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Create a websiteA new book by Sergei Zotov, Mikhail Maizuls, and Dmitry Antonov. In this book, we discuss the exchange of gifts between people and higher powers in the West and Russia. Since the Middle Ages, many Christian churches have been filled with wax legs and arms, silver eyes, iron cows, baby figurines, old shackles, and armor. Such items were called ex-voto, or votives. These were gifts to God and the saints that Christian people brought and still bring to churches in order to ask the heavens for help or thank saints for a miracle.
Thousands of years passed, religions, names of deities, and other supernatural patrons changed, but people still bring votives to them — sometimes in the form of body parts or internal organs. These items materialize human pain, fear, hope, and joy, allowing people to build relationships with higher powers, giving us hope that they could be negotiated with, and a miracle could be accelerated or even bought. And then the pain will pass, and any trouble will recede.
This book will focus on the visual origins of an imaginary magical world. How did the artists portray the famous sorcerers and witches of the past? What role did iconography play in the witch hunt? And why did thousands of magicians all over Europe follow the directions of illustrated grimoires, witchcraft books? This study will lead us to images that are easily recognizable today from films, music, and computer games: the magic wand and witche's broom from fantasy novels, the satanic pentagram from horror films, and the black goat from black metal music. A thousand years of medieval magic has not sunk into oblivion but left a deep mark on modern culture.
«Iconographical Mayhem» is a book about how the most unusual motifs of Orthodox icons appeared and what they really mean. The book will explain the natures of the six-armed Christ, the Orthodox centaur, and the dove with four heads. You will immerse yourself in mystical images, where human life is presented as a labyrinth, mysterious hands sprout from the crucifixion, and many eyes look at the viewer. You will see violent scenes in which saints and even Jesus himself take up weapons. You will understand how laptops, soccer balls, and nuclear reactors appeared on modern sacred images.
Together with the author, you will unravel the meaning of mysterious allegories, take excursions into theology and world history, learn about the most incredible Russian spells and beliefs, see the rarest icons previously available only to scholars. But the main thing is that after reading this book, the familiar culture and history will unfold before you from a completely new and unknown side.
2025