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f5v - a strange parallel - Printable Version

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f5v - a strange parallel - Koen G - 18-01-2018

I came across an image of fol. 11r, grapevine, from the 13thC Arabic Dioscorides. Its polished style and page layout are reminiscent of the Vienna Dioscorides. When I saw the image and mentally converted the painting style to that of the VM, I realized why it seemed familiar. Compare it to VM f5v:

   

Now first of all, these are clearly different plants. The Dioscorides plant has grapes, tendrils and a generic root, while the VM plant has flowers, no fruit and a strange root. So consider this a stylistic/formal parallel, not a proposed plant ID. There's a confusing contradiction here, because while the plants are clearly different they are also almost the same.
  • First there's the page layout. Large drawing, text hugging the top of the plant (but obviously the Arabic text is right to left).
  • Then there's the shading of the leaves. Both drawings show various shades being used, for individual leaves as well as within the same leaf. One would almost think that the Dioscorides reveals the effect the VM painter was aiming for with his limited possibilities.
       
  • The shape of the leaves is also similarly variable in both drawings. Some have five fingers, some three. Some are cross-shaped, others look like butterflies. The veins and leaf edges are similar too. "Partners" in shape, orientation and relative brightness can be found for most leaves, some examples:
       
  • The habit of the plants is similar, though the VM plant does some things which are biologically impossible (branches rejoining).
  • Both plants have exactly 21 leaves. I'd intuitively dismiss this as a coincidence. But there is a possibility that the VM illustration of plant x relied heavily on a Dioscorides illustration of the grapevine. In that case, it's no coincidence.
Once again, I'm not arguing that these are the same plants, nor that the VM plant was directly copied from this Arabic Dioscorides. But there does seem to be some link between both images.

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - -JKP- - 18-01-2018

I also doubt that they are the same plant, but I'll agree that the plants inhabit the page in a very similar way—it's definitely worth noting.


There are some details that are similar, like the leaf you pointed out. Whether the details are similar because of cross-pollination of ideas or because both illustrators got their ideas from living plants is something I've frequently wondered about. The Juliana Anicia plants tend to be more naturalistic than most so I'm assuming real plants were consulted. I also strongly believe, even though many people have expressed doubt, that the VMS plants (the more naturalistic ones) are inspired more or less by real plants.


I've noticed in herbals that drawings of certain plants are all over the place, you can hardly tell they are the same plant, and others are much more easy to recognize (like Aloe, Tusilaga farfara, Acorus, and Cyclamen). I wonder if it's the plants with the more distinctive physical characteristics that are easier to recognize even if they are drawn badly, because certain features stand out.

Other plants like Artemisias and the various kinds of Ranunculus and Petroselinem (parsley) are harder to distinguish because there are many species with similar characteristics. if there's no label or if the plants are out of order, it's very difficult to narrow down what they are, even if they are drawn fairly well.


On my list of possible IDs for You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. I have the following (plus a few others I posted on my blog that are less similar):
  • Artemisia (If it's Artemisia, it's more likely A. vulgaris which has pink flowers and broader leaves than other Artemisia's)
  • Crataegus monogyna - Hawthorne (which looks very much like a tree version of Artemisia vulgaris, also with pink or white blossoms and the same shape of leaf)
  • Bryonia (less likely because it's quite a bit more viny than the VMS plant, but has a few things in common)
  • Pelargonium or Erodium (generally called geraniums). There are quite a few species with palmate leaves that look almost exactly like the VMS drawing in terms of overall shape and proportions. These aren't the closest match to the VMS, but they are ones for which I have public-domain images (Geranium glutinosum (left) and Pelargonium cortusoefolium (second from left)). I wish I had a PD pic of a herbarium specimen because the dried geraniums look more like the VMS drawing than the live ones in terms of the way the stalks curve around and look slightly viny.


I don't have a picture of the Old World version but the New World Geranium maculatum  is very much like the VMS plant and also like geraniums in the medieval herbals. Geranium pyrenaicum may also be one of the Geraniums in the old herbals. Sometimes they show the seedheads (the "crane's bill) and sometimes they don't. Geranium lucidum and many other geraniums have some leaves that are reddish.


