Animal Theme Hatpins
Cat hatpin, VictorianCat - The Cat appears in several categories, including locks and keys. See this one in another category, those that appear to be about groups, signs, and this looks like part of a lock system. Visit Hatpins Collection Tour, Mystery Lock, Two Fanciful Parts With Cat.
Cat in Circle, hatpin, VictorianCat - blue enamel circle surrounding open area with brass cat inside, green paste eyes. What the materials are in all of this is an amateur's best guess. Diameter - 1 3/8". Rod 11 3/4".
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Lioness hatpin, VictorianLioness - width 1 3/4; rod 8". Pressed metal, yellower than this shows. Back has four arms radiating from the suspended or raised pin finding, with each end fixed to an edge of the pin.
Old Biblical texts say animals have souls, in the oldest form. The history of old texts and comparing to various beliefs is a side interest: and if you are looking at animals here, you may be interested in their well-being. Maybe not. If so, go to the "transliteration" of Genesis 1:24, the oldest Hebrew with the word-for-word English beneath each line, at the site in FN 1 here.
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Boar hatpin, Victorian. Howard C. Scharfe and Marjorie Scharfe Hatpin Collection.
Beware the crashing Boar. Covered here with a lot of somebody's old brass polish. Tiny - about 3/4" at longest point, and 7/8" from tip top to where the rod itself starts. Rod 9 3/4".
The boar is a Celtic icon, among other cultural groups who featured it. See http://www.writer2001.com/boars.htm. There is a boar whose breath could set leaves afire and did other fierce things. For Chinese boars (part of the zodiac) see http://www.artisticchinesecreations.com/chinesescroll132.html. So far, ours is not Chinese, and not Celtic. Not fierce enough.
Little boar hatpin, VictorianHere he is again. Polish rinsed a little. In heraldry, the boar symbolizes bravery, the fight until dead. See http://www.fleurdelis.com/meanings.htm
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Wolf's head hatpinWolf's head hatpin, Victorian. Ivory. Ivory. 7/8" at widest point, 3/4" top to bottom. The rod is 8 1/2" and attaches back from the lower jaw-cheek, at a line below the ear, toward the neck. It sticks straight out. The head is bifurcated, as though the halves were joined, see the line at the center bottom. It goes up between the nostrils and eyes. Two halves.This looked just like any nice animal wolf's head, until we were looking up military insignias and crests. See it also at Hatpins Collection Tour, Military. Scroll down.
The wolf's head and its profile and shape as shown here, is also an insignia that represents the 27th Infantry, a result of a nickname for the regiment, the Wolfhounds. See http://www.tioh.hqda.pentagon.mil/Inf/27th%20Infantry%20Regiment.
The motto is "Nec Aspera Terrent," or "Frightened By No Difficulties." The regiment dates from 1901, was in battle in the Philippines (Lake Lanao, especially, see it at http://lakelanao.com/main/index.php; and General Pershing and WWI at http://www.worldwar1.com/dbc/pervandiver.htm); and later, after The Great War, participated in the Siberian Expedition 1918-1920.
We think this belongs with the military, after reading about the Siberian Expedition, and why US forces were in Russia at the time of the Russian Revolution, see http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA283474
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Horse head hatpin, VictorianHorse head. An action shot. Rod 8". Length 1 1/8" then height 2/3". No sterling mark, back is a flat piece, front looks pressed out. Back has two holes on either side of the finding attachment."Power, grace, beauty, nobility, strength, freedom." See ://www.whats-your-sign.com/horse-symbol-meanings.html
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Find more animal themes at the Damascene technique section: Hatpins Collection Tour, Damascene.
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FN 1 - Animals and souls at Creation, oldest Hebrew. Site: ://www.scripture4all.org/OnlineInterlinear/Hebrew_Index.htm. Click on Genesis 1 and scroll.
Find this: "and he is saying Elohim she shall bring forth the earth soul living to species of her beast and moving animal and animal of him land to species of her and every moving animal of the ground and he is seeing Elohim that good" No punctuation in oldest Hebrew, no spacing for phrases. A "mechanical" translation, not words as interpreted by a later culture.
As background, dry parts earth is spoken of as feminine, "she," and the waters and wet are spoken of as masculine, "he." We don't genderize this way. But it may help understand that old text better. Just for interest. See it ongoing at Martin Luther's Stove, Additional Transliteration Site.
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