Artifact - Tumblr Posts
Three Prehistoric Barbed And Tanged Flint Arrowheads, Wimborne St Giles, Barrow G9, The Wiltshire Museum, Devizes
Gold feline figurine, Moche culture, Peru, 100-800 AD
from The Virginia Museum of fine Arts
Markhor Goat Head - copper alloy, shell, and red stone - Sumerian, Early Dynastic III, c. 2550–2250 BCE
Jade axe head pendant, Nicoya Region, Costa Rica, 4th century BC - 7th century AD
from The Cleveland Museum of Art
Askos in the form of a duck, Etruscan, 325-275 BC
from The British Museum
The Pendant of Somnambula
The Pendant of Somnambula is a curious artifact, and one of my favorites to give away to customers. Each one has to be fashioned from a stone that I’ve grown steeped in a magical solution to get just that right swirl. I also have a lovely garden one of my workers tends to water the stones with a similar solution as they develop in caves underground. Once the stone has developed to the size and potency I desire, it’s a simple matter to polish and cut it, then mount in a framework engraved with the runes necessary to bind the pendant to its host and channel its innate magic.
Once bound to a host, the pendant is able to support its carrier by subtly increasing charisma over time. The bearer will become more convincing and enticing to various individuals with whom he has regular contact. The longer they are near the stone as the buyer wears it, the more they will fall under his or her influence.
Of course, the stone also wishes to please its host. As such, its influence will also reach out to the very individual who wears it. Take this customer for example. He started off much smaller than this. He wanted something to help boost his confidence in the gym, so he could reach his goals in peace.
As you can see, the man has clearly reached and exceeded them. The pendant whispered to his mind and heart in his sleep to drive him with greater motivation. Over time, he developed relationships with various other muscle men in the gym. They serve beneath him now, and as you can see here, their constant interaction acted as reinforcement for the entire group to focus on building their muscles. He’s a personal trainer now, and does a fine job of it.
More often than not, my customers go into trance after taking pictures of themselves with their pendants. But don’t worry, there’s a failsafe to ensure no harm comes to them from it. And, of course, as part of the payment for the service my pendants provide, I am able to call upon the buyers when necessary for various jobs and purposes. Whether it be to act as muscle, an escort, a contact, or something else, they are only too eager to listen to my voice and follow my commands.
Don’t you look at me like that. I most certainly am not an abuser of that fact. The pendants may be bound to obey me, and thus their bearers as well, but I don’t treat them like slaves.
However, I will admit that as a writer, I do enjoy having the more muscular ones send me pictures with various poses in their progress for me to use in my stories. There’s something enticing about such images, wouldn’t you agree? Here, let me show you.
Now, now. It’s perfectly safe. Go on. He’s waiting for you. Don’t be rude.
A thick meaty hand supports you by gripping your arm as you stumble through the portal into the poorly illuminated locker room. Thin black strips stretch down to barely conceal the nipples on the man’s massive chest. A deep voice rolls smoothly from the bearded lips above that giant muscled torso as your eyes lock onto a pulsing golden stone that writhes like a galaxy in motion.
“Hey there, little guy. This gym’s for meatheads only. Let’s see what we can do to help you fit the part....”
Sword and Scabbard
Celtic, ca. 60 BCE
Although the scabbard has become amalgamated to the iron blade, affecting parts of the surface, its ornamentation and the exquisitely worked hilt make the whole an evocative statement about the technical ability of the Celts, the powerful conquerors of ancient Europe. The sword is of a type associated with the La Tène culture, named after the important Celtic site on Lake Neuchâtel in present-day Switzerland and eastern France. Other related anthropomorphic swords from diverse finds in France, Ireland, and the British Isles demonstrate the expansion of the Celts across Europe.
~ Cylinder Vessel with Palace Scene.
Place of origin: Guatemala, Petén, Dos Pilas or vicinity
Culture: Maya, lk style
Date: A.D. 740–800
Medium: Slip-painted ceramic with post-fire pigment.
~ The Norwegian Royal Horn (drinking horn).
Date: 14th century
Place of origin: Skalholt Cathedral
Terracotta dinos (mixing bowl)
Greek, Attributed to the Polyteleia Painter, ca. 630–615 BCE
The finest vases from the region of Corinth are generally datable to the seventh century B.C. This dinos, a bowl for the wine diluted with water that was consumed at symposia, is decorated in two zones with large-scale animals. Above, panthers and sphinxes, and below are goats and lions between sphinxes.
Fuck designer clothes, fuck modern gift standards, fuck society expectations.
I don't want a shirt with the logo of some dumb ass company like gucci or supreme, money, giftcards and all the usual stuff you get for an occasion.
I want intresting artifacts, a cube of bizmuth, an old flintlock pistol with dark oak furniture, a cloak stylized for moth's wings, a tophat with cogs plastered all around, a skull of an automaton, a forgotten tome about the creatures from beyond the veil, a collection of gemstones of unknown origins, a cane with a mysterious gem as a handle, a victorian clockwork mechanism that nobody what it does, a cassette containing a score of a movie that never existed, coins from realms not known to human travelers, i want actually intresting stuff and not another giftcard to a shop i never go to
A Mughal heart-shaped jade box set with gemstones, North India, 19th century.
You know, sometime you just can't tell if you're lucky or unlucky.
The Engine of Woburn Waterworks
She was built and installed in 1908. The engine pumped water to the city of Woburn until 1932 when it was laid up in favor of a series of small electric pumps located around Horn Pond. At some point, the engine was named Louise by the chief engineer. During World War II, the chief and all the waterworks staff turned the engine into a very closely guarded secret so as to save it from the scrap drives.
It sat dormant until 2018 when it was restored and steamed, and it steamed again in 2023 for three weekends in May. The site is an active waterworks to this day, but this part has been turned into a museum.