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Craig Peters
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Posts: 2,167
Fri 05 Feb, 2010 10:07 am
Timo Nieminen wrote:
Craig Peters wrote:
Luka Borscak wrote:
These are just big hairy peasants. ;)


Wouldn't be far off some of the medieval descriptions of peasants. ;)


Or at least, post-medieval English propaganda descriptions of Irish peasants.

(Actually, if you do know of medieval descriptions of peasants, I'd be interested, but perhaps this isn't the thread for it.)


What sort of descriptions are you looking for? A lot of the time, particularly in the High Middle Ages, descriptions of peasants were deliberately distorted, emphasizing their monstrousness, hideousness, and bestiality. To provide a modern analogy, the descriptions of peasants are not unlike the old racist representations of Africans/African Americans in 19th and 20th century illustrations. A good book to check out is this one: http://www.myArmoury.com/books/item.0804733732.html.
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Timo Nieminen
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Posts: 1,504 Location: Brisbane, Australia
Fri 05 Feb, 2010 1:32 pm
Craig Peters wrote:
Timo Nieminen wrote:
(Actually, if you do know of medieval descriptions of peasants, I'd be interested, but perhaps this isn't the thread for it.)


What sort of descriptions are you looking for? A lot of the time, particularly in the High Middle Ages, descriptions of peasants were deliberately distorted, emphasizing their monstrousness, hideousness, and bestiality.


I'm looking for enough to see what typical descriptions might have been, and how they varied. That book looks like a good start, pity my library doesn't have it, need to ILL when I'll have time to read it. Thanks.

Context is important - does anti-peasant propaganda during uprisings look like modern racist wartime propaganda? "Peasants are little better than animals" says something, but not the same as "peasants are little better than animals, infidels, or Jews".

Interesting to compare with outside Europe, where (e.g., Japan) peasants officially ranked above other some other classes of society (other than outcastes (e.g., dalits, burakumin), which tended to give the peasants somebody to outrank even if they were at the bottom of the "regular" classes).
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T. Hamilton
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Posts: 85 Location: United States
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 9:25 am
Dan Howard wrote:
Nile crocodiles are freshwater crocs. How long could one survive in the sea?


Here's a wacky possibility. We know the Romans were huge importers of exotic species. Maybe the croc the Hospitaller killed was the descendant of some transplanted menagerie? Another idea (and it is reaching): Mankind is well-known for exterminating species, could a croc-like creature have been indigenous to the area, but been hunted to extinction? Of course, my knowledge of Malta is sketchy. Is it even warm enough there for something like that to have survived at all?
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Thom R.
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Posts: 630 Location: Tucson
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 9:57 am
There is an interesting academic issue as to when knights, as opposed to angels, are shown fighting the dragon(s)..... in my searching I have noticed that prior to about 1300, most surviving images of this type show Michael and the archangels fighting the dragon, and it is not until after that when we see knights in armour and St George fighting the dragon?


Stammheim Missal c 1170


Dyson Perrins Apocalypse c 1260


from a Manuscript belonging to Master de Guillebert de Mets c 1450



Prayer book of Charles the Bold circa 1469
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Thom R.
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Posts: 630 Location: Tucson
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 10:13 am
can't leave these out of this thread

St George by Roger Van der Weyden 1432


St George by Friederich Herlin 1460
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Dan Howard
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Posts: 3,637 Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 1:01 pm
They're all so little. It is hardly worth writing a song about it. Charles the Bold's prayerbook is a classic. The dude can't even reach it with his sword.
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Thom R.
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Posts: 630 Location: Tucson
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 1:38 pm
Dan Howard wrote:
They're all so little. It is hardly worth writing a song about it. Charles the Bold's prayerbook is a classic. The dude can't even reach it with his sword.


I agree - there are some real interesting facets to it, as you pointed out compared to how dragons are portrayed today - they are always quite small in the medieval drawings. They are almost never shown flying, and often are without wings counter to how dragons are portrayed today. Also note how in the 15th c portrayals - there is always the chivalrous aspect of saving the damsel in distress in these illustrations. the dragons and princess seem to me to be clearly symbolic.

the hero battling the dragon is an old and ancient myth - one the earliest versions of this is Bellerophon battling the Chimaera in greek myth I suppose........ it seems that over time that this myth morphed and changed in keeping with the times and culture. which begs the question why do we portray dragons the way we do today (more powerful, larger, flying etc) as compared to how they were portrayed in the past. myth and prominant archetypes are sort of cultural dna in a certain way.

St Dominic and the dragon c 1510
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Christopher VaughnStrever
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Posts: 382 Location: San Antonio, TX
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 2:09 pm
From the numerous possibilites; (1) that people heard accounts of large snakes and (2) Crocidiles (Sorry I mis-spelled that) That in fact dragons were a reality that people heard tales about (Sort of like the times we live in and the tale of big foot)

From the posts here, I see that there was a symbolic portrayl of dragons and there seems to be a realistic portrayl as well. We can clearly see that in the pictures these dragons were exaggerated for their time. That is, not looking like the actual snakes and crocs we know about today. Although there is a heavy resemblance to those animals. Our time has greatly increased the portrayall of dragons because larger creatures have been found out... Dinosaurs and all animals considered.
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Dan Howard
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Posts: 3,637 Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 2:30 pm
For contrast this is a more modern mythology. Here is Tolkien's hero, Turambar slaying the dragon Glaurung.

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Martin Peter Forrester
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Posts: 10
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 7:51 pm
Oriental dragons are deemed pretty big, the dog sized dragon seems to be peculiar to europe. I'd put it down to medieval duff scale if it wasn't so consistent.

ps isn't St Dominic's dragon cute? I think he's begging for scraps... and i'm sure i saw Chewbacca on pg 3

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Dan Howard
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Posts: 3,637 Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Sun 07 Feb, 2010 10:24 pm
True. Medieval illustrations weren't drawn to scale. The most important character was the largest .
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Sander Marechal
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Posts: 671 Location: The Netherlands
Mon 08 Feb, 2010 12:59 am
Thom R. wrote:
There is an interesting academic issue as to when knights, as opposed to angels, are shown fighting the dragon(s)..... in my searching I have noticed that prior to about 1300, most surviving images of this type show Michael and the archangels fighting the dragon, and it is not until after that when we see knights in armour and St George fighting the dragon?


Not so strange IMHO since they probably represent two different stories. The Angels fighting the dragon is probably a depiction of the book of revelations where Michael fights the dragon (satan) over the body of Moses. St. George fighting the dragon is different and much younger story. In this story the dragon is just that, a monster. Not Satan. According to Wikipedia this story started around the 10th-11th century so it would not be strange if it only became widely known and depicted around 1300 or so.
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Craig Peters
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Posts: 2,167
Mon 08 Feb, 2010 11:41 am
More medieval depictions of dragons:

Harley MS 3244, Folio 59r
[ Linked Image ]

Aberdeen Bestiary
[ Linked Image ]

Museum Meermanno, MMW, 10 B 25
[ Linked Image ]

Other bestiary images (see attached).

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DragonIII.JPG
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Thom R.
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Posts: 630 Location: Tucson
Tue 09 Feb, 2010 9:40 am
I forgot about this one - its rather earlier, first half of 14th c, but notice the thematic elements are all the same
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