[Nymph Philosophy] Why the nude female form?

[-JKP-]

The first time I looked through the VMS, I thought "Pagan". Pagan society was very much inclined toward goddess worship, as was much of early Christian society. Worship of Mary the Virgin (which is stronger in some areas than others) is said by quite a number of historians to be a transitional effect of Pagan-to-Christian beliefs. There were still quite a few Pagan pockets in medieval times. In fact, there are recorded exoduses of people from regions where Christianity was being enforced because they didn't want to give up their existing beliefs.


I still often wonder if it is Pagan, but for slightly different reasons. The emphasis on Pagan-like illustrations might be because there is Pagan-era content (Greco-Roman), rather than reflecting the beliefs of whoever created the VMS, but over the years, I began to to lean toward viewing the nymphs not as human, but as overseers and explainers.

And then I had to re-consider my views again because Koen's discussions about the Arma Christi opened up a whole new can of worms that I had only barely explored (I had looked pretty extensively into Agnus Dei, but not much else), and then I realized more and more that souls, sprites, bathers, in other words, certain "classes" of humanoids in medieval illustrations, were typically drawn nude to show their status, either in terms of what they were or what they were doing.