The First Documented Labyrinth 最初の記録された迷宮

“...they decided to leave a common memorial of their reigns, and for this purpose constructed a labyrinth a little above Lake Moeris, near the place called the City of Crocodiles. I have seen this building, and it is beyond my power to describe... The pyramids, too, are astonishing structures, each one of them equal to many of the most ambitious works of Greece; but the labyrinth surpasses them. It has six covered courts – six in a row facing north, six south – the gates of one range exactly fronting the gates of another, with a continuous wall round the outside of the whole. Inside, the building is of two storeys and contains three thousand rooms, of which half are underground, and the other half directly above them... the underground ones I can speak of only from report, because the Egyptians in charge refused to let me see them, as they contained the tombs of the kings who built the labyrinth, and also the tombs of the sacred crocodiles. The upper rooms, on the contrary, I did actually see, and it is hard to believe that they are the work of men; the baffling and intricate passages from room to room and from court to court were an endless wonder to me, as we passed from a courtyard into rooms, from rooms into galleries, from galleries into more rooms, and thence into yet more courtyards. The roof of every chamber, courtyard, and gallery is, like the walls, of stone. The walls are covered with carved figures, and each court is exquisitely built of white marble and surrounded by a colonnade...”

~Herodotus

“...others, again, assert that it was a building dedicated to the Sun-god...”

“...in addition it must contain temples of all the gods of Egypt and forty statues of Nemesis in the same number of sacred shrines, as well as numerous pyramids... banquet halls reached by steep ascents, flights of ninety steps leading down form the porticoes, porphyritic columns, figures of gods and hideous monsters, and statues of kings. Some of the palaces are so made that the opening of a door makes a terrifying sound as of thunder. Most of the buildings are in total darkness...”

~the Roman writer, Pomponius Mela

狸 Tanuki

On Monday evening, whilst talking with my housemate over dinner -- a veritable feast of salmon baked in tin-foil with white wine sauce, brussel sprouts, enoki, and mashed potato -- she began telling me a curious story of her grandfather's, where he meets a tanuki -- what we might call a badger in England, or a raccoon in America.

As the story goes, her grandfather was walking alone through a forest one day, in the middle of a long journey, and in his travels he found himself eventually keeping pace alongside a young man. They soon fell into conversation, and the talk was so pleasant and engaging, such a welcome break from monotony, he was able to forget completely the burden he carried, the aches in his feet, and the long distance he still had to go. They talked for what seemed like hours, but eventually his and the young man's paths diverged, and so after bidding each other friendly farewells he found himself alone again in the forest. At first, of course, walking along merrily, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. But soon enough he began to experience a strange kind of deja vu. A particularly haggard tree he had noted earlier in his journey suddenly loomed again on his right, and he was damned if it wasn't the same. No, no, he said to himself, it must just look the same. Not long after, however, he experienced a similar echo from his recent past, as he found himself crossing a stream he had crossed before. No! He exclaimed to himself, in utter disbelief. If this is the stream I crossed this morning, then, if I remember correctly, and if this is really happening, up ahead there must be a small shrine on the right-hand side. Of course, as he had unwillingly predicted, and to his horror, he saw soon after the same shrine he had walked past that morning.

What on Earth has happened to me, to bring me back here? He bemoaned to the forest. Dropping his pack to the ground he sat down and searched for the sun to see if he had only been dreaming and it was still morning. But, no; alas, it was well into the day, the sun deep on its westerly journey. How can a man walk in circles on a straight path? He questioned himself bitterly, deeply troubled. He scratched his head, and searched his mind, but he found it to be curiously empty. The only image he could recall was the smiling, wolfish face of the young man he had journeyed with. He tried to remember the conversation they had so enjoyed but to no avail. It was then that his suspicion was aroused. Surely I have been deceived by a fox or a tanuki, he said to himself.

Before shouldering his pack, he turned to the shrine and prayed fervently for the forest's protection. He clapped his hands twice and placed a rice cake at the shrine' s

small altar. Perhaps, he said to himself wistfully as he began his journey again, I should have done this before, and no sooner had the thought crossed his mind, then out of the corner of his eye he espied a lone tanuki staring at him from the depths of the forest. He turned quickly to look but the tanuki had vanished. Ah, he spoke to himself quietly, it was a tanuki, after all.

迷宮の玄関 Entrance to the Labyrinth

Size, 6x8 inches.

I painted this last year, from my head, in acrylic. I guess I prefer to use oil paints, they're more versatile, but acrylics are blessedly quick to work with, and if you put in some time and think about it a little bit, you can get quite nice depth. I mean, you can make deep paintings. Shit, I don't know. But I do know a bunch of artists who are dead-set against acrylics, and I think they're crazy. To say nothing of a workman blaming his tools...