[Pareidolia in Beato de Liébana's illuminated Visigothic codes].
The visual perception alterations constitute a characteristic etymological field in some neurological and psychiatric processes (such as hallucinations, hallucinosis, etc.) that can also appear in healthy people (metamorphosias, pareidolias). The pareidolia is a phenomenon characterized by the non auto-provoked visualization of a perception in which reality and daydream are combined. It constitutes a source of inspiration for different artistic manifestations, is the basis of some common psychological explorations (such as Rorcharch test) and it even can be the explication to some situations considered as paranormals, for example the vision of faces in the Moon or in Mars or the apparition of sacred figures either in spots or shades... Beato of Liébana was a cantabrian presbyter, author in the eight century of the Comments of the Apocalypse exegesis, copied and illuminated repeated times all through the following centuries. Given the marked revealing and eschatological component of the Apocalypse, starting from the Leon's School (known also as Mozarabic since the Ninth Century), the original was enriched adding another texts with their own illustrations. From them, the Comments to Daniel's Book, from Saint Jeronimus, stands out. The whole of the illuminated Hispanic manuscripts constitutes a "corpus" of amazing codices international known today as Beatos. We have demonstrated that the first History's graphic representation of a pareidolia phenomenon is found in the miniature Visigoth Hispanic manuscripts known as Beatos; we have arrived to this conclusion studying two facsimiles from the x Century (Beato of Valcavado and Beato of Gerona) specially the miniature called Baltasar's Feast; in both codices, is illustrated how this Babylon king perceives the way a phantasmagoric hand spurts up from a candlestick flame and writes in the adjacent wall three mysterious words: MANE, TECEL, FARES, which were only interpreted by Prophet Daniel, requested ad hoc. Baltasar mixed up unintentionally the perceived and the daydreamed starting from a visual field barely structured, we conclude that he suffered from a pareilolia phenomenon, graphically represented by the first time in History in the Beatos.
Martín Araguz
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A
Servicio de Neurología, Hospital Universitario del Aire, Madrid, España. amartina@medynet.com
Bustamante Martínez
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MC
Fernández-Armayor Ajo
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V
López Gómez
M
M
D005201:Fantasy; D006212:Hallucinations / Q000266:history*; D049691:History, Medieval; D006801:Humans; D008373:Manuscripts as Topic / Q000266:history*; D008512:Medicine in the Arts; D009422:Nervous System Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis; D009462:Neurology / Q000266:history; D009484:Neuropsychology / Q000266:history; D014796:Visual Perception