I decided to look at the Medieval Bestiary. This is a book that chronicles both real and imaginary animals from 1210 to 1220. It is an extremely interesting book that shows the detail paid to those that created it. I was really blown away by the detail in the book, as it carries all of the elements of design in it. There is a repeated theme in the pictures that begins to establish itself as a repetitious part. This simply is a blue coloring that is present in every picture. This is a repeated element that the authors use quite a bit that really pops out, and one of the first things that I noticed along with the gold inlays. The brown lettering and the red contrasts well with the book, but the font is extremely hard to read and makes the reading of the text laborious. The pictures really draw the eye and their placement in the book seems to be deliberate as if the words were sculpted around the pictures. The alignment of the text seems to be an afterthought, almost as if the authors were aware that the text would be a secondary consideration. Proximity does not seem to be a consideration here. The text is uniform and fairly regular with the exception of the large grand beginning of paragraphs that are extremely ornate. The pictures are placed with the corresponding text that describes the picture. It is obvious like with the themes that the authors were well aware that the average person could not read Latin and if they saw this would really be drawn to the picture. This is the primary way that they emphasized the importance of the text. The ornate pictures and the detail in the pictures allow for a longer period of time to study and find the symbolism that is present. Proximity is the last element that was present in the book, but it was found more in the pictures then in the text itself. As I mentioned before the text is repudiative and hard to read, but the pictures group concepts together with the element of proximity. Applying proximity to the pictures see that the authors tried to group together the actions of the various creatures with symbolism. The result is a book that is extremely pretty and worth taking some time to look at. Take a look at it:
The Medieval Bestiary from the British Library:
http://ttpdownload.bl.uk/app_files/silverlight/default.html?id=32841B35-03D4-40D5-A218-0E9EFFB1843A
The Medieval Bestiary from the British Library:
http://ttpdownload.bl.uk/app_files/silverlight/default.html?id=32841B35-03D4-40D5-A218-0E9EFFB1843A