Jadis 2022: Artificial Intelligence

This post is dedicated to Janelle Shane, who sparked my interest in AI learning.

 

Now we’ll move out of the realm of the human artist and look at what art-creating AI engines can come up with. These engines work with a text prompt like “Fox in a field of flowers” or “Volcano erupting over Los Angeles.”  For my prompt I used “Evil queen of an ancient empire with long black hair.”  Because that, to me, is the essence of what Jadis is.

This first rendition is from Nightcafe.com.

This looks like Hawaii to me, perhaps an interpretation of Honolulu’s towers reflected in a quiet ocean. Something is burning (Charn?) and Jadis is regal in a purple cape, though she also appears to be a cyclops, and is melting into a pair of gray stone buttocks.

This one is from is from  Craiyon.com, formerly  Dall-E (Salvador Dali, get it?) Mini.

Craiyon generates nine different scenes from the same text prompt, arranged Brady-Bunch style. The one above was the most interesting of the first batch. The render is rough, but compositionally it’s good. Jadis has long black hair and red slits in her black velvet gown, and she poses defiantly leaning on her right elbow while her body makes a three-quarter turn. Her face looks evil yet glamorous. Unfortunately she also has an extra set of hands, one at her left hip while the other appears to be holding a dagger, which wasn’t in the text but an element the AI filled in on its own!

The more specific prompt “Jadis, Queen of Charn” generated the set of nine below, in wildly differing styles as all the artworks with those words were searched and blended.

Click to see larger

The top center and center ones are pretty good for an AI.

A search a day later produced even finer creations as the AI engine “learned” to satisfy the same prompt. These two were the best.

The left one looks almost perfect — that is, created by an actual human — save for some wonkiness with the Queen’s eyes and jawline and the vague tangle of goldwork that is her crown. Likewise for the one on the right, in which she has a black eye, an abrasion near the corner of her mouth, and blood trickling from her right nostril for some reason. Perhaps because she was “beaten” by Aslan?

Craiyon has a forum so users can share their often hilarious creations. The site is a work in progress and is likely to continue changing in the future.

Click to see larger. This must be seen in all its glory.

Jadis as interpreted by Starry AI. You’ll need a Google or Apple account to use it online, and it’s also available as an app. This site gives you a beginning choice of the Altair or Orion engines, the first dreamlike and abstract, the second “unreal reality” in the engine’s own words. In addition the app offers 37 artistic styles ranging from Rococo to Thomas Kinkade. I chose “National Geographic” for my girl. The art is generated in multiple layers, so you can actually witness the AI’s visual mind chugging away.

So, in this awesome pic we have an ancient empire, in ruins and burning as appropriate for Charn. But Jadis herself is growing out of a rock. Her face is smudged from the fire and quite pudgy, and she is wall-eyed with either a fat lower lip, or is sticking her tongue out. Well, they say great evil is reflected, eventually, on the face.

But what’s interesting is that the AI interpreted “with long black hair” as a flowing mane of long black hair that is actually standing beside her like a companion. This too is growing out of rock, has its own golden crown, and is turning sulphur-yellow at the tips. Note also the random non-English characters to the left of Jadis’s head, which seem to be explaining the scene as if in a magazine.

(An important key to using all of these sites is to consider what the original images might be titled and what words might be in that title — which is also a basic principle of SEO optimization. For example, it’s more likely a picture of a lion would include the words “Lion” or “Felis Leo” than the phrase “a large golden-brown cat with a mane living in Africa” which is something a crossword puzzle writer would use.)

Dream by Wombo works a lot like Starry AI does, giving the user a choice of styles and also requiring a Google or Apple account. “Jadis, Queen of Charn” using the “Fantasy Art” style netted the following image.

The AI did Charn correctly, to my eyes: a never-ending city towering into the sky and climbing down into the valleys, though the style is more Pablo Picasso in his Cubist period than Michael Whelan. But Jadis, even giving she has giant blood, is more than giant-sized… she’s kaiju-sized, towering over her city in a flowing gown. She’s also bald and looks more than a little geriatric. Perhaps as the AI learns it will get the picture more correct.

Replicate.com offers art generation for the geekiest of the geeks. It’s not as user-friendly as Nightcafe or Starry AI, but it does offer a bevy of models, allows download of the programs, and lets you write your own coding, if you’re inclined. One of the generating models is Erlich, which generates “a logo with text” though in truth it can be any kind of graphic image with text, such as a book cover or cereal box. Here’s four examples of art from the prompt “Jadis, Queen of Charn.”

