Ghibelline and Guelph

[John Grove <jgrove@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Well, I've been having fun reading about the two types of battlements
that seem to have evolved directly from the dispute between the two
opposing factions in Italian/German history. The Guelph used the square
battlements, while the Ghibelline supporters flaunted their support in
their architecture with the 'fishtail' battlements. I believe from what
I've been able to locate on the web that these Ghibelline designs on
castle battlements are indeed limited to castles in Northern Italy and
Germany that were built in the period 1100-1300. Since the factions were
not so big a deal in the 15th and 16th century, the castle design in the
VMS only leads to (once again) presenting us with a rough geographical
region - the same as has been discussed for quite some time.

Why a Ghibelline Castle is present in the large foldout and not a Guelph
style may be meaningless to the author except that he lived near one and
drew what he knew. The wall extending from the castle around the spiral
of stars may be indicative that the castle and wall are only a symbolic
representation of a formidable enclosure protecting the 'heavens'. I
don't know if this sort of speculation has any place in discussions
because one could never really prove any number of suppositions until we
can actually read the text.

I'm almost willing to bite at the bait that someone says they can read
25 lines of the text (almost).

John