Bernd 06/08/2019 (Sat) 10:00:01 No.27019 del
The review on the next batch of icons is starting to get into shape. But before I'd get onto it I have to put the fact forward that whatever interpretation I give about the pictorial message of the Crown, it's basically mine as here I wrote: >>26988
Great amount of research were done by many people - I read somewhere that 40 different explanations were made up of it's creation - but it seems to me very few of them actually tried to see what those depicted figures represent and what message they want to convey to the observer. Most researchers stand for the idea that the Crown was made from two parts so it can't have any unified message.
But the two parts can't have one and one on their own? - I ask. At that time literacy was extremely low, even among nobles and sometimes priests couldn't write and read. Relaying information through a pictorial medium was very handy tool (even today it is, just think of computing, GUI and icons revolutionized the use of computers this made it available for the great masses to stomach it) and they used it all the time. Frescos, reliefs, mosaics, statues weren't just decorative purposes, they weren't created because "hey here's an empty space fill it with something nice" but because every figure they depicted held a message in itself.
Ofc with scenes we have an easier job recognizing things. The Imperial Crown of the HRE - the only other crown with enamel plates, the Monomachos-crown might wasn't a crown at all - has such scenes and even captions for those who are able to read hence too smart to understand pictures anymore but lonesome, standstill figures could be and were also symbols, allegories and metaphors of a range of ideas. Those who lived back then it was clear. We, here in our secular world, are now often blindsided by our own genius and well-informed nature, we just know better.
I'm not trying here to decrypt the message, or give a hypothesis of it's meaning I just try to show some unusual things, some peculiarities and wonder why these characters were chosen. However I see only one author who really gives a thought, and a couple more who make some effort. But the one is generally shunned and considered pseudo-scientific researcher. So I was left to my own devices and decided to turn to W*ikipedia to enhance my modest "who-is-who in the Christian mythology" knowledge, while I'm checking these half a handful of writers for their ideas.