zulu mythology, Tikoloshe, Tokoloshe or Hili is a dwarf-like water sprite.
It is considered a mischievous and evil spirit that can become invisible by
drinking water. Tokoloshes are called upon by malevolent people to cause
trouble for others. At its least harmful a tokoloshe can be used to scare
children, but its power extends to causing illness or even the death of the
victim. The creature might be banished by a n'anga (spiritual healer), who has
the power to expel it from the area."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tikoloshe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tikoloshe)

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schoen
The article gives an e-mail address where you can submit suggestions to the
artist!

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11thEarlOfMar
Done, thanks!

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Torai
As in the article about the origin of the wold "yes", the world ignores
basques again.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16448770](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16448770)

Not that I mind. We have a wonderful and cool life here. So maybe it's better
to be ignored. But we have an ancient language and culture. Just saying.

I pick my favorite mythical creature.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akerbeltz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akerbeltz)

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gkya
Word "yes" in romance languages. Basque is not a romance language.

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Torai
So you didn't read the article. Is Gaulish language a romance language?

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gkya
Gaulish is the language the French spoke before early French started
happening, so its inclusion seems normal to me. And I indeed skimmed the
article.

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pwagland
Reminds me of a fun book from my childhood: The Encyclopedia of Things That
Never Were ([https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Things-That-Never-
Were/d...](https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Things-That-Never-
Were/dp/0140100083))

Turns out that people have been fascinated by the things that didn't exist for
quite a while!

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aresant
Reminds me of Barlows Guide to Extraterrestrials which is an awesome sci-fi
companion

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/940230.Barlowe_s_Guide_t...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/940230.Barlowe_s_Guide_to_Extraterrestrials)

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mtts
Love this stuff. It's like an illustrated version of Jorge Luis Borges' Book
Of Imaginary Beings, which is likewise a wonderful catalog of all the strange
things the human mind can dream up.

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schoen
You might also like
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dictionary_of_Imaginary_Pl...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dictionary_of_Imaginary_Places)

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mtts
Fantastic! Didn't know about this one. Will add it to my list. Thanks!

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twic
In which case you might also like:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_Cities](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_Cities)

Calvino is certainly a different writer to Borges, but they were both plugged
into the same circuit, somehow.

