![]() She says that “the armored snail fighting the armored knight is a reminder of the inevitability of death,” a sentiment captured in Psalm 58 of the Bible: “ Like a snail that melteth away into slime, they shall be taken away like a dead-born child, they shall not see the sun. Silly knight, it’s just a snail!”įor Digital Medievalist, Lisa Spangenberg floated another idea. The valiant snails could be a commentary on social oppression, or it could just be medieval humor, says Got Medieval: “We’re supposed to laugh at the idea of a knight being afraid of attacking such a ‘heavily armored’ opponent. The British Library says that the scene could represent the Resurrection, or it could be a stand-in for the Lombards, “a group vilified in the early Middle Ages for treasonous behaviour, the sin of usury, and ‘non-chivalrous comportment in general.’” No one knows what, exactly, the scenes really mean. Photo: Brunetto Latini’s Li Livres dou Tresor, c. ![]() “But the ubiquity of these depictions doesn’t make them any less strange,” says the British Library, rounding up a number of examples of the slimy battles. The snail, in medieval society, was a symbol of exaggerated distrust because the snail carries its house on its back, fearing that its belongings may be stolen, crawling on its stomach as a lowly being, and was deemed a coward. Usually, the knight is drawn so that he looks worried, stunned, or shocked by his tiny foe.Įpic snail-on-knight combat showed up as often in medieval manuscripts as Kilroy across Europe. Sometimes the snail is all the way across the page, sometimes right under the knight’s foot. Sometimes the snail is monstrous, sometimes tiny. ![]() They’re everywhere! Sometimes the knight is mounted, sometimes not. As Got Medieval writes, “You get these all the time in the margins of Gothic manuscripts.”Īnd I do mean all the time. It’s a great unsolved mystery of medieval manuscripts. And scattered through this marginalia is an oddly recurring scene: a brave knight in shining armor facing down a snail. The piece has been recorded as part of UK treasure finds from 2018, which include an Iron Age mirror and tweezers and a rapier from a Bronze Age hoard.It’s common to find, in the blank spaces of 13th- and 14th-century English texts, sketches and notes from medieval readers. While components of the piece may have established meanings, the overall joke intended by the piece which would have attached to a belt is not known as the decoration has no close parallels. In her famous survey of the subject, Lilian Randall proposed that the snail was a symbol of the Lombards, a group vilified in the early middle ages for. “It demonstrates the humour often found in medieval material culture.” ![]() “The mount may be a satirical reference to cowardly or non-chivalric behaviour of opponents in battle, or as a parody of the upper or knightly classes. Snails are often depicted in the margins of medieval illuminated decorated manuscripts. “The image of the praying knight emerging from a snail shell atop a goat implies an element of parody or satire. Sarah J Biggs from the Department of Medieval Manuscripts at the British Library says that such marginalia reflect. She added: “This unusual silver-gilt mount may once have been attached to a leather belt or strap, or perhaps worn as a badge. As, to what end, there’s a strong likelihood that satire was the intent. "The humorous or satirical significance was probably obvious to contemporary people, rather like a meme, although its meaning has now become obscure." In medieval manuscripts snails were sometimes used as a reference to cowardice, or as a symbol of evil, and scholars believe the imagery of the long-lost joke could even be slight against the Lombard people who were unpopular in northern Europe.īeverley Nenk, curator of later Medieval collections at the British Museum, said: "This motif may be an example the medieval theme of the World Turned Upside Down, Le Monde Renverse. The 2cm-long 13th-century object unearthed in Pontefract in 2020 is a decorative nod to a medieval joke, according to British Museum experts, although it’s meaning is not certain. Scholar Lilian Randall provides the best theory for the unusual motif: these medieval knights fought snails in the margins because snails represented the. Visual jokes widely distributed online, memes have become a mainstay of irreverent internet culture, but amusing images with subversive messages were also shared in the Middle Ages.Ī belt mount ornament depicting a praying knight in a helmet emerging from a snail shell, which is balanced on a goat, is believed to be forerunner of the modern meme. A medieval meme has been recorded by British Museum after treasure hunters found the gilded image of a "snail man" used satirically in the Middle Ages. ![]()
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