Instead of a logo, here we have what might be rough renditions — thumbnails, we call them in graphic design world — of book covers or box lids of role-playing games. Erlich did a smash-up job with the exotic costumes of the top pics. The one on the left is a hybrid of Tibetan priest and goldfish, and the right, Samurai and Scythian warrior.  Erlich had problems with the name Jadis, however. The -is at the end is correct, but not the d in the middle, and in the lower left pic, the hook of the J.

The real surprise, however, is the pic at the lower right. It’s been modeled on a MAGIC: The Gathering card!

Another engine on the Replicate site is Pixray, an image generator. It created these images from the text prompt “Jadis, Queen of Charn” using two different art styles.


The woman at the top resembles a nightmarish caricature of Anna Wintour, while the second makes me think of Ursula K. LeGuin with an oversized head.

I don’t think AI will replace human artists any time soon. But for generating thumbnails and rough ideas, they are already there.

A Child of Charn, Part 2 [Narnia Fanfic]

Part 1 is here

———————————————————————————————————-

 

A Child of Charn (cont.)

 

“Come,” Anthen said, taking her arm and leading her out of the crowd. “The rest is just more of the same. It’s best if you don’t witness it.”

There is more, Saffla thought numbly. More slaves, more creatures, more chariots and drummers and cruelties. She hadn’t realized before how keyed up she was. Anthen steered her down a deserted side street.

Every door and window had been shuttered. Was it to avoid that siren call?

“Did Princess Jadis really make them give themselves up?” Saffla stammered.

“Perhaps,” Anthen said matter-of-factly. “But all of them have that power. Sometimes they like to use it. They are cruel and capricious. Never forget that.”

Continue reading

Worldbuilding Wednesday 8/10/22: Nymphs and Satyrs I (Narnia XL)

Les Oreades by William Adolphe Bouguereau

Les Oreades, 1901, by William Adolphe Bouguereau. I’m sure it was skillfully rendered naked female flesh that interested clients more than the mythological content, which was just an excuse to paint it.

This is another of those posts that is informational rather than a set of randomly generated names.

Say “mythological creatures” and “Narnia” and most people even with a passing knowledge of the series are likely to think of dryads, naiads, satyrs and fauns. (And centaurs, but for this post I’m going to stick with fauns and nymphs, of which dryads and naiads are but two members.)

Lewis took inspiration for his dryads and naiads from the mythology of Ancient Greece, where nymphs were considered nature spirits, tied to a specific location or specific type of location. In this they are similar to the Japanese concept of kami, a place or thing that has such imposing or aesthetic qualities it is literally alive. Nymphs take the form of comely maidens and came in a variety of flavors. They were not immortal like the Greek gods, nor did they have special powers. What they did have was, via their youth and beauty, an all-access pass to the doings of the greater deities, from hunting with Artemis to getting drunk with Pan.

Lewis styled his dryads after specific kinds of trees: birches, elms, oaks, ashes, hollies, willows, and rowans, the appearance and behavior of each dryad referencing the tree in some way. There are males and females both. Though both dryads and hamadryads are mentioned in the text Narnian dryads are more like hamadryads in that the dryad *is* the tree, she or he doesn’t just live there. Chop that tree down, and the dryad dies. Lewis was never consistent with his terminology, so what are clearly dryads/hamadryads are also referred to as a wood nymphs, tree people, silvans, or simply trees.

In reality, the word dryad meant, in Ancient Greek, an oak tree nymph only. Other types of tree nymphs had their own names: Daphnaie were laurel trees, Epimelides fruit trees, Leuces poplars, and Meliae, ash trees. All looked like humans, no green hair or snapping off parts of their bodies for tinder as Lewis depicts in Prince Caspian.

Naiads in Narnia, like those of the Greek myths, were tied to fresh water: rivers, streams, wells. They are not mentioned in the Chronicles as much as the dryads are and did not receive as vivid of a description. Like the dryads they had a male counterpart, called a river-god. These male naiads are different from the river-god deities of the Greeks, the Potamoi, who appeared as man-headed bulls or a bull-headed man with a serpentine, fish-finned lower body. (It’s interesting to note that in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe a man-headed bull is mentioned as being one of Aslan’s followers.) At the end of The Magician’s Nephew, the daughters of King Frank and Queen Helen are mentioned as marrying river-gods, thus giving rise to the human population of Narnia, so I think it’s safe to assume Lewis’ river-gods did not have any disquieting bull or fish parts. Like the dryads, he also called his naiads river-nymphs and just plain nymphs.

