So did everyone have a good encounter with their rabbits today? 👀
(I'm pretty sure the moral of these manuscript details is "careful what you hunt today, lest you be hunted tomorrow." Either that, or "bring the scribe more beer while they're working, if you don't want them to play out their boredom on the pages of important ecclesiastical documents." 50/50! 🙃)
@MLClark My understanding is those are a type of meme that was popular in the time called “The World Turned upside down” A reference to the chaos of the end times when the powerful, and the powerless are in inverse position.
I also love that you used the word "meme". I'm just imagining time travelling folk getting all flustered when they see how easy kids have it today.
"Back in my day, if you wanted to share a funny picture, you had to learn how to read and write, commit yourself to a monastery, work your way up to access to the good ink, and THEN, if you were really lucky--"
"Okay, grandpa, we get it, you don't like our GIFs."
"Well, I didn't say THAT, exactly... Show me another one, will you? 👀"
@MLClark That is an amusing images, but meme like images did persist in the Middle Ages, one of which is the Three Hares or Three Rabbits. It started in China and traveled along the Silk Road, until making it to Europe and ending up literally everywhere.
Viral was much harder back in those days, and interpretations were far more local but it points to a universal appeal of certain kinds of design. Which is fascinating.
Oh, I'm aware of medieval literary culture! I studied early saints and medieval manuscripts in a couple of classes in grad school. So many fun images and wonderfully imaginative stories. (Along with approaches to the diversity of spiritual life that would put many rigid ideologues to shame today.)
But I didn't know the history of the Three Hares narrative. That's a beauty of a travelling tale, thank you. 🤗