(14-01-2025, 04:43 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I'll let you reach your own conclusion about Aspergils 
But these images look nothing like the hyssop (?) in the Voynich manuscript, they look more like a metallic aspergillum. Something like the below. Is it possible to find one that looks like a branch or a brush?
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The article, from which I took the picture with a branch in an earlier post, explains the symbolism of using "a leafy branch, or what looks like a bunch of straw, to sprinkle the water". I think we should be looking for pictures of that. Because it's certainly not a rigid wooden/metallic implement in VMS.
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Yeah most of them looked like maces or toilet brushes to me. The bundle of twigs is much easier to find in disciplinary contexts. (School teachers, torturers, you know the kind...)
Also, according to the Wikipedia the aspergillum should be in the right hand, not in the left hand as in VMS. However, to me the overall posture with both arms raised looks more like giving a blessing than punishing.
An aspergillum in the form of a brush-like bundle has to be dipped in holy water but there is no lidless situla in the image.
Also, it was a no-no for a woman in the 15th century to sprinkle holy water.
Concerning the post about Pope Joan, the depicted person does not wear a papal tiara.
(14-01-2025, 06:31 PM)Dobri Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.An aspergillum in the form of a brush-like bundle has to be dipped in holy water but there is no lidless situla in the image.
There is no lower part of the body in this image either, but this doesn't mean its existence is not implied
If the thing in the right hand is a vial of some sort, then some kind of sprinkling with a brush-like tool looks plausible to me.
In general, that extremely long, feather-like looking thing that certain figures are holding is identified as a palm leaf.
Let's not forget where it is that these little folks are popping up. They are all found in a much larger circular structure, that looks like a wreath. This, of course, raises the question of whose wreath it might be. And if the moon-like face in the center is any clue, with a passing knowledge medieval religious history, this is the Wreath of the Virgin.
So, this little guy, like a cherub or a putto, is there, spritzing holy water, keeping the wreath nice and fresh, so everything's fine.
It works for me.
The Wreath of the Virgin is part of an ongoing tradition - (last time I checked.)
For completeness, let's have a visual of all four persons starting from the one with text written on the back of their head and right shoulder and continuing clockwise.
It seems that all four persons are holding distinct attributes in their hands.