Here’s a list of all the types of nymphs that could be included in Narnia. Only the ones tied to a general nature or landscape element are here, not the ones associated with a particular Greek location. Because Greece ain’t Narnia, right?

 

Types of Nymphs

Alseids

Anthousai

Auloniads

Crinaeae

Daphnaie

Dryads

Eleionomae

Epimelides

Haliae

Hecaterides

Hesperides

Hyades

Leimakides

Lampads

Lenai

Leuces

Limnades

Maenads

Meliae

Melissae

Mimallones

Naiads

Nereids

Oceanids

Oreads

Pegaeae

Pegasides

Potamides

Thriae

 Glens and groves

Flowers

Mountain pastures and valleys

Fountains and wells

Laurel trees

Trees  (General term)

Freshwater marshes, wetlands

Fruit trees

Seashore

Rustic dance

Evening and sunset

Rain

Meadows

The Underworld

The winepress

Poplars

Lakes

Wine, revelry, followers of Bacchus

Ash trees

Honey

Music

Bodies of fresh water (General term)

Seas

Oceans

Mountains

Freshwater springs

Wells and springs

Rivers and streams

Bees

A word about the marvelous painting above. It’s by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, dating from 1901, a few years before he died. Bouguereau was old-school Academic painter, dependent on showing paintings at the annual Salon de Paris to collect clients and sell his work. The standards of the Salon were rigidly Classical, described, with some derision, by an art teacher of mine as “a bunch of nymphs and satyrs running around” and not inclined to embrace newfangled art movement of Impressionism. Of course, Impressionism had the last laugh, and artists like Bouguereau had their masterpieces languish for decades.

Anyway, Les Oreades, or The Mountain Nymphs, with its three dozen pink, weightless, vaguely lesbian party girls, was perhaps the apex of the old Classicism which was soon to be swept away… delightful, silly, cheesy fun. I can’t say the same of  Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.

Next week I’ll look at satyrs and fauns.

Jadis 2022: Nadir

Sometimes Jadis can’t catch a break. Take this artist’s depiction for a Portugese language version of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Not only is she dressed in a sackcloth shift, but she’s a hag, with pointy nose, deep frown lines, and gray hair. Well, actually all of her is grayish-blue. She’s staring intently at something out of the picture’s range, and frowning. What is it? Not a clue.

Not a clue either who the red-haired, freckle-faced moppet is supposed to be. He’s standing outside the witch’s picture frame, and therefore outside of the action, in a very modern t-shirt and jeans. He too is staring, but at the viewer in the challenging way children on the covers of books published in the 1970s seem to do.  If he’s supposed to be Edmund, he’s all wrong.

Not fond of this Jadis either who’s wearing a very oversized man’s fur-collared jacket. She’s also got elf ears and appears to have thinning hair on top.

Okay, this artist’s skill is on the amateur side, but that’s just part of the problem. Why on earth (or Charn) would Jadis have dressed like a peacock? It’s just out of character.

This stage version of the White Witch clearly suffers from oxygen deprival. She’s turning blue. Plus the makeup artist felt she needed painted-on collarbones for some reason.

Artwork by Maxim Mitrofanov

This is the worst Jadis I’ve come across. Out of context it’s cute. The woman’s oversized crown and dainty shoe, the flying insect people wearing boots, and the dwarf’s gnomish mask-hat all speak to a sort of Russian sense of fairy-tale whimsy (where the art originated.) But it’s NOT Jadis, and it’s NOT Narnia. There were no stocking-hatted insect fairies attacking Jadis in that scene from LWW, for one thing.  Not only that, the palette is all wrong, Christmas reds and greens against ochre grass and an overcast sky. You might see that in Russia, but not in the book where it’s emphasized the land is thawing and the grass turning green.

A Child of Charn, Part 1 [Narnia Fanfic]

 

How bad was the Empire of Charn? Very, very, very bad.

———————————————————————————————————-

 

A Child of Charn

 

Her mother had told her not to go, but she wanted to see it.

