06-10-2016, 03:13 PM
My reasons for thinking it represents indigo relate to the fact that it occurs within a series of plant-bits (some of which I felt could be identified) and in the context of those ornate vessels which are not of European style. Also, directly below the block is a piece of material (in the general sense) which bears a label almost identical to that set against the block: which suggests some characteristic, common to both, defined them for the first person who made the imagery and labels.
I think it is vital to consider each item, and each detail, within the context provided by the particular folio and section and the information provided by the manuscript, overall. It helps prevent anachronism, anyway.
So that matter below the block - to cut a long story short - is depicted in a way which was meant to tell the reader that it refers to a particular use for cloth; that unusual edging was characteristic of certain eastern canopies and parasols. Since the ornate vessels also find their nearest counterpart in the Buddhist environment of the east, and indigo or saffron were the most commonly used colours, and medieval accounts of the marketing of indigo tell us that it was sold stitched into cloth packets (the buyer was allowed to make a small hole to check the contents), so altogether I concluded that the blue packet referred to indigo and the object below it a piece of indigo-dyed fabric, apparently labelled with a word whose first part is also the name of the block. The gold or yellow might, I suppose, refer to saffron, or to the very high value of true indigo. Or, indeed, the original might have been saffron and the cloth saffron coloured too. But they are blue now.
I can see no reason, myself, why the material below the block should be called "blue cheese cloth" - the cloths used to hang cheese do not ever seem to have been dyed. I suppose it might be a cloth intended to wrap or bind a book... but that doesn't make so much sense to me in the context where these images occur - or, indeed, in the historical context. But perhaps I need to read up a little on the history of cloth bindings.
D.
I think it is vital to consider each item, and each detail, within the context provided by the particular folio and section and the information provided by the manuscript, overall. It helps prevent anachronism, anyway.
So that matter below the block - to cut a long story short - is depicted in a way which was meant to tell the reader that it refers to a particular use for cloth; that unusual edging was characteristic of certain eastern canopies and parasols. Since the ornate vessels also find their nearest counterpart in the Buddhist environment of the east, and indigo or saffron were the most commonly used colours, and medieval accounts of the marketing of indigo tell us that it was sold stitched into cloth packets (the buyer was allowed to make a small hole to check the contents), so altogether I concluded that the blue packet referred to indigo and the object below it a piece of indigo-dyed fabric, apparently labelled with a word whose first part is also the name of the block. The gold or yellow might, I suppose, refer to saffron, or to the very high value of true indigo. Or, indeed, the original might have been saffron and the cloth saffron coloured too. But they are blue now.
I can see no reason, myself, why the material below the block should be called "blue cheese cloth" - the cloths used to hang cheese do not ever seem to have been dyed. I suppose it might be a cloth intended to wrap or bind a book... but that doesn't make so much sense to me in the context where these images occur - or, indeed, in the historical context. But perhaps I need to read up a little on the history of cloth bindings.
D.