17-07-2022, 03:12 AM
(15-07-2022, 04:32 PM)Helmut Winkler wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[quote="Helmut Winkler" pid='51238' dateline='1657898444']
[quote="Koen G" pid='51233' dateline='1657874168']
Rene: do you know of any other example of a foldout that unfolds in two dimensions, like the Rosettes?
It is not just the fact of a large fold out that I found surprising on first impressions of the VMs. I had seen a few fold outs in other (somewhat) later works, but none so arresting. What is this, I thought, a map? A herbal with a map as a feature? That struck me as both surprising and important.
It led me to the conclusion (to which I still hold) that what is depicted is a herb gathering tradition, not a herb growing tradition and not an urban apothecary tradition. There are no horticultural depictions in the work, nor even any signs of sickness and disease (with perhaps one exception in marginalia). The map is remarkable because it contextualises the herbs and the rest to a particular geography. I think that sets it apart from your garden-variety medieval herbal from the outset.
As I read it, the map makes it a work about a herb gathering tradition, and I don't know another work like it in that respect. It helps explain the complete lack of correlates between herb, astrology and the human body. It is conspicuously not a directly medical work: it is about the location, collecting, storage and preparation of herbs, herb gatherers, not herbal-ists. It's an important difference made plain by the map which seems intended, I think, to be a key to the whole work.
(For various reasons, I identify the map with the Ladin territories around the Rosengarten mountains in the Dolomites, alpine northern Italy.)