Medieval Marginalia: Why Are There So Many Snails In Medieval Manuscripts?

just history posts

If you’ve ever flicked through an illustrated medieval manuscript, or seen pictures of some marginalia on the internet, chances are you’ve seen pictures of snails. Sometimes the snails are fighting each other, sometimes they are fighting knights, sometimes things are riding the snails, but in one form or another, snails keep cropping up in these manuscripts. So, were the writers and illustrators of these manuscripts huge lovers of the snail, frustrated gardeners, or did th...