12-07-2026, 08:59 PM
(25-04-2025, 06:02 PM)R. Sale wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.That's a good one. Clearly, the exception proves the rule. It is a woman with a crown holding two fish. Likewise, the VMs must be examined with the same level of detail.
Mermaids are half fish - from the waist down. Not from the knees down - like the VMs. The VMs is not a mermaid, it is something else. She is the mythical Melusine in her less dragon-like, more mermaid-like, Luxembourgian representation. The various Valois rulers of the VMs C-14 era claimed her as an ancestor [Jean de Berry, Philip the Good].
Also a Visconti married into the House of Valois if I recall correctly, an ancestress of Francis I. This would be another connection to France besides the fact that the artist was working under the International Gothic movement.