acorn pyre

(painting by Zao Wou-ki via southebys dot com)

"'God’ll need to be one hell of a palindromist,' I said, 'if history after the Gib G’Nab is to be anything other than sheer gibberish.'"

"Unless something changes sharply very soon, their view from outside may well see modern science—all of it, from the first gray dawn of the scientific revolution straight through to the flamelit midnight when the last laboratory was sacked and burned by a furious mob—as a wicked dabbling in accursed powers that eventually brought down just retribution upon a corrupt and arrogant age." --The Archdruid Report

Adventures in Unhistory.

"He [Arana] reflected on why his nation was not a country and resolved to give it the missing elements. He gave it a name, inventing the word Euzkadi from Euskal, meaning 'Euskera speaking,' and the suffix di, meaning 'together.' Before this, Euskera had only the phrase Euskal Herrig 'the land of Euskera speakers.' " --Mark Kurlansky, The Basque History of the World (1999)

(via cthulhucene on tumblr)

Palindrome Apocalypse.

"There must be dogs barking at the bottom of chaos--great, hoarse hounds whose voices bounce eternally against falling rock and echo and reecho in the crevices of eternity. Only a dog's voice out of the deep abysses carries the proper menace and at the same time preserves the weird objectivity and indifference which is part of the hunting pack. A lion's voice is great but personal, a dog's bark by contrast contains the maniacal essence of chaos, dumb matter come alive in the dark and howling its voice endlessly and stupidly against the sleeping quiet of nonexistence--but I overelaborate--perhaps you have not heard as I have hounds beneath you as you cling desperately to a cliff wall. When I get to the bottom they turn warm and wagging and friendly--again with the total irrationality that obtains over the great cliff of chaos. Did they take me finally, because of my successful descent, as a demon like themselves--for if I had fallen, they had given every indication of devouring me--or are the dogs of Cerberus, the hoarse-voiced, much-feared guardians of Nothing, actually abysmally friendly and lonely creatures? Since that long, agonizing descent before I reached the city on the plain, I have never been quite sure. When I come to the Final Pit in which they howl, I shall, without too great a show of confidence, put out my hand once more and speak. Perhaps the great hounds of fear may wait with wagging tails for a voice who knows them. It may as well be mine. For who is to know one demon from another in the dark..." --Eiseley

Music from a Neanderthal flute.

"That slightly aspirated 'ha' on the h separates Euskalduns from Spanish speakers. The Spanish call Hondarribbia Fuenterrabia, because they cannot say the h. Yet neither can all Basques. In the Roncal Valley, near Roncesvalles, the h becomes a k, and in another valley h is pronounced like a g." --Kurlansky

(emporioefikz via uggly via steampunktendencies on tumblr)

Names on Ceres (including Yumyum).

"Painting never ends, it is the only thing in the world which is both continuous and still." --Joan Mitchell