Gargolyes [Pg 37]

Perhaps we've all seen gargoyles in those cartoon shows, and we even learned about them in global class, flying buttress? Sounds familiar, and now I'm reading about them in a book, but I wanted to know more about them, so of course me being the researcher, I decided to do more research on them.

A gargoyle is a carved stone grotesquely of a human or animal with an open mouth so that it can keep rain off the building walls. They are also supposed to protect from and scare off any evil harmful spirits. Some animals that were commonly used as gargoyles were: Lions, Dogs, Eagles, Wolf, Monkey, Chimeras, Goat and Snakes.

Gargoyles were seen in two ways by the church;
1) They were used to promote that church by carrying messages to the common people. They best way to catch the eye of the common people was to have images that carried a lot of ideas.
2) They were used to represent evil, scaring people into coming to church to remind them that the end of days was much sooner than they thought. They also showed a way to inform the religious people that evil was kept outside of the church.

It was very popular during the medieval times.

Here's some pictures :]

Kali the destroyer [Pg 16]

While reading I came across Kali, the dark goddess, who spills blood and crushes bone. But I wanted to do more research on her.

Kali, also known as Kalika or the "Dark Mother" is a Hindu goddess with never ending energy. She destroyed only to recreate. Her name has many different meanings suck as; black, time, death, lord of death, etc. She is considered the goddess of time and change. She is the first form image of a birth and death mother. She sometimes wore red to show the blood of the life that she gave and took back. She chewed everything that existed with her teeth.

Some pictures showed that she had four arms and some ten so I just put both up.

She has four arms (or ten), with a sword in one hand and the head of a demon in another. The other two (or eight) hands blesses her worshippers and tells them not to fear. She has two dead heads as her earrings, a string of skulls as her necklace, and a lightweight undergarment made of human hands as her clothing. Her tongue hangs from her mouth, and her eyes are red. Her foot is on the chest of her husband, Shiva.

Memsahib [Pg 4-6]

While I was reading I came across the word Memashib, I never heard of that word before so I decided to do some research on it.

I got several definitions of it :

1. Main Entry: mem·sa·hib

Pronunciation: \ˈmem-ˌsä-ˌ(h)ib, -ˌsäb\

Function: noun

Etymology: Hindi, from English ma'am + Hindi & Urdu sahib sahib

Date: 1852

: a white foreign woman of high social status living in India; especially : the wife of a British official

2. mem·sa·hib (mmsäb)

n.

Used formerly in colonial India as a form of respectful address for a European woman.

So basically memsahib is used as a term for a European woman of high class who lives in India and is married. That's who they were referring Gemma's mom as, a memsahib.

But my question is why call her memsahib when she already has a name?

Everyone's Roles (Sorry should of done this first)

Edina K. -Researcher

Danielle C. - Summarizer

Alyssa L. - Illustrator

Johanna H. - Word Wizard

Mary T. - literary Luminary

Schedule:
Every night read 3 chapters of the book. Write down number of pages, from what page to what page, you read in your reading log, and write a short summary on what you read.

Mary Dowd [Pg 353]

After reading all the entries in Mary Dowd's diary, Gemma founds out that Mary Dowd was really her own mother.

"Great and Terrible Beauty" [Pg 334]

Maybe that's why the author decided to name the book "A Great And Terrible Beauty".

Realms [Chapter 21-22]

Is that really Gemma's mother in the realms or are they trying to trick her? Is Katrik really trying to protect Gemma?

Circe & Order [Pg 122-123]

Do you guys think that Circe & the Order are really trying to trick Gemma? Do you believe what Kartik is telling Gemma?

Charlemagne [Pg 121]

Funny how we were learning about Charlemagne in Global class and now he's in the book we're reading.. Just wanted to point that out

"Destiny is chosen" [pg 87]

Remember when in English class we were talking about how our fate/destiny is chosen for us and we can't change it. Well I kind of related that to the book because when I was reading it, it made me think of our class discussion.

A Great And Terrible Beauty

First to post :] Hope you guys liked the book cause I did.