this mouse is a roman flask

www.metmuseum.org
Gift of Renée E. and Robert A. Belfer, 2012

Fashioned by a Roman craftsman in the third century A.D., this graceful glass flask is unusual for several reasons.  It's a mouse, for one thing, with the flask's neck placed to serve as the tail.  It's cobalt blue.  Last but not least, it's embellished with an applied linear detail we currently call "snake-thread."  Read more about this piece here.  And if, like me, you were wondering "Which emperors were there in the third century A.D.?"  maybe this will help.

a mouse, living forever

Theodore M. Davis Collection, Bequest of Theodore M. Davis, 1915
metmuseum.org

Usually ancient Egyptian seal amulets were fashioned in the form of scarab beetles.  This one, set into a ring, is a mouse.  Its seal is the cartouche of Menkheperre, the throne name of Pharaoh Thutmose III (reigned 1479-1425 B.C.).  Across the mouse's shoulders are inscribed the words "Menkheperre, living forever."  Was there a link between the sentiment and the creature?  Mice and rats raided Egyptian grain stores, but that very ability to be small and destructive gave them top billing in a passage from Herodotus in which they devoured the bowstrings of an invading army.  Did this mouse remind the wearer not to discount the insignificant?

top hat

Takeuchi Seihō [Public domain in Japan], via Wikimedia Commons

Are you looking for a hat or a house, little fellow?  We've seen nihonga painter Takeuchi Seiho at the Museum before, but this 1937 "Mouse and Top Hat" is a perfect snapshot of Seiho's use of Western realism in an unmistakably Japanese way. 

a mouse has a snack

Gift of the Estate of Dr. Eleanor Z. Wallace www.brooklynmuseum.org

This woodcut by Mochizuki Gyokusen (Japanese, 1794-1852) shows the simplest of pleasures. "Mouse Eating Pea Pods," ca. 1850. 

white mice have fun c. 1816

H. O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929
www.metmuseum.org

In this happy surimono (color woodblock print), Kubo Shunman shows us "White Mice Playing." Shunman was a novelist and poet as well as an artist; I bet that's a poem written to the right, but alas, I cannot read it.

a foolish mouse, a cat's back

Designated Purchase Fund and Carll H. de Silver Fund, www.brooklynmuseum.org. PD

This is the top, or finial, of a staff created sometime in the 20th century. (You can see more photos of it here at the Brookyn Museum's website.)  It was carried by a particular sort of royal official among the Fante culture of Ghana and the Ivory Coast of Africa.  When I tell you that the official was known as an okyeame - a "linguist," that is, a king's spokesman - you won't be surprised to learn that this small scene illustrates a proverb, as linguist staffs of that period often did.  We're looking at a cat with a mouse climbing onto its back, which is a bad move for any mouse anywhere I'd imagine.  That's borne out by the matching proverb: "It is only a foolish mouse that tries to get into the cat's bag," or, lesser people shouldn't dare to mess with royal business.
Here's another okyeame staff at the Art Institute of Chicago which illustrates the proverb "The hen knows when it is dawn, but leaves it to the rooster to announce.”  Fante culture was found within the greater context of Asante civilization, and Asante visual art has a lot of interplay with its verbal arts.  Their proverbs are fascinating and vivid.  I'll share some more with you tomorrow.

cat and mouse, with a twist

Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, www.brooklynmuseum.org (CC-BY)

Is it difficult to think that ancient people had a sense of humor?  The Egyptians certainly did, which isn't a surprising trait in such a rational and life-affirming civilization.  Here's a sketch to prove it:  a cat - note its lovely dotted coat, typical of an Egyptian Mau - offers goodies to an imperious mouse.  Wait, what? (There's more on the object record page at the Brooklyn Museum's site.)  It's sketched on an ostracon, which is a scrap of pottery or stone  used for notes or sketching; much cheaper than papyrus for tomfoolery.  Date on this funny scene? Around 1295-1075 B.C.E.

this poem is not actually about cats

british library flickr (PD)

From a slender anthology of verse written at the University of Cambridge during a period that included WWI: this brief, sad verse, in which we are all mice under the cat of Fate.

