Gold mine of cheeky medieval doodles discovered

(CNN) -- My personal favorite is this. At the top of a page of angular medieval text -- full of theological extrapolations and religious devotion -- is a cartoon of a deadpan dog. "It's amazing to think that people doodled in medieval times in a similar way to how they doodle today," says Dr Erik Kwakkel, a book historian at Leiden University, Holland. "When you see the monks expressing their personalities, their sense of humor, it makes you feel like you're traveling back through time. It's like you're going through the keyhole and sitting right next to them." Indeed, that dog would not be out of place in The Simpsons. Nov 3,  http://cnn.it/10QnsVD

To understand this  news item we will look at the chart for the solar eclipse at Leiden, Holland. The eclipse [0sc25] is conjunct stars of the Indian lunar mansion Swati which  translates to “the priest” or those into theology like the monks in the news. It also falls in early tropical Scorpio and the fourth house.  

An extract from a post  on the astrology of comedy and comedians [1] explains why the sign Scorpio is linked to comedy and by extension to comic images.

Scorpio on the other hand is a whole different bag of tricks. Scorpio is an emotional water sign, very sensitive to the world around them. Their humor and their material comes from their emotions, sometimes from their pain, and from their acute perceptiveness of the people and situations they encounter. They laugh through their tears so to speak. And they are much more likely to bring their own personal life story and struggles into their routine, as they feel it so intensely.

The fourth house is connected with roots, tradition and the beginning of things. With Mercury here we can relate it to the beginning of publishing of books. We then note that Mercury is conjunct stars of the Indian lunar mansion Hasta  which is associated with activities that require dexterity  and skill in the use of the hand. Coincidentally, it is also linked to laughter through a pun on has – to laugh [2].  

Further, since the eclipse is in Scorpio, it is ruled by Mars here placed in Sagittarius which is again linked to the publishing of books [3].

Progressing the eclipse chart to Nov. 3, the date of the news aligns the  meridian axis with the Mercury-Uranus opposite. In his article Truth-Tellers and Tricksters:The Uranus-Mercury Interface, Bill Streett observes [4]:

Both through comedy and serious communication, it is often the possessor of Uranus-Mercury aspects in the natal chart that overthrows conventional use of language so that a more creative, fiery, or ground-breaking use of language and thought can be applied. The comic that has a Uranus-Mercury combination relies upon the bizarre, the inappropriate, the outrageously unconventional so as to illuminate hypocrisy of the situation they may find themselves within. The serious writer born under a Uranus-Mercury combination often becomes the social critic, the outsider who has extraordinary perceptual insight into the failings and ills of his or her culture. A secondary motivation of these social critics is to push the cultural envelope into the progressive, the exciting, and the avant-garde.

[1] http://brightstarlights.com/2007/11/23/brilliant-comedians-the-scorpio-saggitarius-connection/

[2] Secrets of the Ancient Skies; Diana K. Rosenberg (v.2 p.64-88)

[3] http://www.starsisterastrology.com/sagittarius-become-the-quest/

[4] http://astrologyforthesoul.com/billstreett/uranmerc.html