They studied them, devoting hours and more to academic discussion, thoughtful historical essays, and even occasional theory; However, despite all these efforts, researchers have still not been able to solve one of the strangest mysteries of the illuminated codices of the Middle Ages: XIII. , XIV and XV, molluscs depicted on disproportionate scales, in a menacing attitude, and fighting knights?

There are several explanations. The answers are none.

warrior snails. I know it sounds like an oxymoron; But this is the startling image reproduced in dozens of manuscripts prepared between the 13th and 15th centuries: slugs facing knights equipped with shields, swords and armour. Sometimes gastropods are huge, sometimes small; Sometimes they appear to swim or perch on high surfaces, and there are also cases where they crawl on the ground. They almost always point their antennae at the opponent.

The images of the knights also vary. And a lot. Some appear in the middle of a fight with snails, which they threaten with swords, axes, and clubs, or lassoes while riding their horses. Others kneel before their gastropod rivals in a submissive, almost supplicating manner. The iconography is extremely rich. There are known images of ladies begging their gentlemen not to confront snails. There is even at least one case of a person confronting a mollusk with a spear and shield.

But… Are there that many? Quite a few. Suffice it to say, these alarming images have attracted the attention of experts for decades, and all sorts of theories have been formulated to explain what they represent. It is known that it attracted the attention of book lovers in the 1850s. And in 1962 scholar Lilian MC Randall published: Speculum A work titled ‘The snail in the Gothic marginal war’ is a work in which he talks about these representations and ponders their possible readings. Randall counted 70 copies in 29 different works. And most of it was taken in a relatively short period between 1290 and 1310.

Images of crawling warriors with shells, antennae and slimy tails continue to fascinate experts at institutions such as the Smithsonian and the British Library, which published a special paper in 2013 on illustrations of knights facing gastropods. To illustrate this, it included a dozen reproductions in which knights and snails of all kinds could be seen in scenes worthy of the best surrealism. In one of them, quoted Gorleston PsalmsThe person who shields with a snail and fights with a sword is even… a monkey!

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searching for origins. When and where these paintings appear is as important as what they show. The British Library wrote, “As anyone familiar with the 13th and 14th manuscripts can confirm, images of armed knights fighting snails are common, especially in the margins. But the ubiquity of these depictions does not make them any less strange.”

Experts note that the first designs of this type were found in illuminated manuscripts in Northern France around 1290, and over the years they spread to other Flemish and English works. After losing its power, the motif appeared to reappear briefly in manuscripts produced in the late 15th century.

There are examples in the genealogical lists of the kings of England from the late 13th century. Gorleston Psalms; HE What happened tresorWritten by Brunetto Latini; HE Psalms of Queen Mary, a 14th-century work named after Mary I of England; the Decrees of Gregory IX; or Macclesfield Psalms Dating from the 14th century. The list goes on and on with fascinating designs, always based on an a priori mix as unlikely as snails and armed knights.

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The great unknown. Medievalists have documented dozens of examples, but what they haven’t been able to clarify, at least not with an answer that could generate consensus in society, is what these snails represent.

“There has been much academic debate about the meaning of these snail-fighting images,” admits the Biritish Library. One of the reasons it’s not easy to solve the mystery is that gastropods seem to sneak into all kinds of texts: hymns, books of hours, vowels. Book of Treasures…They were even found on carved panels in the cathedral of Lyon in the early 14th century. Images often seem irrelevant to their context.

From satire to social history. There are theories about what artists wanted to show with them, to give and to receive. Some speak of a satirical and humorous character, a way to lighten the content of the works and give readers a humorous image with which they can take a break from the content of the works. Others suggest that the image of the knight staring at the snails symbolizes cowardice, which in at least some cases may be a metaphor for resurrection, female sexuality, or even interpreted as a struggle between the poor and the aristocracy.

“The fight between the snail and the knight is an example of the world being turned upside down, a broader phenomenon that produces different medieval images,” Marian Bleeke, professor of medieval art at the University of Chicago, explains to the BBC. The idea is that the overthrow of existing or expected hierarchies is surprising and even comical; I think we understand this implicitly today.

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A mockery for the Lombards? One of the most popular theories, put forward by Randall in the 1960s, is that the snail may be a symbol of the Lombards, “a group vilified in the Early Middle Ages for their treacherous attitudes, the sin of usury, and ‘ungentlemanly behavior.'” ‘,” says the British Library.

This comment was echoed by other experts, who recalled that the Lombards were portrayed as a group devoted to usury and had a bad image in medieval France, where many paintings of gastropod warriors were made. Just because it is popular does not mean that this interpretation is uncontroversial. There are those who are skeptical about this and question whether it can explain why drawings of snails became so popular in Europe.

endless metaphor. Another possibility is that warrior snails do not have a single meaning, but are used as symbols that must be interpreted in the context of each work. Thus, the mollusk will not be a symbol with a single reading, as some would like to see it, but rather it will be inseparable from its surroundings.

“I don’t think images work that way. I want to look at how the snail is represented, what it looks like and where it is found, so I can think about the meaning given to it in each particular case,” Bleeke said. . “They may have meant all of these and more at once,” the British Library concedes. “It is important to remember, as Michael Camille, who devotes several pages to this issue, notes: ‘Marginal images lack the iconographic stability of a narrative or religious symbol'”.

Pictures | British Library

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