MICE
I see the broken bodies of women and men,
Temples of God ruined; I see the claws
Of sinister Fate, from the reach of whose feline paws
Never are safe the bodies of women and men.

Almighty Cat, it sits on the Throne of the World,
With paw outstretched, grinning at us, the mice,
Who play our trivial games of virtue and vice,
And pray—to That which sits on the Throne of the World!

From our beginning till all is over and done,
Unwitting who watches, pursuing our personal ends,
Hither and thither we scamper. The paw descends;
The paw descends and all is over and done.

 - Gerald Bullett (1893-1958) in Davison, Edward Lewis, 1898-. Cambridge Poets 1914-1920. Cambridge [Eng.]: W. Heffer & sons ltd., 1920. 31.

a mouse's dazzling morsel

The Walters Art Museum,  Gift of Mrs. Leslie Legum, 1991

There's a diamond in that golden spoon, and that mouse (he's silver) has his beady eye upon it.  If you were a well-dressed, well-off gent in 1870s England, you might have selected this to be the perfect stick pin for your tie.

kittenful of mice

courtesy and thanks to Library of Rennes - Les Champs Libres. public domain.

They don't make giveaway calendars like this any more.  If only.  This chromolithograph of a kitten holding a cage of six mice dates from 1885.  It's a typically high-quality product from Oberthur Printing, which among other accomplishments published the first French telephone directory.  Though this may not be the finest of fine art, in its day Oberthur Publishing brought attractive and well executed ephemera to the general public.  There's a lot to be said for teaching people how to look via their everyday materials.

a prisoner befriends the mice - and the spiders

Though I've heard of prisoners befriending the mice and rats who might visit their lonely cells, this is the first time I've heard of spiders joining in. . . 

An officer confined to the Bastille, at Paris, begged to be allowed to play on his lute, to soften his confinement by its harmonies. Shortly afterwards, when playing on the instrument, he was much astonished to see a number of mice come frisking out of their holes, and many spiders descending from their webs, and congregating round him while he continued the music. Whenever he ceased, they dispersed; whenever he played again, they reappeared. He soon had a numerous audience, amounting to about a hundred mice and spiders.

-- from Goodrich, S. G. 1793-1860. (1849). Illustrative anecdotes of the animal kingdom. Boston: Rand and Mann. 173.

it's not dessert without a friend

thanks wikimedia commons (PD)

Georg Flegel (German, 1566-1638) was a painter of still lifes full of good food, fine settings and the occasional extra little guest.  This undated "Stillleben mit Maus" (Still-life with Mouse") is an oil on copper measuring all of 4.8" x 3.81".  How it must glow in real life.

the cat and mouse: hostile takeover

thanks wikimedia commons. pd

British artist Walter Crane created the illustration above (I regret I can't find a bigger version) for a Brothers Grimm tale, "The Cat and Mouse in Partnership."  In this story, a cat misleads a mouse to think that they will have a prosperous and happy life together.  What actually happens: the cat lies about where it goes and what it finds, eats up all the treats he discovers, and leaves nothing for his friend.  In the end, the mouse gets wise and the cat eats her. Him.  Well, you can see where the genders would really be open to interpretation, though yet again the cat is the bad guy.  A version of this story about the cruel, cruel world is here.

fable: "the cat, the cock, and the young mouse"

spot illustration from the book

From an 1836 collection of fables, here's one on not trusting to appearances, written by Robert Dodsley in the 1700s:

