Cornell University Library created this utterly mind-blowing image-bank of the fantastic and supernatural in art and fiction. The material, several hundred images from the Library's Rare and Manuscript Collections, is themed by such delightful categories as Angels & Demons, Danse Macabre, Weird Science, Possession & Insanity, and Fantastic Space. Absolutely marvelous. (Seen here, an illustration by M.L. Breton from the 1863 text "Dictionnaire Infernal." Apparently this is "a destructive demon….which, according to some, is the ancient serpent that seduced Eve.") From the site description:
In the context of western literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, The Fantastic involves dread, fear and anxiety in the face of phenomena that escape rational explanation, or that reveal the notion of reality to be no more than a construct. A fantastic experience can therefore be likened to the breaking or shattering of a frame. While the literary fantastic is limited to the last 200 years, the Fantastic in art can be construed more broadly. This elasticity allowed us to choose images from works spanning a period from medieval manuscripts and printed incunabulae, to the early twentieth century.
Link (via The Seven Deadly Sinners)