Saffla, a common farmers’ daughter of House Tricklewater, Goodworks Farming District Precinct VII of Sadelnon Province — which once, eons ago, had been the city-state of Kurm before the magicians of Charn invaded it, ransacked it, and razed it to the ground —  pattered through the fields between hillocks of freshly planted rice. The sky rumbled, signaling a storm to come. The air was close and humid, the red-orange sun tinting the clouds. Every morning Saffla’s mother and father prayed together to ensure the sun’s continued life. Hundreds of centuries ago, they said, the sun had been bright yellow, giving off a pure, clear light. But with time even good things decayed, like unharvested crops, and only the earnest faith of the common people kept the sun in good health.

The Royal House of Charn said otherwise. They said their magic was what kept the sun from dying. Their enemies claimed the Royal House’s magic was, in fact, responsible for the sun’s decay, draining the sun’s fire and vitality through its profligate use.  Saffla kept no opinion on the matter. All she knew were the green fields, the seasons of planting and harvest, and the high wall of dull stone that enclosed her, and them.

Outside the wall was Charn. The city was everywhere, in every direction: north, south, east and west, climbing the hills and mountains like sunrise, nosing into the valleys like a hound. There was no point in Saffla contemplating a life away from the rice paddies. Everywhere was the same.

Other farmer’s children, like her, were hurrying to see the spectacle. It was the first time in a generation a Gifting was to pass by Precinct VII on its way to Charn-the-Center. (Everywhere was Charn, and thus nowhere; so the term was used to refer to the palace and temple complexes of its dense, rotten heart. Saffla, a true being of her world, did not think of it as such, having nothing more wholesome to compare it to. Like the red-gold sun, it simply was.) She should have nodded at them to be friendly, but to do so would call attention to herself. One of them might tell her mother how she had stolen away from her work.

She finally reached the end of the paddies and hopped the short fence that separated them from drier land. A boulder was nearby where she sat to put on her shoes, which had been tied together by the laces and banging around her neck as she ran. On her small, plump legs she wore leather greaves for protection from the cold water and its leeches, and over them, one of her favorite tunics embroidered with blue flax flowers. The sun peered out from the clouds and a fire rainbow formed, transcending the gold and ivory mansions, the tall palms and cycads, that staircased up the hills, places she would never go to unless she got lucky and married into a household there.

But she was no great beauty. She was completely ordinary and likely as not to die where she has been born, here, in these fields.

Which was why she would see the Gifting procession, just this once.

Continue reading

Worldbuilding Wednesday 8/3/22: Mythical Lions (Narnia XXXIX)

The Babylonian zizsang

One thing the world has no shortage of are mythical creatures based on lions, as I showed in this post. This is likely the reason there are no manticores or chimerae in Narnia; they would have stolen Aslan’s thunder!

There are even more bizarre lion monsters in the world of heraldry, but that’s for another post.

Here’s some randomgenned lion creatures that might be real but aren’t.

 

Mythical Lions that don’t exist

Aristanduran: A lion god of the ancient Near East with bird’s plumage instead of a mane, a human body, and protuberant fangs. He holds a thresher in one paw so it’s likely he was an agricultural deity.

Asadlip: A white lion with the head of a crocodile and twelve eyes, the Asadlip was the deity in charge of irrigation for the ancient Egyptian city of Semliph.

Camblehav: A many-legged lion common on European coats of arms. The number of legs varies from six to twelve.

Gallaslan: A mythical monster said to roam 15th century France. It was the size and shape of a lion but had black, shaggy fur and an extra row of sharp teeth in its mouth. The creature’s rear legs resembled those of a hare, enabling it to jump, and it had small red eyes that burned like coals. The creature was magical in that ordinary weapons could not harm it, only those that had been consecrated by a priest.

Jampasangha: A mythical Indonesian spirit with two heads, that of a lion and that of a wild boar, with a slim body like that of a deer. Jampasangha are very shy and live in the forest.

Kirleijona: A Finnish lion-like beast who was the embodiment of Winter. It had long, silky white fur, a black nose, eyes, and claws, and the inside of its mouth was pale gray. The Kirleijona dined on walrus and elephant seals, and was even said to eat polar bears. Hunters would leave the beast a small offering after they broke their camps. The pine forest bordering the tundra was its abode. It often made an appearance in Finnish fairy tales.

Klaarlowen: A monster from German Medieval Romance stories. It looks like a furless lion with a tortoise’s beak and feet and is very wise.

