(23-07-2016, 10:43 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Many people have considered the rosettes image to represent a map. Some suggest that the entire collection of circles is a map, while others concentrate on one of the circles. Known propositions of this type are from Diane O'Donovan, Nick Pelling, Jürgen Wastl and D. Feger, J.K. Petersen and from Marco Ponzi, but there are many more similar suggestions that predate all of these.
There could be a tendency to believe, by the sheer number of these suggestions, that there is indeed most probably a map here, but I am of a rather different opinion.
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I do not believe it is a map. For me it is something more abstract.
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First of all, I believe that the central circle represents the sky. I already mentioned it before. The sky is like a plane or sheet with stars held up by six towers.
The upper right circle I believe represents the Earth. Most of the buildings are in or near this circle, and just outside it is a T-O map. There is more to be said, but let me keep it short.
That leaves 7 circles......
These 7 circles could represent the seven planets.
They could also be associated with the 7 week days and 7 metals.
(Nick Pelling suggests in his book - I believe - that the individual circles in the cosmological section might refer to the planets, so this is a close parallel, if the above-mentioned mapping between individual circles and the rosettes image is real).
Now if this is right, can we decide which circle is which planet / week day / metal? Let me add the mapping first. I also add the association with the humours, but I am not sure if these are uniquely identified.
Moon - Monday - Silver - Cold and moist
Sun - Sunday - Gold - Hot and dry
Mercury - Wednesday - Quicksilver - ?
Venus - Friday - Copper - Cold and moist
Mars - Tuesday - Iron - Hot and dry
Jupiter - Thursday - Tin - Hot and moist
Saturn - Saturday - Lead - Cold and dry
There is another important problem, of course.
In the illustration, all circles on the outside are connected to each other, and connected to the sky in the centre.
This implies that the Earth would have a similar 'role' as the other planets, which is quite an unusual concept for the 15th Century of course....
That raises the question: What is (the definition of) a 'map'? I find the definition of 'map' by Harley & Woodward (in their preface to ‘The history of cartography’ ) to be an excellent and widely acclaimed one:
‘Maps are graphic representations that facilitate a spatial understanding of things, concepts, conditions, processes, or events in the human world.’
This forms part on my latest geometric analysis which fits perfectly into this discussion. Several weeks ago I made my third geometric essay available on figshare raising exactly that question ( You are not allowed to view links.
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Via physical ‘triangulation’ (analysing the position of the city landmarks) and philosophical ‘triangulation’ I introduce Brigitte Englisch’s geometric analysis of maps from late antiquity and medieval times and discuss the relationship between geometric projection and geographic representation (and the method's usability with respect to the Rosette folio here) to get closer to the answer : Is the Rosette folio a map?
I sort of agree to your dissent on it being a map. It is not a map in the sense of a geographic travel map. It may have features of it, or at some time during its construction and life it was conceived as one, but I agree it is a more abstract one and, as Marco rightly points out, ours is more an Elements based climate diagram highlighting the climate and its characteristics (hot/cold/dry/moist) per continent.
Centre/sky/six towers:
I agree. We suggested the centre being the quintessential Element Ether AND the abstract & imaginary Heavenly Jerusalem, which others discussed later in this thread already. The one page 'all-in-one' summary view of ours is here (You are not allowed to view links.
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upper right circle: representing Earth:
I came to a similar conclusion, if you were to allow ‘Earth’ being substituted by oecumene (living world). The oecumene (see Crates of Mallus) would fit here I believe...
Humours/qualities of the Elements:
Would be interesting to align your qualities with our suggestion of climate qualities per continent/circle. Though the numbers don’t add up (4 vs 7)
I come back to the beginning: Is it a map? It may well be, but was it constructed as a map (and as a map of what?) or did it gain additional features (and in which sequence)? Nick Pelling raised this concern and I agree with him that this is not trivial to solve.
That sort of led me to start from the beginning and try to construct the rosette folio from the beginning - starting with the scaffold, interior of the scaffold and, the latest addition, the construction of (some) of the city landmarks (see my three essays on the geometry of the Rosette folio) I have some ideas to follow up on these and do more ‘constructive’ (literally) work on how the Rosette folio evolved.