(24-08-2017, 01:42 AM)Ruby Novacna Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I thought it was an artificial or semi-artificial seawall.
Terracing happened frequently in medieval times (building stone jetties was common, also). Terracing so that grape vines or rice could grow on slopes was a common practice.
Terracing also happened on paths. Everything was by foot (whether animal or human). Many paths weren't wide enough for a cart. Paths that were used frequently were even worn down through stone.
Terracing could create layers or loops, depending on whether the object was to flatten steep areas (for farming) or to climb them.
Because the VMS has a limited palette, it's hard to tell where water ends and blue is used to mean other things. The bottom-left rosette looks like it might be rivers or rivulets, the top-right one may have waves, but blue might mean something else in the three center rosettes (from top to bottom), so it's difficult to know whether the blue that is at the base of the dune-like shapes is meant to represent water or some other texture (like stone).
In the center rosette, blue is used on a cloud band, which variously represents air or sky or divinity or the division between us and stars or imagined sky dwellers or spirits. Based on how they used and combined cloud bands with other things, it doesn't appear as though they expressly associated cloud bands with water (condensation—as in real clouds) as much as with something more like air or spirit or a "force-field" or invisible fence.
The blue semi-circular bumps under the dune-like shapes look very regular, as though they were stacked like building stones, so I would be hesitant to assume they were water, even if there's water by the rosette to the right of them. So it may be natural or artificial terraces (they were common), but not necessarily above water, unless.... each rosette is perhaps a different "snapshot" or viewpoint of the same place and the blue is symbolic of water in an abstract way. I suppose that might be possible. But it's also possible that each rosette represents something fairly distant from the others. If they are real topological features, and not metaphysical ones, there might be miles between them.
I would be cautious about assuming blue is water unless the shapes of the lines themselves add support.
So, maybe not a sea wall, but quite possibly an artificial (or semi-artificial) wall.
I've been assuming, at least for the time being, that they are escarpments carved or created out of some softer material... dirt, sand, sandstone, which might be shaped that way due to wind or erosion. The part under the dune-shapes looks more artificial to me than the dune-shapes themselves.