Tag: YEAH

sindri42:

sindri42:

space-coyote:

Am I the only one who sees this?

Barn owl is a death symbol in Mexican folklore.

To be more precise, the owl is often called the ‘messenger of the lord of the land of the dead’ and flies between the lands of the living and the dead. The Aztec god of death, Mictlantecuhtli, was often depicted with owls. Mayan religious texts desribe owls as messengers of Xibalba, the “Place of Fright”. And there’s a saying still in use today which roughly translates as ‘when the owl cries, the Indian dies’.

Meanwhile in various native american cultures: To the Apache, dreaming of an owl signified approaching death, and there are ‘bogeyman’ stories telling children to stay inside an not cry when they hear an owl hoot, lest they be carried away. The Cree believed the Boreal Owl whistle was a summon from spirits; if you answer them and do not hear a response you will soon die. The Hopis saw the Burrowing Owl as the god of the dead. The Kwagulth believed that owls represent the newly released souls of the recently deceased. The Mojave believed that you would become an owl after death as an intermediary stage of the afterlife. The Newuks believed that after death the brave and virtuous become Great Horned Owls, while the wicked become Barn Owls. In the Sierras people believed that the Great Horned Owl would capture the souls of the dead and carry them to the underworld.

As it turns out, an awful lot of cultures looked at a silent, incredibly efficient predator who only appears at night, and got creeped the fuck out. A few describe owls as symbols of wisdom, or spirits of protection, but most mythology surrounding owls considers them to be a dire portent or some kind or other. [Several African cultures also consider owls to be harbingers of death, but I’m less qualified to talk about those and preliminary googling isn’t turning up much]

So by wearing the face of an owl, Reyes is styling himself as the messenger or bringer of death; when he is seen or heard that means people will die, and when he leaves he carries with him the souls of the fallen. Depending on which myths you look at, it also carries connotations of how he himself is already dead and walking the earth as just a spirit, and possibly an admission of his wickedness in life.

All in all, the barn owl mask is a lot more interesting and meaningful than a boring old skull.