RE: No text? A visual code!
R. Sale > 08-09-2023, 08:31 PM
Back to the visual code. The visual code is the use of attributes. The nymph on VMs White Aries has two different attributes: a red hat and a pattern of blue stripes. Both can be interpreted according to medieval heraldry.
During the VMs C-14 dates, ecclesiastical heraldry of the Catholic Church used the red galero to designate the rank of cardinal. While the definition of a galero is fairly strict, the actual, medieval depiction (as Wiki says) has more variation. It could be a pizza, but it's probably a cardinal's hat.
Knowledge of relevant historical information would provide an instant, interpretive shortcut, but failing that the investigation of the blue-striped patterns as armorial attributes is complicated by several issues. The first issue is the orientation of the stripes. There are two patterns on VMs White Aries with blue stripes. If orientation is determined when the relevant nymph is vertical, then one pattern has vertical stripes, and the other has diagonal stripes in the heraldic, 'bend sinister' direction. Alternatively, ignoring the radial influences, the patterns on the page are both oriented in the standard 'bend' direction.
The second issue is what is happening with the ink lines drawn between the alternate stripes with the blue paint. This can be described and potentially interpreted as tincture designation, but Petra Sancta is rather late. This becomes a quagmire, because it is an intentional quagmire. Systems of tincture designation were never combined. Such combination of systems is not allowed.
Another issue is the number of stripes in the pattern. Modern heraldry represents the bendy pattern as a bendy of six parts - alternating bands of two tinctures, starting with the primary and ending with the secondary. The counting of parts is a modern convention that did not apply back then. Additionally, the modern pattern divides the top line of the pattern into three parts which creates certain difficulties that are not present if the pattern uses a four-part division.
Then there is the problem of historical attribution. Does the pattern correspond to the heraldic insignia of some historical person or family? The critique is often raised, using these early, simple heraldic patterns, that one merely needs to look until a matching pattern is found. And while this is not absolutely valid, it does apply.
Given all these difficulties, is a potential identification possible? If there actually is a subtle pairing of patterns as raised in the first issue, then pairing is a potential clue. Eventually history must intrude, and here the historical record reveals the presence of two 13th century popes with the armorial insignia: bendy, argent et azur. This conforms to the proper orientation. It also conforms to a time when a pope's shield and insignia actual was an 'armorial' insignia. Whereas, several centuries after the VMs C-14 dates, all popes were given shields with insignia.
History tells us, these two popes from Genoa, were Pope Innocent IV (Sinibaldo Fieschi) and Adrian V (Ottobuono Fieschi), the nephew of Sinibaldo. Among the various historical details we find that Pope Innocent IV did institute the church tradition of the cardinal's red galero, and secondly, that Pope Innocent IV did install his nephew, Ottobouno, as cardinal in 1251. Is this the event represented by these to nymphs on VMs White Aries?
Is this a valid interpretation? There is both the 'presence' and the color of the attributes, but is there anything else? In the medieval system of celestial diagrams, outer circles or spheres are considered superior to the inner circles. In the church hierarchy, popes are superior to cardinals. In the VMs diagram, the cardinal, with the red hat, is inferior to the representation of the pope.
Separately, in medieval heraldry, the upper right quadrant is considered superior. In the VMs both of the relevant nymphs are found in the "heraldic" upper right quadrant - because the orientation is determined from the perspective of the person behind the shield - looking forward.
Both of these structural constraints are fulfilled simultaneously. There's only one way to do that. That is the way it was drawn.
A third structural confirmation, to the extent that popes and cardinals have celestial associations, the animal depicted in the medallion of VMs White Aries is the only animal in the Zodiac sequence that is appropriate for celestial sacrifice. And, through a good bit of manipulation, it happens that this is the third medallion as well.
On the two preceding Zodiac pages, an obscure heraldic fur, corresponding in both sphere and quadrant with the blue-striped insignias, sets forth the structure of the final confirmation, which is the papelonny pun as an example of heraldic canting.
This is visual code - communication without written text.