Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Eldritch: Lineage 027


Sorry, I intended on uploading this last night at midnight… but I’m kind of sick, and had to go to bed early last night.  I doubt having to spend a couple of hours shoveling snow today helped.  But it’s done now, so, I hope you enjoy, and I’ll see you next week!

Tuesday, December 18, 2012



Well, folks, the next post won’t come until after Christmas… so, a Merry, Happy Christmas to you all.  Or, if you prefer, a Blessed Yule, or a prosperous Winter Solstice… Or maybe a Happy Hanukkah or Kwanzaa.  Or, perhaps, if none of those fit you, a happy Snoggletog or Hogswatch.  Regardless of what you celebrate… Happy Holidays folks.

Now with the important stuff out of the way… let’s talk folklore, shall we?

When I first heard of the Hounds of God, well… let’s just say it wasn’t from a very good source.  Imagine my surprise when I learned it was true!  However… I also found out that the general benandanti formula applied to several different types of folks.  So, when I began outlining Eldritch and had Faith meet the benandanti werewolves, I had to take the other types of benandanti into consideration.  I could simply ignore htme… but, frankly, they’re far too interesting to merely dismiss.  So, while in history the Hounds of God, the benandanti werewolves, don’t seem to have interacted with the typical Agrarian/funerary benandanti, I threw them all into the mix and invented a social order for them.  Is it ‘accurate?’  Oh heck no.  But, I like it.

Now, regarding the ‘leyline gateways…’ that’s a reference to the ‘gates’ of hell the Hounds of God would go through in order to steal the crops back from.  Different translations call them different things, though… for instance, one source referred to the place as the ‘hell-hole-cave.’  However, since I was trying to keep Eldritch vaguely plausible, unless I wanted to implement Hollow Earth theory, I had to put the vast ‘hell’ they visited someplace other than under the earth.  Alternate dimensions made for a decent fix.

Now, about the Caul, yeah, that was a thing too.  Those born with the Caul were said to be benandanti… and according to Slavic tradition, the caul is associated with the werewolf.  For some reason, being born with a bit of amniotic sack stuck around your head was often seen to be a portent of supernatural ability.  I suppose this is because of its general rarity, but I’ll be honest… aside from basic stuff, I don’t yet know much about the caul in folklore, save for what I needed to know for the comic.

Also… while wizards weren’t involved, yes, benandanti could transfer lycanthropy from one to another.  Bu that’s a story for another time.

In addition… Theiss was a real guy.  In fact, if it weren’t for him, our understanding of benandanti werewolves would be far less.

And… I’m tired.  Have some sources or something:

The Night Battles --Carlo Ginzburg
Witches Werewolves and Fairies --Claude Lecouteux
Werewolves --Neigel Suckling
The Nets of Modernism: Henry James, Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, and Sigmund Freud-- Maud Ellmann
 The Werewolf Handbook -- Dr. Robert Curran

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Eldritch: Lineage 025


WHY IS CHRISTMAS SO HARD?  I miss Halloween. Santa, I sure hope I’m on the nice list for once.  I’ve really been trying. 

Anyway… kinda getting the holiday blues.  Kinda feeling drained, in need of a pick-me-up, etc.  Thankfully, I get to see The Hobbit at opening, and that’ll fix eeeeeverything, but I may splurge and find some other film to go to or something after work in the interim.   Or maybe I’ll get to work on the next page first.  Or get around to doing some work on the seasons drawing that I finally got around to posting some of the preproduction sketches for the other day.  I think I’ll draw Tim O’ Leaves first. Gah, so much to do! At least I got to listen to Harry Potter while working on this…

DEAR SANTA, FOR CHRISTMAS THIS YEAR, I WANT A FEW HOURS OF FREE TIME.  It’s a shame you can’t send me some snow or something.
 Love, Nash.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012


Yet another busy week. I’m tired. And it’s just the beginning of the month, oi. But, I got my Christmas Tree up so I don’t have to worry about it later. One of these days I should get a fake tree… it’d be cheaper and kinder and easier but I do love real trees so… meh.

I hope the holidays are treating you folks well thus far!