Image Theory from Figurative Thinking in Emblematic Literature: Vauzelles, Corrozet, and Paradin

The medieval doctrine of the figura, in the form of either allegorical poetry or theological hermeneutics, provided a rich source of image-theory in the early-modern period. In the prefaces to their emblem books and manuals of ars symbolica, authors often anchored image-theory in an investigation of the figura and its development. My paper attempts to disclose some commonalities in the theories of the image to be found in such literature. I will devote particular attention to emblematic and symbolic works in which Jean de Vauzelles, Gilles Corrozet, and Claude Paradin draw upon the Bible. I am particularly interested in their reluctance to distinguish between the form and function of visual and verbal images, between visibility and legibility. The willingness to license indeterminacy of this sort would seem to examplify what Foucault termed, “the single, unbroken surface,” where no distinction is made between what is seen and what is read