RE: VMs (f80v) critter identified
Linda > 26-07-2019, 08:12 PM
Koen, possibly if they were trying to save Christian imagery from being destroyed then they might hide it. The Ottomans were already travelling down the Danube before the time of the vms carbon dating, the Ottoman Venetian wars started in 1396.
JKP, i see the loges and rainbows in quire 13 as cartographic in nature, as marshes or shoreline and river systems respectively. If you remove the nymphs, it all seems far more geographical than Christian in its imagery. If you keep the nymphs and remove the other imagery it still doesn't seem Christian. I see the nymphs not as angels but as standing for the history of human habitation in their respective locations, ie more earthly than heavenly, and yet probably much of this history speaks of those no longer alive at the time, so in that sense somewhat spiritlike. If the dead become angels then yes maybe angels. Given that the zodiac nymphs hold stars, i see the nymphs not as stars themselves, but perhaps locations with which those stars are aligned. As Koen stated in a comment on his blog recently, "they appear to communicate what they must through pose, attributes, and relative location".
R. Sale, the Agnus dei/golden fleece aspect of the creature does call to me, it had once been my preferred identification but now i feel it really looks more goatlike than sheeplike. However they may both be indicated, in my interpretation the ibex and the lamb would stand for the mountain and the valley, the yin and the yang, and so i carry it along with the ibex to stand for the entire northern Italian region as we know it today, since of course the alps do not simply stand alone but are integrated with the rest of the geography around it. The version of the sixth seal that you have seen your structure in seems to stand pretty much alone in using that particular structure, and i find that somewhat compelling, its age, and the familial connections with its owner fit in with other political happenings of the time that could be referenced in its inclusion within the imagery. I find it coincidental that the sixth seal is all about earthquakes and other apocalyptic happenings, including kings and men hiding in the mountains, i know it isn't part of the structure you are concerned with, but it fits in with mine.