Armillary sphere

Or, a wolf passant Gules; on a chief Gules, three bells Or. Crest: Upon a helm with a wreath Or and Gules, a demi-wolf Gules supporting with both paws an armillary sphere Or. Mantling: Gules doubled Or. Motto: «Varia vivendi cupidus».

The coat of arms of Jean-Christophe Loubet del Bayle. The image combines a photograph of a drawing of an armillary sphere along with his arms, both painted by me.

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Blazon keywords: Or, Gules, One, Three, Wolf, Passant, Chief, Bell, Crest, Upon (wreath), Helm, Wreath, Demi, Supporting, Paw, Armillary sphere, Mantling, Motto and Scroll.

Style keywords: Outlined in sable, Illuminated and Semi-circular.

Classification: Personal, Interpreted, Boa, Hand-drawn, Collage and Photographic.

Bearer: Loubet del Bayle, Jean-Christophe.

Or, a wolf passant Gules; on a chief Gules, three bells Or. Crest: Upon a helm with a wreath Or and Gules, a demi-wolf Gules supporting with both paws an armillary sphere Or. Mantling: Gules doubled Or. Motto: «Varia vivendi cupidus».

The Commoners' Certification of Arms for Jean-Christophe Loubet del Bayle with his arms designed by him emblazoned by me.

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Blazon keywords: Or, Gules, One, Three, Wolf, Passant, Chief, Bell, Crest, Upon (wreath), Helm, Wreath, Demi, Supporting, Paw, Armillary sphere, Mantling and Motto.

Style keywords: Outlined in sable, Illuminated and Semi-circular.

Classification: Personal, Interpreted, Boa, Certification and Heraldic document.

Bearer: Loubet del Bayle, Jean-Christophe.

Or, a wolf passant Gules; on a chief Gules, three bells Or. Crest: Upon a helm with a wreath Or and Gules, a demi-wolf Gules supporting with both paws an armillary sphere Or. Mantling: Gules doubled Or. Motto: «Varia vivendi cupidus».

Arms depicted by me, illuminated with lights and shadows, outlined in Sable, with a semi-circular outer contour and with a texturized finishing.

The coat of arms of Jean-Christophe Loubet del Bayle designed by him emblazoned by me.

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Blazon keywords: Or, Gules, One, Three, Wolf, Passant, Chief, Bell, Crest, Upon (wreath), Helm, Wreath, Demi, Supporting, Paw, Armillary sphere, Mantling, Motto and Scroll.

Style keywords: Outlined in sable, Illuminated and Semi-circular.

Classification: Personal, Interpreted, Boa and Coat of arms.

Bearer: Loubet del Bayle, Jean-Christophe.

Martin Fernandez de Enciso, «Sum of Geography, which deals with all the parts and provinces of the world: especially the Indies. And deals extensively with the art of navigation, together with the sphere in the vernacular, with the regulation of the Sun and the North: newly made. With royal privilege.», 148 pages, House of Trade (Casa de la Contratación), Seville, 1519.

Preliminary note

Note that I try to use, even in these non-heraldic cases, the language of blazon, thus I speak of positions such as in chief, in base, dexter or sinister, arrangements such as in bend and in bend sinister and tinctures such as sable, azure or gules.

Zodiacal bands in armillary spheres: A comparative analysis of Marchant (1499) and Fernández de Enciso (1519) engravings

[Marchant, G.; 1499; page 15] and [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519; page 1] depict an armillary sphere with the zodiac signs, &Aries; Aries, &Taurus; Taurus, &Gemini; Gemini, &Cancer; Cancer, &Leo; Leo, &Virgo; Virgo, &Libra; Libra, &Scorpio; Scorpio, &Sagittarius; Sagittarius, &Capricorn; Capricorn, &Aquarius; Aquarius and &Pisces; Pisces, represented on a band around the sphere. I have compared both zodiacal bands by means of the composition of the previous image.

In this image I have made there are:

• In the 3^rd row, the band of zodiac signs of the armillary sphere by [Marchant, G.; 1499].
• Above, in the 2^nd row, the band of my interpretation of the same previous engraving.
• In chief, at the very top, in the 1^st row, the zodiac signs in sable and azure, with those not visible, in the order of [Marchant, G.; 1499], that is, as read by the reader of the book, from his frontal perspective of the engraving, in counterclockwise direction, &Gemini;, &Taurus;, &Aries;, &Pisces;, &Aquarius;, &Capricorn;, &Sagittarius;, &Scorpio;, &Libra;, &Virgo;, &Leo; and &Cancer; which is not visible. Note that, for example, Taurus appears before Aries so the sequence is geocentric, that is, arranged from the point of view of an observer located at the center of the Earth, which is different from the book reader.
• Below, in the 4^th row, the band of zodiac signs of the armillary sphere by [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519].
• In base, at the very bottom, in the 5^th row, the zodiac signs in black and in cyan, with those not visible, in the order of [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519], that is, as read by the same reader of the book in counterclockwise direction, &Capricorn;, &Aquarius;, &Pisces;, &Aries;, &Taurus;, &Gemini;, &Cancer; which is not visible, &Leo;, &Virgo;, &Libra;, &Scorpio;, and &Sagittarius; which is also not visible. Note that in this case, for example, Aries appears before Taurus so the sequence is ecliptic, that is, from the point of view of an observer located in outer space, the point of view of the ecliptic sequence coinciding with the point of view of the book reader.

