RE: Two factor verification
R. Sale > 07-08-2020, 07:06 PM
In the best VMs tradition of the old oak and ivy combination, the use of combined illustration has long held historical investigators of the VMs at bay, even those of us who go back to prior years. Unlike the oak and ivy, which can be compared to botanical samples, other illustrative combinations rely on historical and artistic elements and on the recollection of tradition. Well, you can scratch that last one right off. The linguists don't look for medieval, artistic tradition. The botanists don't look at tradition. Tradition got left in the dust.
The VMs cosmos is one of the more significant illustrations, if both parts of the combined illustration can be identified. Zero factors yield nothing. One factor goes half way. Two factor verification, identifying both parts of the combination, provides a full explanation. Well, it sounds good. Actually the purpose is to create confusion, to generate ambiguity. The purpose is not to expose, but to disguise, to obfuscate - to imitate, but clearly not to copy. The clues might be hidden, but they cannot be omitted altogether. The VMs cosmos, as a cosmic combination, is the primary example that shows a variety of methods by which appearance can be distinctively altered within a particular structural framework, as exemplified in specific historical illustrations from Oresme and de Metz and Shirakatsi.
This is the lesson of the VMs cosmos. This level of trickery, this level of sophisticated alteration and disguise is what should be expected by VMs researchers. Much has been done in many examples to diminish the possibility of reliance on visual appearance. That creates a problematic situation where form, structure, position, color must be used for identification. Each part poses a problem - to discover the inner reality beneath superficial appearance, to find accord with tradition. Does an alteration of direction constitute an alternate and rejected comparison or does it show the flip-side of the same object? Must pairings consist of similar items rather than complementary opposites? Where might one find a lost tradition?
Taking the VMs cosmos as a combination of two historical factors forged together also indicates a crossing of paths in regard to the historical provenance of each factor - a story of potential opportunity.