Influence of Parisian Sources

[Jorge_Stolfi]

The Oresme manuscript, as I understand it, was made in Paris, c. 1410, for the Valois Duke, Jean de Berry, an avid bibliophile. The proposed mythos that there were multiple replications is unfounded.

Why "mythos" and "unfounded"?  People routinely copied books that belonged to others.  I saw an estimate that only 10% of the manuscripts of that time have survived to this day.  The fraction must have been smaller for paper copies.  By Bayes's formula, if a copy of a book survived, the expected number that existed at the time is around 10 or more.

The second-best example is the later copy of de Metz, Harley 334.

Indeed I see three images on that book (f11r, f27r, f40v) with the same "inverted T-O map" as in the Oresme/Berry book (BNF Fr. 565) with a blue surround, but no cloud-band and no stars.

This seems to be You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. of Metz's Image du Monde  (BNF 2479?) It is a much mode modest copy, with fewer and simpler illustrations.  I can't see any T-O map or cloud-band; there are several diagrams that show the Earth, but as just a plain circle. That site says it is dated 1200-1300.  There is You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. copy, BNF Fr. 574. 

Based on these five minutes of palæographic research, I would say that the T-O map in BNF Fr. 565 and BNF Fr. 574 are not meant to describe the geography of the world, like the most common T-O maps in other books, but are an old French artistic convention  to illustrate the Biblical creation of the world per Genesis I 9-11:

9. And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. 10 God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good. 11 Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so.

Which is the theme of Metz's poem.  Furthermore, I would guess deduce that, in both BNF Fr. 565 and BNF Fr. 574 the diagram with the inverted T-O map with the surrounding elements were not defined by the authors (Metz, Oresme, Aristotle), but were just gratuitous decoration provided by the artists (possibly added one or twice by some early artist and then copied by others).

In the VMs cosmos, the artist has maintained the structure and decisively altered the appearance as much as possible. Disguise is part of the VMs puzzle. Disguise is not the result of incompetent bungling; it is the product of intentional deception.

Considering the VMS Scribe's work on other pages, I would say that "incompetence" is a much more plausible explanation than "cunning deception".

All the best, --stolfi