I just noticed today that one of the people who responded to my blog several years ago suggested Comarum palustre, which is also worth considering as it has the right basic shape, palmate leaves, and similar coloring.

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - Koen G - 22-01-2018

JKP: if my suspicion here is correct, someone used a Dioscorides image of grapevine as a basis for this plant. Hence I wouldn't necessarily dismiss Bryonia. On the other hand, the most vine-like properties of the grapevine, i.e. tendrils, are exactly what has been removed from the image, so I don't know... It would also be strange for someone to have knowledge of or access to standard grapevine imagery but completely deviate from tradition in something as essential as artemisia. 

I agree that the leaves of geranium maculatum do look very similar, and so do quite a number of other plants. Probably a hard one to ID with some certainty.

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - MarcoP - 23-01-2018

Hello Koen,
this vine illustration is also reproduced by Minta Collins in "Medieval Herbals, the Illustrative Traditions" (fig.29) - but in the book the page seems to have been accidentally mirror-imaged.

Collins writes that ms Ahmed III, Cod. 2127, Topkapi Museum Library, Istanbul, was created in 1228 by a scribe from Mosul. "A number of the plant illustrations are roughly copied from a model of the Alphabetical Herbal Recension ... Whereas the Vine may have been copied by the artist from another source, probably of Western or Byzantine origin, because it corresponds to no other representation in any of the Greek or Arabic Herbals examined so far".

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - Koen G - 23-01-2018

Thanks, Marco! That's an extremely interesting quote, in my opinion. It hints at the complexity of sources underlying the herbal traditions, and the way the VM plants might be related to them. It's fascinating that the plant which struck me as Voynich-related appears to be the odd one out.

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - Koen G - 29-01-2018

Been looking for some grape illustrations which are similar to the Dioscorides one, but this proved difficult. As Collins wrote, it does not correspond to other drawings from the tradition. For example, MorganMS M.652 fol. 270v (Turkey, Istanbul, mid 10th century) shows a much more creeping vine with "flat", equalized leaves:

[Image: m652.270va.jpg]

And unfortunately grape is missing from the Juliana Anicia Codex. I say unfortunately because its art style is really similar to the Tokapi vine, so I would have liked to compare them.

I found one plant illustration which is similar in the way the plant is drawn, standing up with three "branches". It looks like a very stylized version of a Diosciridan model, though proper attention is stil given to the leaf edges and veins. From: Leiden Or.289, 1083 CE. Arabic translation of the Materia Medica of Dioscorides. f185a



[Image: 3f75ccbc2b327237e171b4fd7fff4b7f.jpg]

(When I followed the link, it turned out that the source of this image was Marco's Pinterest, again Big Grin)

The VM is the only one I found which attempts to render the differences in leaf shade, shape and "volume" we see in the Tokapi example. So I can still very much appreciate the similarities between these drawings, even though they appear to refer to different plants.

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - Diane - 30-01-2018

Marco,

Your saying 
Quote:created in 1228 by a scribe from Mosul. 

is very interesting to me because it co-incides with the line of transmission that I've described for the botanical folios' re-entry to the Mediterranean world, though Mesopotamia - and the time-frame is pretty right, too.  Not only by consideration of the historical events of that time, but also for purely iconographic reasons, because some of the botanical folios' roots find close stylistic correspondence in some within the  Mashhad Dioscorides (made 1152-76).  

Very interesting comment. I've made a copy intending to quote you later if you don't mind.  I haven't bought a copy of Collins' book, preferring studies by other scholars, so I've quote her via you.  Thanks Marco

RE: f5v - a strange parallel - Diane - 07-03-2018

Koen,
I've just taken another and slower look at that 13thC mss - and thanks again to Marco for the details (ms Ahmed III, Cod. 2127, Topkapi Museum Library, Istanbul.  1228 by a scribe from Mosul).

An absolutely brilliant example.

To me it looks just like the sort of picture ours descend from, but the Ahmed mss seems a much closer copy from some original ('ur-copy').

One has to wonder whether this is the sort of eastern Christian imagery which first went from Edessa and Nisibis to Baghdad.

Great example.