YEARBOOK OF THE ALAMIRE FOUNDATION

86 LUMINITA FLOREA
normally result in a high degree of similarity between the two exemplars with respect
to the general layout of the text, script, and illustrations. In other cases, a completely
different set of people would produce the next copy, and thus a wider array of variations
and/or deviations from the model are perceptible. Whatever the case, occasionally,
due to the scribe’s and illuminator’s skill or to a firm editorial decision, a
copy was exceptionally close to some earlier exemplar on which it was or could have
been based, or to some other exemplar providing a link in transmission. For example,
folio 21v in The Hague, National Library of the Netherlands, MS 72 A23 is extremely
close to folio 20r in the 1120 autograph copy of the Liber; by the same token, the
French prose translation of the Liber found in a 1512 manuscript now similarly in
The Hague, MS 128 C4: Le livre fleurissant en fleurs, contains, on folio 40r, a perfect
replication of the labyrinth drawing in the Latin version (which may or may not
be the one of 1460), with the Minotaur at the center and a word-for-word French translation
identifying the characters involved. 33
STRAIGHT LINES AND CIRCULAR SHAPES – THE MONOCHORD AND THE LADDER
Not all illustrations found in music theory treatises, however, were as spectacular as
En la maison Dedalus from the Berkeley manuscript, or at similar levels of graphic
complexity; nor did they need to be. Simple signs, however, are truly scarce, as most
of the time the matter illustrated naturally lends itself to being depicted by means of
complex graphic renditions. Individual letters of the Latin or Greek alphabet will
mark individual ‘points of pitch’, but as soon as intervallic relationships or scales,
whole or fragmentary, must be presented, a certain level of visual complexity enters
the stage.
More frequently, and in most treatises, two or several simple graphic signs would
be combined in one complex diagram, of which perhaps the most frequently encountered
are the ladder and the monochord. Letters were often enclosed within other
graphic shapes such as squares and triangles; through repetition, these individual patterns
tend to form the image of a ladder – a most appropriate visual denotation for a
musical scale. Sources of inspiration for musical scalar figures could have easily been
found in illuminated Bibles and books of spiritual advice and devotion: the ladder is
one of the instruments of the Passion of Christ, thus an ubiquitous presence in both
33 Both the 1460 Latin and the 1512 French versions are included in The Hague, Handschriften; they can
be seen by accessing this website, then following the Expert Search link, and using the word labyrinth
to perform a Words from descriptions search under Images. Unlike folio 21v in the 1460 Latin version,
which is almost identical (although more skillfully executed) with what can be seen on folio 20r in the
autograph manuscript of 1120, folio 40r in the French version does not include the text at the bottom.
I am giving both the Latin and the French captions for comparison: MS 72 A23 has Domus dedali in
qua minotaurum posuit, Minos rex, Parsife regina, Dedalus artifex, Ycarus filius eius, and Minotaurus
in laberintho; MS 128 C4 has La maison de dedalus en qui il mist Minotaurus, Le roy minos, La royne
paliphes, Dedalus le maistre ouvrier, Ycarus son fils, and Minotaurus dedens le laberinthe.