Quote:
Originally Posted by Galadriel55
These are pictures of the birds from Slavic mythology. The second one is the bird Alkonost, and the first is either Alkonost or Sirin depending on who you ask; it's a fragment of Vasnecov's painting of both of them. There are two versions about these birds that I know of: one, that Alkonost is the bird of joy, and Sirin sings joyful songs that lure you into darkness and death (so she's the dark one). The other is that Sirin sings of happiness and Alkonost of sorrow (and also, that Alkonost makes a great storm when she flies above - the reasoning behind the second picture). So depending on which version you follow, the bird in the first picture is either Alkonost or Sirin.
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A-ha. Now I know where I saw them. About a month ago, I was at an exhibition where they had the original paintings of these, and some more...
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"Should the story say 'he ate bread,' the dramatic producer can only show 'a piece of bread' according to his taste or fancy, but the hearer of the story will think of bread in general and picture it in some form of his own." -On Fairy-Stories
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