Folio 2v Commentary

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f2v Text: Illustration: the Creation of the animals. God stands in a three-quarters pose facing right, very similar to f2, except that now his tunic is red and his cloak blue. He has no beard. On the right are three compartments . The elephant at the top is drawn from the same model as f65v, except it is in reverse. Below him are a hare, a squirrel holding a nut and a cat. This is not the soft tabby of f5 but the spiky tailed animal found on Ashmole f9. The position of its tail coming through its legs and across its back is like the model in Ashmole. Below in the damaged area are a bull and lion, and at the bottom a goat, stag and horse.There is a tiny amount of splattered blue paint beginning on the right side of the cat, a very rare example of carelessness or perhaps an accident. A similar image of a beardless God standing to the left of his created animals is found in the narthex mosaics at St Mark's, Venice. It is significant that the mosaic also includes a hare because this creature is not mentioned in the Bestiary. The damaged area has been scraped and smudged. It corresponds almost exactly with the pricking on the recto and probably occurred when the pricking took place.