Re: VMs: Fish (was What's Missing or Different?)

[<elillie@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello all.

Dana Scott wrote:
>
> The nymph in the mouth of the 'fish' in f79v might represent melusine
> (mermaid/siren).>
> http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix/dagon4.jpg<http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix/dagon4.jpg>
> http://imaginez.net.free.fr/illustrations/origines/occident/melusine1.jpg<http://imaginez.net.free.fr/illustrations/origines/occident/melusine1.jpg>
> http://regorm.free.fr/expo/couverture.jpg<http://regorm.free.fr/expo/couverture.jpg>>
> The scene in the pool at the bottom of f79v reminds me of Jason and the
> Argonauts. Melusine represents the Sirens.  The Salamander> distinguishes itself as a poisonous creature (possibly representing a
> dragon). There appears to be a Golden Fleece at the right end of the
> pool.  There appears to be a horse or possibly Unicorn in this scene,
> confronted by possibly a dog or dragon.  All of this is probably just a
> wild imagination on my part.  Notice that there is a hint of similarity
> between the maiden in the fish here and the two nymphs below the first
> 'paragraph' in f83v who are interacting in some fashion with what I
> believe to be opium pods.  There are, of course other references to
> bodies in fish, including Jonah and Vishnu.>

Just adding my 2 cents.

In my paper linking the VMs to Dante's Divine Comedy, I identified the
scene at the bottom of folio 79V as illustrating the dream of Dante while
on the 4th cornice of Purgatory (Purgatory -- Canto 19). The nymph with
the fish body is the Siren/Lilith who comes to him in his dreams while the
salamander nearby represents evil and destruction. Some alchemy text
illustrations also depict a similar Siren and salamander together.

Salamanders were widely believed to be evil, poisonous creatures in
medieval times. The painting, "The Fall of Man" by Hugo van der Goes
depicts Satan as a salamander and not a serpent:
http://cgfa.sunsite.dk/g/p-goes3.htm



The animals shown to the right side of the folio are the Three Beasts of
Worldliness; The Leopard of Malice and Fraud, The Lion of Violence and
Ambition, and The She-Wolf of Incontinence.

Erni



______________________________________________________________________
To unsubscribe, send mail to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxx with a body saying:
unsubscribe vms-list