What Do Objects Signify?
Objects clearly exist as physical items that take up space. But do they also exist in another realm, as symbols?
One common medieval trope was metaphor. Writers in the middle ages were constantly telling stories through representation: a castle could signify the Virgin Mary, or a journey could represent life.
So, what could our objects represent?
In this section we’ll explore examples of objects as symbols through some pieces of medieval literature: the Exeter Book of Riddles, and William Durand’s Rationale Divinorum Officiorum.