24-08-2016, 01:00 PM
(This post was last modified: 24-08-2016, 01:23 PM by Diane.
Edit Reason: clarity
)
Koen,
This comment could be a little off the strict topic of the Vms, but this image from El Djem is somewhat different. It combines elements usually seen as distinct: the child on the lion occurs in ancient Arabia. The figure with the wreath on his head is usually Dionysius. The one wearing a skin is usually Herakles. To find reference to all three in one figure is .. well.. not classical Greek myth.
This is an interesting discussion. All I would say is that one should be very slow to attribute any "individual expression" or "creativity" in the modern sense to images whose first enunciation is of unknown date, though over time their study has suggested increasingly that first enunciation is not contemporary with the manuscript's manufacture.
Because imagery is not just 'drawing pictures of something' but is a form of communication - as it was perceived by all peoples, across the world, before what is described as the invention of the 'artist' in the modern era - so the task of a reader who comes so much later is not (as it might be with a piece of modern art, or a child's drawing) to attempt to discern what the individual "meant" to draw, so much as to discern the visual language in which he or she naturally communicated with persons of that original place and time - leaving aside later efforts at 'translation', or re-working etc.
One very good place to begin is by considering the way human faces or anthropomorphic faces are represented; it is one of the classic hallmarks of culture, time and place.
It is then up to the reader to study and learn that visual language, just as one might have to study and learn the language of an older written text.
For us, the sign "X" might mark an important place, or signify poison, but in the visual language of the Voynich map, it signifies a respository of seed and of gold - in the region where that symbol appears on the map, the word for a site of that sort is also found as a common place-name. So sign, symbol, cast-of-mind, time, culture, spoken language and much more inform pre-modern imagery in the European cultures, and still inform imagery in others which have maintained longer traditions.
One of the most important images in the manuscript, in my opinion, is the one quite consistently ignored: what I have called "the bearded sun". It is not a male, bearded face, but a beardless one which I read as having been meant for a female sun, and then given a plainly artificial beard. There are relatively few known cultures and languages in which the sun was considered female or of mutable gender. There were fewer still which depicted a female creature with a false beard, and identified it with the sun - whether in an anthropomorphic guise or some other symbolic of the sun.
Here endeth the lesson.
This comment could be a little off the strict topic of the Vms, but this image from El Djem is somewhat different. It combines elements usually seen as distinct: the child on the lion occurs in ancient Arabia. The figure with the wreath on his head is usually Dionysius. The one wearing a skin is usually Herakles. To find reference to all three in one figure is .. well.. not classical Greek myth.
(19-08-2016, 10:14 AM)Sam G wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(19-08-2016, 09:52 AM)ReneZ wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(19-08-2016, 09:19 AM)Sam G wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I disagree that there is a meaningful distinction between identifying an image and understanding the intentions of the illustrator. Saying "this is an image of a feline animal" and "the illustrator intended this to be an image of a feline animal" are, in my view, functionally equivalent statements.
For me, the distinction is crucial.
The statement that an image looks like a certain animal (or plant) is the conclusion of the reader. It is made on the basis of the
experience of the reader. What is meant in the illustration is based on the experience of the artist / draughtsman, who lived
and worked 600 years ago.
Well, I probably could have phrased that a bit better, but what I mean is that to correctly identify an element in the VMS (or anywhere else) is basically equivalent to knowing what the illustrator intended. That's basically the thing we're trying to figure out.
For instance, when we ask "what plant is this?", we are essentially asking "what plant was the illustrator attempting to depict?" Obviously it's not easy or even possible to know this in many cases. And the plant may by chance resemble some other plant more than the one which was intended.
It's a complicated topic, especially when talking about images that (as I propose) have been modified by different people over generations of copying. I was basically addressing Marco's statement to the effect that attempting to understand the intentions of the illustrator is something that could only be known by recovering a direct written statement from the illustrator himself. It seems to me that understanding the intended purpose of the illustrations is one of the main reasons for studying them.
This is an interesting discussion. All I would say is that one should be very slow to attribute any "individual expression" or "creativity" in the modern sense to images whose first enunciation is of unknown date, though over time their study has suggested increasingly that first enunciation is not contemporary with the manuscript's manufacture.
Because imagery is not just 'drawing pictures of something' but is a form of communication - as it was perceived by all peoples, across the world, before what is described as the invention of the 'artist' in the modern era - so the task of a reader who comes so much later is not (as it might be with a piece of modern art, or a child's drawing) to attempt to discern what the individual "meant" to draw, so much as to discern the visual language in which he or she naturally communicated with persons of that original place and time - leaving aside later efforts at 'translation', or re-working etc.
One very good place to begin is by considering the way human faces or anthropomorphic faces are represented; it is one of the classic hallmarks of culture, time and place.
It is then up to the reader to study and learn that visual language, just as one might have to study and learn the language of an older written text.
For us, the sign "X" might mark an important place, or signify poison, but in the visual language of the Voynich map, it signifies a respository of seed and of gold - in the region where that symbol appears on the map, the word for a site of that sort is also found as a common place-name. So sign, symbol, cast-of-mind, time, culture, spoken language and much more inform pre-modern imagery in the European cultures, and still inform imagery in others which have maintained longer traditions.
One of the most important images in the manuscript, in my opinion, is the one quite consistently ignored: what I have called "the bearded sun". It is not a male, bearded face, but a beardless one which I read as having been meant for a female sun, and then given a plainly artificial beard. There are relatively few known cultures and languages in which the sun was considered female or of mutable gender. There were fewer still which depicted a female creature with a false beard, and identified it with the sun - whether in an anthropomorphic guise or some other symbolic of the sun.
Here endeth the lesson.