A Young Mouse, that had seen very little of the world, came running, one day, to his mother in great haste: —“Oh! mother,” said he, “I am frightened almost to death! I have seen the most extraordinary creature that ever was. He has a fierce, angry look, and struts about upon two legs; a strange piece of flesh grows on his head, and another under his throat, as red as blood: he flapped his arms against his sides, as if he intended to rise into the air; and stretching out his head, he opened a sharp-pointed mouth so wide, that I thought he was preparing to swallow me up: then he roared at me so horribly, that I trembled every joint, and was glad to run home as fast as I could. If I had not been frightened away by this terrible monster, I was just going to commence an acquaintance with the prettiest creature you ever saw. She had a soft fur skin, thicker than ours, and all beautifully streaked with black and grey; with a modest look, and a demeanour so humble and courteous, that methought I could have fallen in love with her. Then she had a fine long tail, which she waved about so prettily, and looked so earnestly at me, that I do believe she was just going to speak to me, when the horrid monster frightened me away."
“Ah, my dear child!” said the mother, “you have escaped being devoured, but not by that monster you was so much-afraid of; which, in truth, was only a bird, and would have done you no manner of harm. Whereas, the sweet creature, of whom you seem so fond, was no other than a CAT; who, under that hypocritical countenance, conceals the most inveterate hatred to all our race, and subsists entirely by devouring Mice. Learn from this incident, my dear, never, while you live, to rely on outward appearances.”

Flowers of Fable. Selected from the best sources. (London: Tilt and Bogue), p. 335

a pet mouse takes a bath

During an illness of some weeks’ duration, mice were to me a source both of amusement and annoyance; the former certainly predominating. A wainscot ledge ran round the room in which I lay, and it was their delight to scamper after one another upon this projection; but as the head of my curtainless bed was close to it, they so frequently diverged on to my face, that I was obliged to have it drawn at least a yard from the wall. Sometimes also, they dragged away my pocket handkerchief, which, from not being immediately missed, was not recovered till sundry holes had been nibbled in it.
A small table stood by my bed-side; having on it a bason full of cold tea, which formed my night beverage. On one occasion, my light was extinguished, and I heard a scratching against the legs of the table. I guessed the cause, and tried to frighten the climber away; but I suspect he mounted by the bed clothes, for I presently heard something flop into the tea. All was silent; and I concluded the intruder was drowned; but of course, whatever my thirst, I did not attempt to drink. When daylight came, there sat a poor mouse holding up his little chin just above the liquid. Had he moved he must have been suffocated, and he had been all these hours in this position. It was impossible to take away a life so hardly earned, and he was allowed to rejoin his companions.

-- from Mrs. R. Lee, Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals (Lindsay & Blakiston, 1853), pp.275-6

medieval kitchen implement: cat

thanks discardingimages 

So it's the middle ages and you finally got the pears picked through the sweat of your brow.  Now you've got to see about preserving them for the winter and . . . what are these tiny toothmarks on the fruit? Yuck.  Get the cat.
From Antonius von Pforr, Buch der Beispiele (Book of Examples), Swabia ca. 1475-1482, at the Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg, Cod. Pal. germ. 84, fol. 232v.  Are you any good at German when it's printed in Fraktur?  You can read an abridged version of this book of fables here at Archive.org.

a cat, a mouse, a moku hanga

image copyright and by kindest permission of the artist

Kevin Clark of Roseburg is a fine craftsman of moku hanga, Japanese woodblock printing (an explanation of the art here).  On handmade paper he impresses scenes he's carved, and we get to enjoy the result - such as Cat & Mouse, above.  I personally love the innocence of this image, with the cat - a kitten? - not even sure what that little animal is, and what should she do now?
You should visit Kevin's Etsy shop, lizardprints.  Find the wild horses frisking, or the wheat field, or the fresh, sweet beauty of the cherry-blossom castle.  See why I love woodblock prints so much?  They're full of the artist's physical presence, as if you could take their outstretched hand and walk into the art with them.

three fine mice

thanks wikimedia commons (PD:US)

Carl Reichert (Austrian, 1836-1918) was best known for paintings of dogs and cats, often cutesy to the point of saccharine. Such was the taste back in his day.  I was pleased to find this Reichert watercolor/crayon work of Mause (Mice) today, because it's a plain but kind look at three creatures doing their mousey thing.  The mouse in back is a little bulky, unless he's supposed to be way bigger than the other two, but I like the elegant and delicate portrayal of the other two's whiskery faces.  I think watercolor and colored pencil are the perfect media for mice portraits.