The 3 main differences observed are:

• [Marchant, G.; 1499], number 6 in the image, places at the top the zodiac signs that [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519], number 7 in the image, places at the bottom, as a curiosity it can be seen in my interpretation of [Marchant, G.; 1499] that for aesthetic reasons I placed at top and bottom the zodiac signs as [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519] does.
• They do not start in the same position, it is &Aries; Aries that has a more similar position in both but with one slot of difference.
• The signs in [Marchant, G.; 1499] and [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519] rotate in opposite directions.

The only important conceptual difference is the reverse rotation of the zodiac signs, that is, that [Marchant, G.; 1499] uses the geocentric sequence and [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519] uses the ecliptic sequence. In no case is it a printing error of an engraving in mirror, since neither of the two armillary spheres is engraved in mirror, as both have the zodiacal band in bend, and if they were engraved in mirror the zodiacal band would appear placed in bend sinister.

We could also study the few non-symmetrical signs that can be distinguished completely:

• For example, on the back side of the band of [Marchant, G.; 1499], &Scorpio; Scorpio has the scorpion’s stinger in the shape of an m pointing to sinister (the reader’s right), so it makes sense from the point of view of a geocentric observer.
• For example, on the back side of the band of [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519], &Leo; Leo seems to have the circle of its head to dexter (the reader’s left) and the curl of its tail to sinister (the left of a geocentric observer), while in &Scorpio; Scorpio, the stinger of the m-scorpion seems to point to dexter (the reader’s left) as if the sign were intended to be seen from the other side of the outside, piercing the band, so that the book reader sees the sign in mirror. Be that as it may, the arrangement of these 2 signs does not seem consistent with each other.

Although it is not a case of printing the engraving in mirror, such errors exist since, if we go beyond the armillary sphere of [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519] to study its outer decoration, we see that the SPQR, of «Senatus Populusque Romanus», is in mirror, I have marked it with a square of gules with the number 8 in the image, so that, although its armillary sphere is well printed, in the outer decoration the printer made a mistake and printed it the other way round.

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Bibliographical reference of century XVI.

Classification: In black and white and Castilian language.

The author is Fernández de Enciso, Martín.

Bibliographic reference mentioned in the following articles:

• Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519
• Marchant, G.; 1499

External resources:

• At the Naval Chair, Spanish Navy, University of Murcia,.
• Link to the full PDF.

Internal resources: FernandezDeEncisoM1519.SumaDeGeographia.CatedraNaval.pdf in scanned PDF format at the Naval Chair, Spanish Navy, University of Murcia..

Guy Marchant, printer, «Compost et Kalendrier des Bergères», 68 folio leaves, more than 80 woodcut illustrations, Paris, August 17^th, 1499.

This work complements the «Kalendrier des Bergiers» (1491), intended for a male audience, while this «Compost» is aimed at women readers, «Calendar of the Shepherdesses». Both books combine astrology, medicine, Christian morality, and practical advice. It includes numerous didactic woodcuts.

The image shows a golden armillary sphere, to be used in one of the versions of the coat of arms of Jean-Christophe Loubet del Bayle, extracted by me from one of the astrological pages of this book, page 15, «a iii».

In [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519; page 1] there is also an armillary sphere that bears certain similarities to the one appearing in [Marchant, G.; 1499; page 15]. A comparison of the bands with zodiac symbols of both spheres can be seen in [Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519].

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Bibliographical reference of century XV.

Classification: In black and white, French language and Incunabulum.

Author: Marchant, Guy.

Bibliographic reference mentioned in the following articles:

• Fernández de Enciso, M.; 1519
• Marchant, G.; 1499

External links:

• Historical Library of Marquis of Valdecilla.
• Catalogue entry and full text.
• In the Digital Heritage of the Complutense University of Madrid.

Internal resources: MarchantG1499.CompostEtKalendrierDesBergeres.UCM.pdf, scanned PDF version from the Historical Library of the Complutense University of Madrid.