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Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

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• Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Jorge_Stolfi > 20-11-2025, 10:37 PM

  (20-11-2025, 10:22 PM)rikforto Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I always hesitate to say anything looks like anything in the manuscript, but the proposed nebulae look fairly convincingly like nebulae to me. I'm not sure how much closer that gets me to seeing the beast a certain way, though

  
  So those nebuly lines too are a common idiom in Medieval graphical language, like dragons and roots shaped like women.  I mean, the VMS scribe did not invent that style of lines himself.  
  
  Could those nebuly lines be used to constrain the location where the scribe worked (or came from),
  like the merlons and dresses did?
  
  The pool at the bottom of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (Bio) also has a nebuly edge, which departs from its supposed meaning of "cloud".  However, that discrepancy may be spurious, because that edge [theory censored to protect allergic researchers].
  
  A nebuly line also appears as the edge of the "galaxy core" on page f68v3.  That part of the diagram is incongruous since the stars say it is sky, while the double outline says it is a sunken pool of water.  And neither would be a cloud.  However, that discrepancy too may be spurious, because, there too, [theory censored to protect allergic researchers].
  
  All the best, --stolfi

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Koen G > 20-11-2025, 11:01 PM

  There's a big old thread about cloudbands here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
  
  Most often they function as a boundary between the heavenly and the earthly realm. But they can also be clouds. Sometimes water, sometimes fabric. 
  
  For the way they are used with the critter, I would expect it to be imagined up in the sky, or in a higher realm of sorts.
  
  (Notice how Q13 uses this pattern at the top of pages).

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Jorge_Stolfi > 21-11-2025, 12:39 AM

  I browsed thorugh that thread.  What I got out of it is 
  
  1) The wolkenband in Medieval imagery is a "hieroglyph": readers are not supposed to see it as the edge of a cloud or cloud bank, because it does not look at all like one.  They are supposed to know that this weird wavy line is the standard symbol for "edge of clouds" -- and, metaphorically, for the boundary between Heavens and the Earthly Domains or whatever.   Like "$" does not look at all like money, but people are supposed to know that it stands for money.
  
  2) There are two types of wolkenband: the "first-order" one looks like R.Sale's "nebuly" lines. The "second-order" one is a nebuly line with small teeth, bent around in the shape of a nebuly with larger teeth.
  
  3) In the best manuscripts, both are rendered with graded shading or hatching so as to suggest a specific three-dimensional shape that looks sort of like a ruff (frilled collar) seen edge on.
  
  The supposed "wolkenbands" of the VMS are the simplest possible: first-order (simple nebuly lines) rendered as flat curves.  There are two exceptions on the six-panel fold-out, in the central and east rosettes, where we see what look like attempts to draw second-order wolkenbands with hints of the 3D shading.   Are there other examples?
  
  Moreover, in the Bio section, the things delimited by wolkenbands are often drawn as if they were canopies or pools, with the water pooling on top and dripping along the edges, instead of raining from the underside.   On the NW corner of f79v, for instance, the "cloud" has lines radiating from a central "doorknob". 
  
  Puzzling, as usual...
  
  All the best, --stolfi

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  R. Sale > 21-11-2025, 02:43 AM

  @rikforto Post #170
  
  Nice examples. If the cosmic boundary interpretation of the nebuly line is accepted, then the question is what type of animal would have been associated with a cosmic boundary? Possibilities would include the Agnus Dei or animals from the zodiac. The differentiation here is based on the third part of the critter diagram, the short vertical strokes under the nebuly lines. These match with the Agnus Dei interpretation but make no sense with zodiac animals.
  
  
  The definition of a nebuly line states that the crests and troughs are *bulbous*, but there are different ways to do bulbous. The heraldic version is usually a simple, smooth, curved line. Some naughty bulbs will bifurcate or trifurcate. Then there are the scallop-shell patterns, bumpy on the extremities, but smooth on the sides Then there is the variation that is bumpy on the extremities and on the sides, like the VMs central rosette. There are also hybrid examples in circles that have elaborate bulbs on the outside and plain bulbs on the inside (center right rosette). The leaf margins in the VMs botanical section show a great deal of variety.

