Re: VMs: Pleiades Occultation Further Date Refinement

[Pamela Richards <spirlhelix@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi, Dennis

Here's some information from a webpage about
Hildegard:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/med/hildegarde.html

<<It is now generally agreed that Hildegard suffered
from migraine, and that her visions were a result of
this condition. The way she describes her visions, the
precursors, to visions, to debilitating aftereffects,
point to classic symptoms of migraine sufferers.
Although a number of visual hallucinations may occur,
the more common ones described are the "scotomata"
which often follow perceptions of phosphenes in the
visual field. Scintillating scotomata are also
associated with areas of total blindness in the visual
field, something Hildegard might have been describing
when she spoke of points of intense light, and also
the "extinguished stars." Migraine attacks are usually
followed by sickness, paralysis, blindness-all
reported by Hildegard, and when they pass, by a period
of rebound and feeling better than before, a euphoria
also described by her.>> 

With all due respect, although I personally hold the
highest regard for Dr. Sachs and believe he is a
brilliant man who no doubt would be hesitant to
diagnose a woman dead for over a thousand years
without very good evidence, I also believe there are
conditions which make such a diagnosis in the case of
the VMs author premature.

Migraine and its symptoms are all subjective
phenomena.  Evidently the reason that an eminent
neurologist like Dr. Sachs is able to make a claim
about Hildegard's condition and her works is because
she shared in detail her subjective experiences
(visions, illness, etc.) in her writing.

In the case of the VMs, we have no such evidence
before us--we cannot speak with such certainty about
the origin of these drawings unless we know the VMs'
contents, the author's intent in writing and its
provenance in detail, along with a few other factors
like the state of the author's health--and have in
hand a description of the subjective experience which
led to these drawings.

In addition (speaking of subjective experience), I
find the leap from the "extinguished stars" of
scotomata to an assumption that the artist would be
inspired to record groupings of stars as the result of
a visual migraine to be unfounded.  I'm a trained
artist, I experience migraines, and my subjective
experience has been that I have never felt impelled to
draw pictures of my visual migraines.  I'm usually
rather sick and can't even stand light in my good eye.
 The other eye, which has experienced the scotomata,
is temporarily blinded.  My visual memory of the
phenomena, if I look back upon it, is that it
constantly changes.  I see no points of light which
remain in my mind as a grouping of stars.  These are
very poor conditions drawing groups of stars, or
anything else.

In addition, in my adult years since being diagnosed
with visual migraines, I have carried out a number of
artistic subjects which do not resemble migraines, and
I although I don't imagine Dr. Sachs or other eminent
experts would be interested in them, I suggest they
would never know from viewing them that I am a
migraine sufferer.  Like many artists, I attempt to
see things as others view them in order to convey them
in a way that can be "read" by the viewer.
Temporary aberrations like visual migraines are not
helpful to my intention.

I would like very much to have enough information
about the provenance of the VMs, its content and its
intent to make a clear statement about the author's
health conditions.  Let's hasten the day.

Warmly,

Pam






--- Dennis <tsalagi@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> jan wrote:
> 
> >>	The visions of Hildegard of Bingen are now widely
> believed 
> >>to have been inspired by migrainous imagery.  
> > 
> > She may as well had migraine - why not? - but I
> bet there was a number of 
> > painters who put stars  on their pictures without
> having migraine. How we 
> > then recognizes which stars are only artistic
> license and which are  
> > "migraine dependent"?
> >  Of course there are other symptoms of migraine
> effects discussed in the article
> > you listed. 
> 
> 	That is how we know, of course.  Her biography
> suggests she 
> had migraine, and other migrainous images, such as
> scotomata 
> and fortification spectra, can be found in her art. 
> I 
> believe they can be found in the VMs as well.
> 
> > Why don't   you carry  on the study a  let us know
> - after all it should
> >  show in other  parts of the VM, as probably K+C
> noticed. 
> 
> 	I am doing that.  Kennedy and Churchill noticed a
> lot of 
> things.   I have noticed some others.
> 
> > Of course, visions can be 
> >  caused also by other  factors: head or eye
> injury, schizophrenia or other mental 
> >  sickness,  drugs and last but not least those
> coming directly from  
> >  Heaven :-).
> 
> 	Yes.  Oliver Sacks, a famous neurologist who wrote 
> *Migraine*, a standard reference, noted that
> scotomata are 
> almost exclusively found in migraine as I recall. 
> We must 
> also do as doctors do, and look for several factors
> to 
> decide on a diagnosis.
> 
> 	I fully agree; we would need to see several things.
>  As 
> always, we need to be careful.  After all, Rugg
> looked at 
> several things as well.
> 
> 	I do not mean to say that there is nothing to the
> VMs but 
> migraine aura images.     No one says that about
> Hildegard 
> of Bingen, after all.  It might simply be a useful 
> hypothesis.  Anything definite at all helps us with
> the VMs.
> 
> >>	This is just my point.  Most of the star patterns
> in the 
> >>VMs don't seem to follow any "constellation", they
> are just 
> >>random collections.  This would suggest that they
> were 
> >>inspired by something besides real or mythic
> celestial images.
> > 
> > Not necessarily - the inaccuracy for instance. As
> for randomness, 
> > even that needs to be proven. As for inspiration -
> true, but almost
> > anything  will do. 
> 
> 	These points are well taken.  However, I have heard
> very 
> little mention of definite constellations to be
> found in the 
> VMs.  The Pleiades are about the only instance I can
> think 
> of - all of which suggests that there is usually no
> such 
> pattern involved.
> 
> >>	No, I think the 'Pleiades' could be an exception.
> > 
> > Well, why exception? The author momentarily had no
> migraine? 
> > And if one exception, why not more of those?
> 
> 	See above.    One certainly doesn't expect
> consistency in 
> an artwork.
> 
> 	In another post, you asked 'So what?' to the
> migraine 
> hypothesis.   To me that would make it more likely
> that the 
> VMs is the work of just one person.   We might
> expect some 
> of the plants to be known migraine remedies.  We
> might wish 
> to investigate Renaissance-era thinking about
> migraine or 
> headaches.  Words relating to migraine could be
> cribs - just 
> as the Pleiades hypothesis could provide us with
> cribs.   We 
> might wish to study migraine art further.  Migraine
> art is a 
> genre; just do a search on 'migraine art'.   There
> could be 
> other implications, and I am still thinking about
> that.
> 
> Dennis
> 
>
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=====
"I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing, than to teach ten thousand stars how not to dance."


		
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