Wednesday, March 20, 2019

Aberdeen Bestiary Details

To show you the kind of detail produced by the new digital capture of the Aberdeen Bestiary, here is a close up of the hunter shooting a magpie from a tree, significance is unknown. In the second, a knight has stolen a tiger cub. 

"The tigress, when she finds her lair empty by the theft of a cub, follows the
tracks of the thief at once. When the thief sees that, even though he rides a swift horse, he is outrun by her speed, and that there is no means of escape at hand, he devises the following deception. When he sees the tigress drawing close, he throws down a glass sphere. The tigress is deceived by her own image in the glass and thinks it is her stolen cub. She abandons the chase, eager to gather up her young. Delayed by the illusion, she tries once again with all her might to overtake the rider and, urged on by her anger, quickly threatens the fleeing man. Again he holds up her pursuit by throwing down a sphere. The memory of the trick does not banish the mother's devotion. She turns over the empty likeness and settles down as if she were about to suckle her cub. And thus, trapped by the intensity of her sense of duty, she loses both her revenge and her child. "

No comments: