A 15th-century Alchemical image which includes 4 TdM atouts - all in one

Astraea

This is fascinating, Kenji. Thank you for sharing these images. So nice to see you!
 

kenji

This is fascinating, Kenji. Thank you for sharing these images. So nice to see you!

Wow Astraea, how have you been? Thanks and I am glad to see you here again!:)
 

Astraea

Wow Astraea, how have you been? Thanks and I am glad to see you here again!:)
I've been just fine, Kenji, and I hope the same is true of you! :)
 

Yoav Ben-Dov

fascinating. thank you Kenji. i wonder what was the meaning of these compositions.. but it surely reinforces the link between Tarot and Alchemical symbolism
 

kenji

Description of the alchemical image in question

The following is a quote from Ms Mary E. D'Imperio's 'The Voynich Manuscript: An Elegant Enigma'.
https://www.nsa.gov/about/_files/cryptologic_heritage/publications/misc/voynich_manuscript.pdf

The other figure has elements resembling some of those in the folios showing nude human figures in tubs of liquid. A cloud-like form at the top, from which conventionalized rays emanate, represents God; immediately below, the figure of a man or angel breathes into the mouth of a bulbous alchemical vessel; his breath is clearly indicated in exactly the way that the vapors or liquids are shown passing through the elaborate "plumbing" on the Voynich manuscript folios.On the vessel are a sun (with a face) above and within a crescent moon; from each of these, vapors or emanations are shown descending through the vessel. The round bottom of the vessel is provided with seven spouts, spaced around its curved circumference, and the vapor emerges from all of these and trickles down over two nude, plump human figures locking arms and holding hands; these figures, while better drawn than the Voynich manuscript nudes, are short-legged and "hippy", with fat tummies, in a very similar style. Two dragons standing on their heads and a toad complete the composition. The style of the seven spouts on the vessel is so close to that of similar spouts and vents on the pipe-like forms in the manuscripts as to be almost indistinguishable, and the symbolic use of conventionalized forms to create a new synthetic whole with a complex meaning also seems closely akin to the methods of the Voynich manuscript's scribe or scribes. While these drawings are identified only as "anonymous" in Ashomole's collection, I have discovered some highly similar figures in other works where they are associated with the writings of George Ripley, a fifteenth-century alchemist who produced numerous treatises with a strong Christian flavor (Philalethes 1678, Ripley 1591, 1756). De Rola (1973, figure 64) shows a figure similar to the second described above, citing its source as De Erroribus, by John Dastin (British Museum, Egerton 845, folio 17v).



The version in Ashmole's book, which Ms D'Imperio refers to:

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And from 'The Voynich Manuscript':

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kenji

Black toad as an important alchemical symbol

'HUNTING THE BLACKE TOADE: Some aspects of alchemical symbolism' by Mr Rafal T. Prinke:
http://www.levity.com/alchemy/toad.html

One of the earliest appearances of the Toad symbol in alchemical literature and iconography seems to be that in the works of George Ripley, in which it plays a very prominent, or even central, part. His short poem The Vision describes an alchemical process veiled in symbols. The Toad first drinks "juice of Grapes" until it is so filled up that "casts it Venom" and "begins to swell" as a result of poisoning. Then the Toad dies in its "Cave" and the usual sequence of colour changes follows: black, various colours, white and red. Thus the Venom is changed into powerful Medicine.

The famous Ripley Scrowle has not been available to me in its entirety but from several published fragments it seems that it presents a similar, though considerably extended, process of the Toad undergoing various chemical changes. It reappears in various points of this symbolic road, clearly suggesting continuity. In some versions the Toad is also the final symbol of the Philosophers' Stone.

Eirenaeus Philalethes in his comentary to Ripley's Vision says that the Toad symbolizes gold. This view may have been influenced by Michael Sendivogius's statement that the Philosophers' Stone is nothing else but "gold digested to the highest degree", especially as Philalethes was his admirer and adopted his pseudonym of Cosmopolita. As we do not know the First Matter of Ripley, it is difficult to say whether Eirenaeus Philalethes is right. Ripley himself in his most famous work The Twelve Gates, which is less symbolic and uses early chemical terminology, remarks in the first Gate (Calcination): ....


