Tell me about gargoyles, /tg/.
Where can I best learn about them, in regards to IRL folklore and mythology?
>>44678547
bump
>>44678961
Thanks, but I'd rather not have a bunch of racists tell me how Hitler was a hero parrot around the "WE WUZ KINGZ" meme.
>>44678547
Pretty sure there isn't any.
They're just there to keep the walls from getting water-damaged.
People decided to make them look like something because, fuck it, why not?
>>44678547
The gargouille, who is sometimes said to be the basis for gargoyles, was this dragon like fucker, and was attacking a town from the river. The archbishop of the town, together with a condemned criminal, tamed it by making crosses with their fingers.
They took the fucker back to town, where they killed it.
The gargouille, the tarasque, and the peluda, all have pretty similar stories.
It's said that they tried burning the gargouille, and it's neck and head wouldn't burn, so they stuck it on their cathedral, starting the tradition.
Really though, a gargoyle is just a grotesque combined with a waterspout. They date back to ancient Egypt where they were carved into the shape of lion heads. Any folklore came later and there's no gargoyle monster in and of themselves.
>>44679031
But that's /pol/ and maybe /news/ idk.
And as long as you can get the info you need, what does it matter where it comes from?
>>44679031
that's /pol/
You see OP
One thousand years ago, superstition and the sword ruled.
It was a time of darkness. It was a world of fear. It was the age of gargoyles.
Stone by day, warriors by night. They were betrayed by the humans they had sworn to protect, frozen in stone by a magic spell for a thousand years.
>>44679898
>mfw
Seriously though op, they're just there to prevent water damage.
Ask wikipedia.
Look up wasserspeier etc.
Funfact: Notre Dame has a Darth Vader mask in there somewhere.
>>44678547
Check it:
>The purpose of the grotesque masks on the outside walls of Romanesque churches was undoubtedly that they should serve as a means of exorcism against impure spirits. The mode of action of such exorcistic masks can be readily understood if one considers how, when a man approaches a sanctuary and seeks to direct his spirit towards the highest, all the dregs in his being, owing to a natural reaction of the soul, tend to arise and seek to enter his thoughts under a multitude of guises. If, at this moment he espies a mask which represents, with unmistakable grossness, any hidden greed, passivity, or lust, he can look on them "objectively", and laugh at them. In this way the evil spirit is exorcized and flees the scene.
>These stone masks thus contribute to a process of unmasking in the souls, but on a basis that is the exact opposite of modern psychoanalysis. For whereas in the latter the one who is plagued by dubious impulses is invited to accept his complexes as himself, the medieval man, awakened by an exorcistic device, looks on the mischievous intruder as an enemy from without, as an impulse foreign to himself which, like a disease, has sought to take root in him, and which he has only to perceive with clarity in order to be freed from it. For, according to Christian doctrine, the devil cannot be tolerate the truth.
>>44679999
>they defaced Notre Dame with a pop fantasy icon
Gross af desu senpai
>>44680140
In a way gargoyles were the pop culture/fantasy icons of their times.
I was kinda surprised to, but on the other hand it's kinda neat. Vader is nothing if not a modern boogey man. Somewhere among 100s of faces there is Darth Vader.
>>44680140
>implying the other faces aren't pop fantasy icons too
>only old things can be on cathedrals
The only reason most cathedrals have a lot of old things is because most cathedrals are old.
>>44679999
You're thinking of the National Cathedral in Washington DC.
>>44680140
Boy, you're gonna be real annoyed when you hear about the Chapelle de Bethléem.
>>44680793
>gremlins and gizmo
>demon from mazinger
>a fucking xenomorph
What the hell is going on
>>44680504
It would seem that way. I could have sworn it was notre dame.
Oh well...
>>44680927
Symbolism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bethlehem_Chapel_(Saint-Jean-de-Boiseau)#Restoration_of_the_pinnacles
My god. Its true.
As has been said, their purpose was, practically speaking, to prevent water damage
Spiritually speaking, to ward off evil spirits like guard dogs. You find a similar concept in other places and religion, like the foo dogs of China, or the whole concept of fierce dieties in buddhism
>>44678547
In discworld they're an urban species of trolls that don't happen to move much and eat pigeons. That's the only sort of thing I've ever heard, and and it's obviously not true IRL
>>44679898
You.
You're a good person
