Connected...by chains.

The area of Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire is one of the great gold-producing regions of the world, and from roughly 1400 CE it was a primary producer of gold dust for much of Africa and Europe -- Europeans called the region the Gold Coast and the British guinea coin was minted from gold obtained there. The Akan peoples who lived there made weights called abammuo or mrammou (among others, depending on which Akan language) for use when trading the dust. Originally geometric in form, by about 1700 they started to be cast in the shape of many different animals and objects.

Whale-like appearance notwithstanding this is a sankofa bird perched on a stepped pyramid. The sankofa is a symbol for learning from the past in Akan culture, which is why the bird has its head turned backwards as if looking behind it. Abammuo are generally small, and this one is 3.8 by 2.2 by 2.2 cm.

This image is copyright to the Smithsonian Institution, and used with permission. You can see the original on their website.

(Originally posted by me to Reddit a couple years ago)

Going with the Halloween connection. But also because hearing the early synth-heavy Ministry makes me laugh every time.

This is a season's ticket for the 1931 New York Giants baseball club made out of 14 carat gold. It was given to Franklin Delano Roosevelt in his capacity as Governor of New York. The picture on the front is a reproduction of a 1909 image by Charles Dana Gibson (more famous as creator of the "Gibson Girl"), while the back has Roosevelt's name and "one party" as those covered by presenting the ticket at the Giants' home field, the Polo Grounds. The reverse also shows a 14K gold stamp from Lambert Brothers, the jewellers once located at 58th Street and 3rd Avenue in New York City which produced the ticket for the Giants.

The original image can be seen here on the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Museum's website.

(Originally posted by me to Reddit here but I thought I'd revisit some of my favourites since I switched to Lemmy)

Both bands are from Georgia (the state, not the country).

This is a map I made about a year back after encountering Hamilton Inlet and the associated Lake Melville on a map. It looked like the sort of place a medieval Norseman might call home, and when I checked it's climate was actually nicer than the one around the real Greenland settlements.

In this alternate history it was settled and managed to survive until European fishermen arrived in the area in the 1400s. With closer connections to across the Atlantic after that, it then carried on down to the modern day, a bit like Iceland but not as populous.

Its look was inspired by the National Geographic infographic maps of the 70s and 80s.

Brad is short for Bradley....

Mark Linkous was the key member of Sparklehorse before his early death, and he produced this album of Nina Persson's

Ignoring the Stan-shaped elephant in the room -- both songs sample the same drum beat from Dexter Wansel's "Theme from the Planets".

Saint (or St.) in the artist's name.

Has the same producer, Mutt Lange.