classical music Archives - Bone and Sickle

Bird-Women of Greece and Russia

September 18, 2021 boneandsickle Aeolus, Alkonost, antiquity, bestiaries, Bird-Women, classical music, folk tales, folklore, Gamayun, Greece, Greek myth, harpies, legends, mermaids, monsters, opera, pagan, paganism, Russian, seduction, sirens, Sirin

Bird-women hybrids of Greek legend and Russian folklore are uniquely ambivalent, sometimes bringing death and destruction and at others, prophetic wisdom[…]

Witchcraft in Southern Italy

November 21, 2020 boneandsickle butchers, cannibalism, Catholicism, classical music, cunning folk, demons, diabolism, EPISODE, evil eye, fairies, fairy tales, folk customs, folk medicine, folk tales, folklore, horror, Italy, legends, magic, movies, murder, Naples, Stregoneria, superstition, witch trials, witchcraft, witches

In southern Italy, belief in witchcraft has a long history, much of it centering on the town of Benevento, about[…]

Slavic Mermaids: Water Ghosts and Goblins

May 29, 2020 boneandsickle classical music, death, demons, EPISODE, fairies, fairy tales, folk customs, folk music, folk tales, folklore, ghost stories, ghosts, Green Christmas, history, horror, legends, literature, mermaids, movies, mythology, opera, pagan, paganism, Romanticism, rusalia, Rusalka, Russian, Semik, Slavs, vodnik, Whitsunday

Quite distinct from their Western equivalent, Slavic mermaids might better be described as water ghosts, as they are almost always[…]