Roundel

A roundel in heraldry is any circular shape; the term is also commonly used to refer to a type of national insignia used on military aircraft, generally circular in shape and usually comprising concentric rings of different colours. In heraldry, a roundel is a circular charge. Roundels are among the oldest charges used in coats of arms, dating from at least the [...]

Round Table

The Round Table is King Arthur’s famed table in the Arthurian legend, around which he and his Knights congregate. As its name suggests, it has no head, implying that everyone who sits there has equal status. The table was first described in 1155 by Wace, who relied on previous depictions of Arthur’s fabulous retinue. The [...]

The letter O

O is the fifteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English (pronounced /oʊ/) is spelled o; the plural is oes, though this is rare.
The letter was derived from the Semitic `Ayin (eye), which represented a consonant, probably the voiced pharyngeal fricative (IPA: [ʕ]), the sound represented by the Arabic letter ع called `Ayn. This Semitic letter in its original form seems to have been inspired by a similar [...]

Braille

The Braille system is a method that is widely used by blind people to read and write. Braille was devised in 1821 by Louis Braille, a Frenchman. Each Braille character or cell is made up of six dot positions, arranged in a rectangle containing two columns of three dots each. A dot may be raised [...]

Bora (rings)

A Bora is the name given both to an initiation ceremony of Indigenous Australians, and to the site on which the initiation is performed. At such a site, young boys are transformed into men. The initiation ceremony differs from culture to culture, but often involves circumcision and scarification, and may also involve the removal of [...]

Carolingian cross

 

A variation of the Everlasting Cross is the Carolingian Cross, named after the Carolingian dynasty, a Frankish noble family that can be traced back to the seventh century. One member of this family, Pepin the Short, was crowned King of the Franks by the church, who saw this as a useful way to extend their authority over the [...]

Triquetra

Triquetra (IPA: [tɹaɪ'kwεtɹə]) is a word derived from the Latin tri- (“three”) and quetrus (“cornered”). Its original meaning was simply “triangle” and it has been used to refer to various three-cornered shapes. Nowadays, it has come to refer exclusively to a certain more complicated shape formed of three vesicae piscis, sometimes with an added circle in or around it. This widely recognized [...]

Tree of life

The concept of a many-branched tree illustrating the idea that all life on earth is related has been used in science, religion, philosophy, mythology and other areas. A tree of life is variously, a) a mystical concept alluding to the interconnectedness of all life on our planet, b) a metaphor for common descent in the evolutionary sense, and c) a motif in various world theologies, mythologies and philosophies.Various trees of life are [...]

Hourglass Nebula

 

The Engraved Hourglass Nebula (also known as MyCn 18) is a young planetary nebula situated in the southern constellation Musca about 8,000 light-years away from Earth. It was discovered by Annie Jump Cannon and Margaret W. Mayall during their work on an extended Henry Draper Catalogue. At the time [January 18, 1996] it was designated simply as a small faint planetary nebula. Much improved telescopes and imaging techniques [...]

Mandorla

 

A Mandorla is a Vesica Piscis shaped aureola which surrounds the figures of Christ and the Virgin Mary in traditional Christian art. It is especially used to frame the figure of Christ in Majesty in early medieval and Romanesque art, as well as Byzantine art of the same periods. The term refers to the almond like shape: “mandorla” means almond nut in Italian. In iconsof the Eastern Orthodox Church, the [...]