Korshizhi: A small nature spirit from Japan that lived in flowing water and resembled an algae-covered lion living inside a turtle’s shell. The lion’s head had rough horns and human ears. The shell was a purplish black in color with small green spots. These spirits were mischievous bordering on malicious. One of their favorite things to do was tearing off butterfly’s wings. If one went walking by a river or stream and saw a small pile of discarded wings, it was wisest to cross at another spot.

Krakasimh: A hybrid of lion and Oriental dragon, covered with golden fur and shining greenish-yellow scales, with the naked legs and taloned feet of a bird of prey. Krakasimh live in a supernatural realm running parallel to the mortal world. When a krakasimh roars the thunder sounds in this world. These beasts do not breathe fire but scalding steam.

Lomacasoo: Part lion, part eland (a large African antelope) the lomacasoo hunts husbands who desert their wives. It walks on its hooved hind legs and uses its lion front paws to catch its prey. Instead of roaring, it emits a birdlike mew.

Lowenhetch: A creature from Germanic myth. A huge lion with cursed three horns on its head who liked to eat virgin maidens, until it was forcibly baptized by St. Johannes of the Ewer. Afterwards, its horns fell off and it followed the saint like a dog. Its bones are said to be entombed at Augschlussfathenberg Cathedral in the Rhineland.

Nagalion: Cross between a naga and a lion. Basically a lion that is a snake from its haunches down. It is covered with golden scales and has a forked tongue.

Oeslonne: A legendary lion, perhaps a sub-species, from Dutch-occupied South Africa. The oeslonne had a small horn on its nose and was a solitary hunter. It preferred to eat horses and zebra. Its fur was rough and wiry and so was its mane. No oeslonnes have been sighted since the late 1700s.

Psloma: The alchemical embodiment of “Greek Fire.” A lioness with green scales who breathes yellow flames.

Simbadoon: A lion with a face that is as ugly as a warthog’s, with tusks and the long ears of an ass. It was often included in Medieval bestiaries.

Singhalisk: Cross between a lion and a basilisk.

Yevensing: A Lithuanian symbol of rulership, a lion with an owl’s face that is holding two spears in its claws.

Zizsang: A Babylonion demigod that resembles a lion with the legs of a horse. In color it is golden brown. It can breathe fire and also use magic. This monster is mentioned in Biblical apocryphal literature where it is linked with Leviathan and Behemoth.

Jadis 2022: Zenith

In this post I’ll present depictions of Jadis that are my personal favorites and catch something of her character.

First, take the above. I doubt it’s meant to be Jadis, and the Gothic church background, with pews, is all wrong, but that costume is something, and so is the blank but dreadful look in her eyes as she casts a spell.

A traditional White Witch depiction that doesn’t break new ground, but the artist’s technique is wonderful.

A portrait of Jadis in which she looks like a glamorous 1940s movie star. Her complexion is healthily pink rather than pasty white or pale blue. She looks regal yet brittle. Say the wrong thing and she’ll snap.

Not meant to be Jadis, but I like that overdone celestial headpiece that resembles a Chinese pagoda. This Jadis is menacing rather than angry and dynamic.

This Jadis is triumphant, sadistic, and mean-spirited, despite the little butterfly bow on her cape. The winged crown is unique and there’s something about her eyebrows that screams “Frida Kahlo” to me.

The top illustration is Russian and so is the one below, which are meant to depict the Snow Queen, or Winter Queen, of Russian fairy tales. Usually this lady is friendly and inviting, but these depictions are far from that.

A theatrical costume for the witch in which she wears a feathered showgirl headress and a sort-of Victorian military jacket fitted with panniers, the open front showing beige jodhpurs and black boots. It’s a different approach, and I like it.

The pale femme fatale offers Edmund some Turkish Delight, which he eagerly eats.

Jadis of Charn, in the red gown that is sort-of fanon for her visual depiction and a sword that drips green venom, alluding to her envy, perhaps. Another piece with great technique and great atmosphere.

Aslan’s Cousins

The Green Lion Devouring the Sun, an alchemical image dealing with the transformation of matter

Aslan, the God figure in the Chronicles of Narnia series, is but one of a long line of powerful sacred, mythological, or  supernatural lion creatures. And no wonder. Lions are apex predators, golden as the sun in color, and the males have a kingly mane. Tigers may be larger and more eye-catching, but they lack this crowning glory. In addition, lions roamed over a larger part of the civilized world, including Europe,  the Middle East, and Western Asia at one time, and became firmly embedded into the myth structure there. Tigers, on the other hand, were Asiatic cats. Though figuring much in Indian myth, they played second fiddle to the lion even in the Far East.

