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+--- Thread: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? (/thread-3106.html)
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Koen G - 21-02-2020
(21-02-2020, 09:12 AM)DONJCH Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Is that really the consensus?There are plenty of instances where the text fills the space left by the images. I don't see any indication for any case where it happened the other way around. Do you?
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Aga Tentakulus - 21-02-2020
Sorry, maybe I was a little vague.
it looks like the paint was applied after the binding, but the text and the drawing are applied before.
The sequence of the different consistencies of the inks is not right for the complexion.
It is the sequence. light light dark light light dark.
So dark is a different sheet than light.
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - RenegadeHealer - 16-12-2020
I'm working on a project currently trying to put the Herbal B bifolios back into their original order. I suspect the nine sheets of parchment which contain Herbal B pages (8 bifolios and one foldout the equivalent size of two bifolios) originally composed 3 quires: 2 of the standard 4-bifolio / 8-folio / 16-page quires, and then the 8-page foldout (now f94~95) either by itself, or with two additional bifolios which have since been lost. Whether these 3 quires composed 1, 2, or 3 books is not yet clear to me. What I'm doing is printing out a thumbnail image of each Herbal B page, and pasting these onto pieces of cardstock folded down the middle, to model each of the Herbal B bifolios. Then I plan on laying them out on a table in front of me, rearranging them and playing around with them, looking for clear thematic similarities or a clear progression of images, before stapling them together into proposed quires.
I don't think there are many different kinds of plants pictured in Herbal B. Although there is a great variety of leaf and root shapes, there is a strange but unmistakable similarity to most of the plants that appear alongside Currier B text. At first glance, I'm seeing the complete life cycle of a single, highly fantastical type of plant. But I'm seeing potentially another layer to this progression of plant images, in which they are humans and/or animals in a story, with the arrangement of their parts, the shapes of their leaves and roots, and the apparent stage of the plant's life cycle standing for the attributes or actions of the story characters. Or something like this.
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Koen G - 16-12-2020
A very interesting project. Though my experience with trying to rearrange Q13 is that the number of possibilities will soon make your head spin. Making your own toy bifolios does help a lot, but then still...
Do you have any idea to get you started? Like what might/should be the first page?
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - RenegadeHealer - 16-12-2020
(16-12-2020, 07:45 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.A very interesting project. Though my experience with trying to rearrange Q13 is that the number of possibilities will soon make your head spin. Making your own toy bifolios does help a lot, but then still...
Do you have any idea to get you started? Like what might/should be the first page?
Coming from one of the first people I've seen actually make some coherent sense of Q13 (Linda S and Wladimir D being the only other two that come to mind), your humility is commendable, Koen.
What got me started was the observation that the highly interesting You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. occupy the left and right halves, respectively, of one bifolio. And on the reverse of this sheet of parchment is two ordinary Herbal B images. This got me thinking of one of two possibilities:
- f57v and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. comprised the centerfold of a quire, and were meant to be viewed together. A diagram and a table, respectively, with related information.
- This sheet was originally turned over, with You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. comprising the front cover to a quire, and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. the back cover, with a sequence of (probably 3) entirely Herbal B bifolios in between. This would give a total of 14 plant images in this little book (or 12 if one of the bifolios was the f58~f65 one, which is tantalizing but problematic), with You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. as the first and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. as the last. My question to myself is, is there a way that three Herbal B bifolios could be turned and stacked inside f57~f66, such that a logical succession of plant images would reveal itself to someone turning the pages?
Let's see how far this takes me. I'm fully expecting to come out of it only more mystified than ever, but it sure is fun!
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Searcher - 16-12-2020
(21-02-2020, 11:13 AM)Aga Tentakulus Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.it looks like the paint was applied after the binding, but the text and the drawing are applied before.
The sequence of the different consistencies of the inks is not right for the complexion.
It is the sequence. light light dark light light dark.
So dark is a different sheet than light.
Some time ago I spent a lot of time comparing every bifolio and came to conclusion that almost all colors were put before binding, excluding a few cases (especially it concerns the blue paint). In You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. I expressed my opinion more or less in detail. Maybe, some points of my view had been changed with time, but I'm pretty sure that in general the most part of bifolios was colored in the unbond state. You can note that green and brown colors, i. e., their shades, differ on almost all the pages sides of the bifolios, but they are the same on the same side of a bifolio, i.e., f...r and f...v of a bifolio. I think it also can concern yellow in the most cases. In the mentioned post I shew a few examples of the bifolio sides, so you can see for yourself.
I hope this information will be useful for you.
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Searcher - 16-12-2020
P.S. The above concerns A and B either.
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Koen G - 24-04-2021
I dug a little deeper into the question of Herbal A vs B images, illustrating previous remarks by Sam G and Oocephalus.
By just learning a few exceptions and two rules, an inexperienced person can separate all Herbal A vs Herbal B bifolios based on images alone.
I will just link to the blog since some of the images I included are quire large:
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - Anton - 24-04-2021
Quote:I don’t know how to explain these observations about the Herbal section.
I guess these observations can be interpreted in a straightforward fashion. For the dividing line in the stem, it's just a stylistic difference. The A scribe (or the artist who worked together with the A scribe) had the habit of separating stems with a line. He was also in habit of colour annotations, while the B scribe was not.
The B scribe was short of red paint, as opposed to the A scribe.
The latter observation is important, because it shows that the scribes worked separately from one another, that is - not at the same location.
RE: Do Herbal A and Herbal B correspond to differences in imagery? - MichelleL11 - 25-04-2021
(24-04-2021, 11:14 PM)Anton Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[The B scribe was short of red paint, as opposed to the A scribe.
The latter observation is important, because it shows that the scribes worked separately from one another, that is - not at the same location.
As much as I would greatly enjoy being able to make any kind of conclusion like this about the VM production, I have to disagree that this is what naturally follows from Currier A pages having a fair amount of red paint and Currier B pages having little to no red paint. Different locations (with differing red paint availability) is certainly a possibility -- but it is one of many.
Other possibilities than "separate working locations (e.g. "red paint only in one location theory"):
1. All painters involved worked in the same location, but there was only so much red paint and it was all gone by the time Currier B pages were done (perhaps the bottle got knocked over?) -- and no more was available and/or the project had run out of funding such there was no more money to buy more (e.g. "red paint amount or funding limiting" theory).
2. The painter for Currier A loved the color red or the painter for Currier B pages didn't like red (e.g. "painter prerogative theory", if more than one painter -- keyed to Currier A and B) or the same painter became "disenchanted" with the red paint over the course of the project (if A truly came before B).
3. Plants actually having red leaves, berries, roots were specially selected to be on the Currier A pages (for a possible variety of unknown reasons) ("Plants with actual red parts were purposely placed on Currier A pages" theory - maybe plants were produced in some sort of "favored" order by the painter and they really liked red?).
4. The use of the red hue has some sort of symbolism (e.g. are not reflective of any particular plant) that is more appropriate for the plants illustrated in Currier A (e.g. Currier A selectively illustrates those plants that treat blood/menstrual related issues, etc). Could also throw in the whole "red roses" thing, perhaps -- although I believe that is Lancaster rather than York . . .
5. Only one painter did all possible red (e.g. like the scribe "You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view." specialists, maybe "owned" the red paint) and that painter died, was imprisoned, left the project, etc. before getting to Currier B pages ("red painter unavailability theory"). Maybe the several possible unpainted-over "rot" or "r" symbols even in Currier A are the result of this?
Eh, that's enough -- understand, Anton -- I get what you're saying, but I just can't get on board with your conclusion as a necessity.