Again, the Ashmole's version of the image ---

The well known illustration from Ashmole's Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum shows the Toad at the bottom of the symbolic process, probably indicating its beginning. It is interesting that it joins the male and female figures, as if it symbolized the power of attraction with some sexual overtones. The whole figure is entitled "Spiritus, Anima, Corpus", of which the Corpus or Body is the male-female pair. The whole possible sexual aspect of alchemy is still completely unknown and waiting to be explained but it may be interesting to note that Thomas Vaughan, who illustrated Ashmole's collection, made numerous sexual references in his own alchemical works, especially Aula Lucis. In his notebooks Vaughan explained how he had made the "oil of Halcali" with the help of his wife. According to A.E. Waite this oil is the First Matter which connects it with our Toad symbol.
 

Abrac

This tends to make me wonder whether I should reconsider the whole tarot majors as veiled alchemical images. :)
 

kenji

Rough thoughts about THE MOON

THE MOON in the 'Cary sheet' (c1500?) has towers in it, but not the two beasts yet. (Meanwhile, a tower was already depicted in the counterpart of Visconti-Sforza.)



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Here is an interesting picture of Cleopatra in a French version of Boccaccio's 'De claris mulieribus', which was made around 1440 in France.
http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/record.asp?MSID=8359&CollID=16&NStart=160705
This shows Cleopatra shedding blood from her arms to two dragon-like asps. Boccaccio says:

Cleopatra, dressed in royal garments, followed her Anthony. Lying down next to him, she opened the veins of her arms and put two asps in the openings in order to die. Some say that they cause death in sleep.

Blood-shedding and dragons -- I wonder if this image might have something to do with the 15th-century alchemical image...




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By the way, the following is a 15th-century image of a mother pelican which feeds blood from her breast to the chicks, which could also be relevant. (Not only to THE MOON but also to THE STAR, to be discussed some other time.):


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Museum Meermanno, MMW, 10 B 25, Folio 32r



Now, the pics above remind me of the allegory of 'Benignita' in Cesare Ripa's ICONOLOGIA, which I dealt with in another thread. Here the dragons have turned into dog-like beasts, and the blood from arms into the milk from breasts. Ripa says about this allegory as follows:

FIG. 39. Benignita: BOUNTY.
A noble Lady cloth'd in sky-colour'd Apparel, with Stars of Gold: she presses her Duggs with both Hands, from which flows abundance of Milk, which several Animals drink up: on her left Side is an Altar with Fire kindled upon it.
The squeezing her Breasts declares Bounty towards Subjects; the sky-colour, &c. shews that it ought to be shewn upon the account of Religion, therein imitating God himself.



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Ripa's book was published in the 17th century, the same as Jean Noblet pack, one of the earliest TdM specimens.


Could all these possibly be in the same lineage?



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kenji

Dear Astraea, Yoav and Abrac;

thanks (again) for your comments:)
I feel this problem is worth more investigation and contemplation, and am thinking of going a little further about it, little by little...
 

Abrac

There's a picture of Le Monde card at the Camoin website and you can see what looks like a flask in the figure's right hand.

https://en.camoin.com/tarot/Tarot-Marseilles-Nicolas-Conver-1760.html

I enlarged it as much as I could without degrading the image quality too much.

http://s30.postimg.org/d254y4jgx/Conver_World.jpg

I've contended for along time that it contains the Elixir.

In a lot of Conver versions it's not all that clear, but the image at Camoin's site shows it pretty clearly. Some other versions have the same image, one example is the Lequart House version (1890) of the Arnoult Tarot.

http://tarot-de-marseille-heritage.com/images/galerie/1890_lequart_pochoir/21_le_monde.jpg