The earliest mythic lions in Western civilization belonged to Mesopotamia, like the Shedu below.  Like the Sphinx of Egypt, the Shedu  had a lion body, wings, and, usually, the head of a bearded human male. Sometimes the lion body was swapped for a bull one. Shedu were not monsters, but sacred guardians and symbols of kingship, often appearing on city gates and palace doorways.

In Egypt, several deities were associated with lions, chief among them Sekhmet, who sported the head of a lioness, and Maahes, a god of war. There was also this strange creature below, known as the Ammit or soul-eater, who devoured sinful souls in the Egptian afterlife. The beast had the head of a crocodile, the forequarters of a lion, and the rear of a hippopotamus, all animals that must have been terrifying to the ancient Egyptians. The hippo aspect seems comical, but not when you consider that even today more people in Africa are killed by hippos than crocodiles or lions.

Egypt also had the Sphinx, of course, which came in several varieties: Gynosphinx (woman’s head); Androsphinx (man’s head); Criosphinx (ram’s head) and Hieracosphinx (falcon’s head.) The Hieracosphinx is illustrated below. Unlike a gryphon, which it resembles, it has no wings or eagle talons.

Isn’t it adorable how the mother and baby sphinx have matching headdresses?

In Hindu mythology it is common for the deities to have multiple avatars, some of them animals or animal mixes. Narasimha was an avatar of the god Vishnu, appearing in this form as a four-armed, lion-headed man with a living hood of living cobra hoods, if that makes sense.

Lions were still roaming Greece when the first Grecian myths were composed, which is how we got creatures like the Nemean Lion, which Hercules battled as part of his Twelve Labors, and the Grecian Sphinx who asked riddles of travelers and ate them if they couldn’t guess the answer. She was eventually bested by Oedipus and, very ladylike, threw herself off the cliff in defeat.

This is actually a 1883 print from Ingres’ painting of the myth, chosen in part because I couldn’t find a good color image of it on the internets, but also because it shows the detail better. Ingres actually did three versions of the painting, frustrated that none of them accurately reflected the vision he had in his artistic eye. I love this one because of the compositional and linear qualities, and also because it’s so damn silly. Why is Oedipus walking over a mountain pass stark naked, for starters?  It’s also silly how imposing Oedipus is, and how tiny the Sphinx is, and how she’s supposedly responsible for those scattered bones and wonderfully detailed right foot she saved for a later snack. I also love the doltish look on Oedipus’s face and how, by his gesture, he looks about to diddle the right nipple of the Sphinx, who draws back in alarm with her paw extended to swat him like an annoyed kitten.

Like Ingres’ Sphinx, the Nemean Lion is often depicted by artists in a decidedly underwhelming fashion. Some artists show a massive feline giving Herc a frightful wrestle for his life, other times, the beast is merely ocelot-sized and he bests it easily. I don’t get it.

If you’re looking for the Greek Chimera, by the way, another lion monster, read about it here.

Another lion creature with a human head is the Persian Manticore, which has a precise description from Claudius Aelianus, a Roman writer at the court of Emporer Septimus Severus in the second century CE. I’m not going to quote it because it’s long, but basically, the Manticore lived in India, had reddish, shaggy fur, a face like a man, and three rows of sharp teeth. It was the size of a lion and had a lion’s feet and claws, and, presumably, a lion’s body and tail, which ended in a scorpian’s sting. At the sides of the tail were sharp quills the beast could fire off like missiles.

The Manticore was said to be very fierce and had a hankering for the flesh of humans. Unlike this modern depiction, it did not have wings or horns. It was assumed to be an actual animal until science proved otherwise.

Another widespread lion creature is the Gryphon, which might have have evolved from the Egyptian Hieracosphinx, or from ancient Iran during the Bronze Age. The Gryphon (I prefer spelling it that way) was doubly blessed as a mythic creature, united the lion, king of the animals, with the eagle, the king of the birds. It came into its own in Europe during the Medieval Age, being depicted in church art, on coats of arms, in bestiaries, and in secular decoration. As with the Sphinx, it has many variations: the Hippogriff, the Keythong, the Opinicus, even a Gryphon-Marine, which has a fish’s tail. I suspect its popularity came in part because it’s just so much damn fun to draw.

Gryphons figure in the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian movie adaptations, but they are not mentioned in Lewis’ books.