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Antonio García Jiménez > 21-11-2025, 09:00 AM

  I don't think it depicts any animal. It's just an optical illusion. Whatever it is, it has to be consistent with what's drawn on the page.
  
  It seems we agree on the meaning of the wavy or nebulous line (let's not get bogged down in the terminology). The important thing is to understand its meaning clearly. It has nothing to do with clouds but with the boundary of the medieval cosmos, that is, the sphere of the stars. I think we've all seen manuscripts where God appears behind that curved line that separates his kingdom from the world he created.
  
    The drawing that looks like an animal is right on that curved line, so it's easy to infer that it's related to it, that they're one and the same. I already said in a previous post that for me it's just an attempt to trace the sphere of the stars. Only one hemisphere is drawn to suggest it.

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  ReneZ > 21-11-2025, 09:29 AM

  I once had a brief exchange with the zoologist who supported the Tucker, Talbert & Jannick proposal of a meso-american origin of the MS. I can't remember her name now.
  
  She supported the identification of an armadillo due to its curling posture. So I pointed out that only one type of armadillo can curl up into a ball, and does this in a split second, so you actually never see it partially rolled up. That is a very small type of armadillo which does not live in Mexico. (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)
  She then said that they can curl up a little in their sleep, like most animals.
  
  It has also been pointed out in this forum that this cannot be a ram, as rams cannot curl their backs.
  
  I'm just thinking that one can still draw a ram with a curled back, just like in many bestiaries crocodiles have a loop in their tail, which real crocs cannot do, I believe.

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Philipp Harland > 21-11-2025, 09:34 AM

  ^ Hernan Cortes' arrival in Aztec-era Mesoamerica postdates the completion of the VMS by 40 years or so. I'd throw it in the rubbish bin by that alone.

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Jorge_Stolfi > 21-11-2025, 10:12 AM

  (21-11-2025, 09:29 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.She supported the identification of an armadillo due to its curling posture. So I pointed out that only one type of armadillo can curl up into a ball, and does this in a split second, so you actually never see it partially rolled up.

  
  Ahem, pangolins can curl up too... You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
  
  And both pangolins and armadillos normally walk hunched up, with the head close to the ground.
  
  All the best, --stolfi
  

  ---

  (21-11-2025, 09:34 AM)Philipp Harland Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.^ Hernan Cortes' arrival in Aztec-era Mesoamerica postdates the completion of the VMS by 40 years or so. I'd throw it in the rubbish bin by that alone.

  
  You got the date off by 100 years or so.

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Antonio García Jiménez > 21-11-2025, 11:22 AM

  I don't think any animal is depicted, but I'm going to assume, as René says, that it's a ram. Then, given that it's on an element representing the boundary of the cosmos, the only possible conclusion is that it's the sign of Aries. Anything else wouldn't make sense.
  
    We are therefore on an astrological page, which would not be unusual at all since I believe that the whole book has an astrological meaning.

• RE: Dragons, Dogs & Amadillos?

  Koen G > 21-11-2025, 12:16 PM

  (21-11-2025, 11:22 AM)Antonio García Jiménez Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I don't think any animal is depicted, but I'm going to assume, as René says, that it's a ram. Then, given that it's on an element representing the boundary of the cosmos, the only possible conclusion is that it's the sign of Aries.

  
  I've always been skeptical of that view, since I tended to see the lines as scales. But I was surprised to see that manuscript-internally, they are best explained as a somewhat compressed version of the pattern the manuscript uses to indicate (thick?) fur. It just took me some time to "unsee" the scales.
  
  I'm not sure if we should just default to "ram" now though. It's an option, but there are some differences with the Zodiac section's Aries. For example, the Voynich artist seems to have been aware of the fact that rams have a two-part hoof, while the mystery creature has... well, I guess it depends which foot you look at. The rear one almost looks like a paw with four claws. But the next one looks like it has two parts, and the front one maybe three?
  
  Given the cloud band, it could be a constellation, as is demonstrated by the use of the motif in the Tübinger Hausbuch discussed throughout this thread. But the iconography of the animal would deviate quite a bit from what we'd expect of Aries.
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