This 14 karat golden ring was inspired by a snailcat, depicted in the 14th Century Maastricht Book of Hours.
I think it was either through @stephenellcock or @damien_kempf that I was first introduced to the magical world of medieval marginalia. These drolleries, or grotesques, were illustrations that decorated the margins of illuminated manuscripts, often of mixed and magnificent beasts.
My favourite creatures must be the snail hybrids that pop up all over the place between the 13th and 14th century.
Scholars don’t know exactly where they originate from and have offered many interpretations; from biblical (Psalm 58.8: ”may they be like a snail that melts away as it moves along..”) to satirical (comparing a snail to a heavily armoured knight), from being a metaphor for resurrection, to a symbol of the Lombards or perhaps a representation of class struggles.
But although they often surrounded heavy religious matter, marginalia rarely illustrated the text and most often have no direct relationship with it at all.
They truly constitute a world of their own.
They celebrate the freedom of the outer edge.
History often calls the medieval period the Dark Age, but these brilliant illustrations prove, that many medieval minds were full of light, humour and crazy curious creativity.
xez