In Hindu myth it’s another two powerful creatures who are united together: lion and elephant, in the hybrid beast known as the Gajasimha.

Hindu gajasingh

Unlike Europe and Near and Central Asia, artists of the Far East had no access to any lions living or dead, and their depictions of the beast are based only on hearsay. As in the West, lion creatures serve most commonly as guardians and protectors, like these depictions of Japanese Komainu from a modern artist.

Artwork by Yuko Montgomery

They are known by many other names in different cultures: Foo Lions, Foo Dogs, Shishi, Fengshui, Shizuguo, Shisa, Pixiu, Nian, Haetae, Barong.

The Snow Lion roams the Himalayas and is a symbol of Tibet. It has a white body and turquoise mane.

Like many Asian lion creatures it resembles a Lhasa Apso dog more than a real lion. Which begs the question, did the dog breed derive from representations of the mythical lion, or the mythical lion evolve from the appearance of the small, loud-barked shaggy dogs who guarded the temples?

Meanwhile, the city of Singapore took the Sea Lion, or Merlion, as its symbol. Merlions also figure in Southeastern Asian myth.

Lions also figure in the Bible. Christ is known as The Lion of Judah. In the New Testament, the Book of Saint Mark is symbolized by a lion, as Luke is by a lamb, Matthew by a human man, and John by an eagle.

In this charming Medieval illustration the lion is actually helping St. Mark with his writing by holding the end of the scroll for him. But for a more exotic lion we have to go to the Book of Revelations.

Then I saw a monster coming up out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads. Each of the ten horns was wearing a coronet, and blasphemous names were written on the heads. The monster I saw was like a leopard, with bear’s feet and a lion’s mouth.

I am sorry, God, but this is one silly and implausible-looking beast.

There’s also a bunch of lion-headed horses that rampage across the earth.

As I looked, this is how the horses and their riders appeared. They had breastplates made of fire, sapphire and sulphur. Their heads were like lions’ heads, and fire, smoke and brimstone came out of their mouths.

In the 21st century humans are making their own lion monsters. The big cat below is a liger, created by breeding a male lion to a female tiger.

Ligers tend to be larger than either cat and have an individual appearance depending on the roll of the genetic dice. This one has pale tiger stripes and a short mane the color of its coat. If that’s not exotic enough for you, there are white ligers (on the right, one of its parents is on the left.)

jaglions

A pair of lion-jaguar hybrids. The one in the back surprised the owners with her black coat, in which faint spots and rosettes can be seen.

It’s likely that the physical appearance of the Cave Lion and the American Lion likely resembled these big cats more than their maned African cousin. Cave Lions are featured in Palaeolithic art done by human ancestors … proving, indeed, that lions in the human imagination go way, way back.

Think about that the next time you read the Chronicles.

 

Worldbuilding Wednesday 7/27/22: Other Mythical Creatures of Narnia (Narnia XXXVIII)

germanic Wolpertinger

The Germanic Wolpertinger

This week’s post is a little different. I’m running out of things in Narnia to name, so I’m going to post a list of possibilities for Narnia fanfic writers: Aside from those mentioned in the books, what other sorts of mythological creatures might have resided in Narnia?

Lewis himself had a pretty catholic list of inhabitants, to excuse the pun. Most were from Greco-Roman myth: satyrs, centaurs, naiads. Others, mostly hostile, were from European myth: giants, witches, dragons, sea serpents. Then there are those dating from the legends and crude, printed bestiaries of the Medieval age: monopods, salamanders, unicorns. It’s a real mash-up, and one that fellow inkling J. R. R. Tolkien took issue with: he didn’t like the mixing of beings from different times and cultures. (Personally, I think Lewis also received inspiration from Disney’s Fantasia; it came out in 1940.)

It is interesting to note also what Lewis left out. There are no evil creatures from Greco-Roman myth, no harpies or gorgons or cyclops. (Some of these did make it into the movies, however.) There are no American creatures, North or South, or Asian ones. Though Jinn are mentioned in passing and what might be a lammasu, no Middle Eastern creatures reside in Narnia either, or Indian, or African. That the Indian subcontinent was left out is puzzling, as Lewis grew up when it was still part of the British Empire. They should be there, but they aren’t.

So, if Narnia-the-series had gone on and on, like the Wizard of Oz series did, what other creatures might be found?

