She Can't be Stopped!

I know, I know! "Two posts in one day?" I hear you (Jordan) shouting in disbelief at your computer. "Doesn't she have better things to do?" The answer is, undoubtedly, yes. I thought, however, that I would enlighten you about Italian Renaissance botany.

Random, non?

Well I'll explain a little first. Today in my class on Dante's Purgatorio and Paradiso (The one I had a test in and I think I actually may have passed, by the by.) we had a guest lecturer for the second hour of class. His name was Prof. David Wilson of the University of Western Ontario. At least I think that was his name, I tuned out for the beginning of the lecture. He was lecturing about the science of botany in the Renaissance and how they speculated plants grew from ground that had previously been barren. So apparently they believed that the plants created a power that would get caught up in the wind that would then go around the world and then when it hit a barren area, it would uh 'rape' the ground and the wind and the plant would make a new plant grow, and then the wind would rape that plant and it would get pregnant, or something like that. Well, Sandro Boticelli (of the Birth of Venus) was a big fan of Dante and studied La Comedia for nearly 20 years. During that time he painted his very famous painting "La Primavera" (Spring time).



In Purgatorio, Canto 28, Dante and Virgil meet Matelda outside the gates of paradise, she prepares souls for their ascent to heaven. She is described as very beautiful, and with many flowers all over her. She tells the pilgrims about the creation of plants. In 'La Primavera' apparently Boticelli is painting the process of what we would call pollination in this part here:



It shows the wind, (on the far right, windy looking) attempting to rape Chlora. Chlora is the nymph of little green shoots. As you can see here:



There are vines growing out of her mouth. The Zephyr has impregnated her, and she is turning into Flora, the woman standing beside her:



Anyway, I just liked the image of the vines coming out of her mouth and I thought I should explain it instead of just posting it. Again, this is just the professors interpretation of the painting, there are many different interpretations. And I have a strong feeling that I absolutely butchered what he was lecturing to us about. Oh well, there are pretty pictures now.

Yours,