Anton - shouldn't you begin by demonstrating that what we see in this folio looks like either (a) a bear's foot or (b) a representation of Hellebore in some text or other?
Subjective interpretation of the detail at the head may well lead to a wrong id, but then if only that (possibly quite wrong) id is the main spring to how you decide to interpret what you see at the 'foot', then what you have is a circular self-supporting (but otherwise unsupported) argument which - were an argument of similar sort proferred about the text's written part - you yourself would never countenance for a moment.
I will say that the way you simply assert that the form taken by the root is meant to refer to the scorpion (no qualifications, no hint of guessing included as you say that) was done with such elan; with such devil-may-care insouciance, that it really (honestly) brought a happy grin to my own fact, too. It's so nice to see people enjoying work of this sort, that even though you are surely mistaken, it hardly seems to matter.
In fact, I'm going to see if I can provide you with some circumstantial evidence: a picture - no matter whether ancient, modern, literal, or purely imaginative - which shows a noticeably hairy scorpion, with no sting to its tail, no head, no legs and no claws, with a thorax formed in five segments of descending size and a ring of white material clearly separating each. Wish me luck
Subjective interpretation of the detail at the head may well lead to a wrong id, but then if only that (possibly quite wrong) id is the main spring to how you decide to interpret what you see at the 'foot', then what you have is a circular self-supporting (but otherwise unsupported) argument which - were an argument of similar sort proferred about the text's written part - you yourself would never countenance for a moment.
I will say that the way you simply assert that the form taken by the root is meant to refer to the scorpion (no qualifications, no hint of guessing included as you say that) was done with such elan; with such devil-may-care insouciance, that it really (honestly) brought a happy grin to my own fact, too. It's so nice to see people enjoying work of this sort, that even though you are surely mistaken, it hardly seems to matter.
In fact, I'm going to see if I can provide you with some circumstantial evidence: a picture - no matter whether ancient, modern, literal, or purely imaginative - which shows a noticeably hairy scorpion, with no sting to its tail, no head, no legs and no claws, with a thorax formed in five segments of descending size and a ring of white material clearly separating each. Wish me luck