 

Other Mythical Creatures that Might Live in Narnia

Alkonost and Sirin: Two mythical bird-women from Slavic mythology, rather like the Greek harpy, but good in nature. They were depicted as large, pheasant-like birds with the heads of beautiful women. Their singing had the power to bring joy and happiness to the good, and sorrow and pain to the evil. I could see there being a race of such bird-women.

Fairies/Sylphs/Cherubs/Putti: These winged humanoids are not mentioned as being inhabitants of Narnia, but they clearly belong there, if only to fill the elemental role as creatures of the air, as dwarves were of the earth and naiads of the waters. Oddly, they are mentioned in The Magician’s Nephew as living on Earth in ancient times.

Gajasimha: A lion with an elephant’s head from Hindu myth.

Hieracosphinx: A lion with a falcon’s head used in Egyptian art. Not a gryphon because it has no wings and doesn’t have the front body of the bird.

Hippogriff: Prominant in E.R. Eddison’s The Worm Ouroboros, the hippogriff is a horse that has the front part and wings of a giant eagle. It is not a mythic animal but one invented by a 15th century writer Ludovico Ariosto for his epic fantasy poem Orlando Furioso. Hippogriffs would serve Aslan as the gryphons do.

Icthyocentaur: The marine equivalent of a centaur. Humans from the waist up, sea-horses from the waist down.

Makara: A sacred animal from Hindu myth, a giant fish with the head of an elephant.

Merstag: A deer with a fish’s tail. These do not figure in myth, but were employed as decorative elements by the Romans.

Naga: A Hindu and Buddhist spirit/creature, a human who is a snake from the waist down. Nagas might live in the warmer or desert parts of Narnia.

Pantheon: An imaginary animal used in heraldry. It looks like a white doe with the tail of a fox and is spangled with markings on its coat that look like stars.

Roc: Jinn were mentioned in books 1 and 6 of the Chronicles, so why not a Roc? I can imagine it being a side adventure in The Voyage of the Dawn Trader.

Sea-lion: Basically, a merlion. A lion with a fish’s tail and, sometimes, webbed feet. An animal appearing on some European coats of arms and also in Southeast Asian myth.

Selkie: Shapechanging beings from Celtic myth who change from humans to seals, and vice versa, by putting on or taking off a fur skin.

Simurgh/Senmurv: A creature from Persian myth and art, appearing as a giant peacock with the front part of a canine and the legs and paws of a lion. It is benevolent, wise, and tender-hearted. It lays eggs but also suckles its young.

Sphinx: A sphinx has the body of a lion and the head of human.  From its shoulders grow the wings of a bird. I could see these being wise and benign creatures in Narnia, unlike the one of the myth of Odysseus.

Wolpertinger: A small animal from German folklore that combines the features of several forest animals, most commonly a hare with stag’s antlers and bird’s wings. Its Western Asian cousin is the al-mi’raj, a hare with golden fur, sometimes spotted, that sports a single horn, unicorn-style, on its head.

Yale: A large antelope-like creature the size of a hippopotamus, with fierce tusks like a boar and two long, curved horns it can swivel to attack from any direction.

Jadis 2022: Ascent

Though Jadis is called The White Witch, her evil is strong enough that black may be a more likely color than white for her costume. In the conceptual sketch above her gown is formfitting at the bust, but otherwise prim, and black. Her crown is gold, her cape and face white, her hair and lips dark red.

Again she wears a black gown and white fur cape. Her hair is white, but her eyebrows, eyelashes, lips and choker are dark, like those of a White Goth. Is it me or does she resemble Sarah Jessica Parker?

Here she has a tight, uncomfortable-looking Elizabethean collar as well as a black dress, bringing to mind the Tudor age.

I am not sure if this painting was intended as Jadis, but if so, she’s a Bohemian Jadis, with long black hair or veil, and a chilly demeanor as she sits on a throne of ice.

Artwork by Jenna Mueller

Four different designs for Jadis, each in a different costume with faces that differ slightly. I don’t what grade the student got for her project but I hope it was an A+. Click on the picture to see the larger version.

But the traditional “Snow Queen” look is nice too, like this regal getup which has a Russian flavor.

A variation on movie Jadis.

This artist has adhered closely to Pauline Baynes’ style, but gives Jadis a huge sword and a cloak of Arctic cats, I guess? Plus some really elaborate footgear. It’s different, and looks good.

A long poster showing Jadis’s gown showing the events of the story as pictures on Jadis’s gown, in chilly blues and grays plus black and white.