Zibaldone #2: Black Swallow of Death

Here’s a trio of things from one of my commonplace books that I’m reading about right now, for no particular reason.

Eugene Bullard. Black combat pilot in WWI. Boxer. Musician. Elevator operator. Had a pet monkey named Jimmy. Known as ‘the Black Swallow of Death’. Probably some kind of pulp hero.

The War of the Bucket. AKA the War of the Oaken Bucket. Literally a war fought over a bucket. Also part of that whole sorry-ass Guelph and Ghibelline scene. Began AND ended with the Battle of Zappolino. Had a mock-heroic epic written about it.

Picatrix. AKA the Goal of the Wise. Four hundred page book of magic. 11th century, or maybe 10th. There’s a copy in the British Library. The original Arabic version wasn’t discovered until 1920.

My subconscious has a bad habit of making random connections–crashing together unrelated concepts until something fits. I don’t know if that’s what’s happening here, but I wouldn’t bet against it. Bullard, in particular, has been taking up real estate in the back of my head for a few months now. If ever there was a historical personage deserving of fictional adventures, Bullard is it.