CHAPTER VIII

SYMBOLIC DESIGNS FOR SUN-DIALS
How beautiful your presence, how benign, Servants of God, who not a thought will share With the vain world ; who outwardly as bare As winter trees, yield no fallacious sign."
— Ecclesiastical Sketches, XIX, WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.
HE old Emblem writer, Geof- frey Whitney, noted with severity, as we have with
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sympathy, that readers and on-lookers weary of monot- ony of device: "The nature of Man is alwaies delighted in nouelties & too muche corrupte with curiousnes and newfanglenes." Truly we
desire and need "curiousnes and newfanglenes" in sun-dials as in all things else, and to satisfy that desire I shall offer in this chapter some suggestions for novelty as well as significance of design in sun- dials.
At Ophir Farm, the country seat of Hon. White- law Reid, there stands in an open court, near the house, a sun-dial. It is pictured with a corner of
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1 86 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
the castle-like house opposite this page. The dial is set upon a circle of brick pavement surrounded by sentinel trees of Japanese Retinosporas. It is not in a garden, but stands rather sombrely alone, with no flowers, no creeping vines, no neighbors but the solemn trees. It is fitting that it should thus stand, for it is an emblematic dial, and was not meant to be lightly wreathed and garlanded, nor to have its significance hidden. The dial-plate rests upon a carefully wrought bronze tortoise, and that is sup- ported on a symmetrical marble pillar which bear de- signs of the signs of the zodiac in wrought bronze.
The design of a tortoise is most appropriate for a sun-dial. The myth of the tortoise is world-wide. The Hindoos believe that a great tortoise lies beneath the earth on his back. Earlier is the notion that the earth itself is a tortoise ; the flat plate 6n the belly of the tortoise is the land, and the sky is the shell of the back.
The oldest of all Chinese pre-Confucian books is the famous Book of Changes. It contains a system of philosophy deduced from eight hexagrams which were copied from the lines on the back of a tortoise. Each represents some great power in nature, as fire, water, earth, etc. It is also regarded as a calendar of the lunar year. So important are the lessons of this book, so great is its wisdom, that Confucius declared that could a hundred years be added to his life he would devote them all to its study.
A most suitable and perhaps the most dignified engraving for a dial-face is a chart showing the lines of latitude, signs of the zodiac, etc. Such a face is,
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Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 187
of course, a costly one, as the drawing must be made with astronomical precision and copied by a skilled workman. I give on page 187 such a dial-face from
Dial-face with Lines of the Zodiac. Owned by Author.
my collection. It is about ten inches square, of finest workmanship, dated 1812; a most attractive piece of work. The dial on the church porch at
1 88 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
Eyam (facing page 64) shows the lines of the tropics and the equinoctial.
On this page is given Captain Bailey's fine dial, which tells the seasons. This dial exhibits beauti- fully, not only the comparative obliquity and direct- ness of the sun's light, which is the primary cause of the seasons, but it also shows the rapidity of what in nautical terms is called the sun's decli- nation and entry into the signs of the zodiac. As the sun gets higher, the dial's shadow goes down ; then it crawls from Can- cer up through Leo and Virgo to Libra, and so on. The signs of the zodiac are shown in bronze on the pedestal of Mr. Reid's dial. Being an absolute symbol of the progress of time, they are a natural and beautiful emblem for the decoration of pedestal as well as dial-face, and have appeared on many. Save in the simplest sym- bol they cannot become a common decoration, as they would be too costly a one, whether cast in metal or carved in wood or stone. There is a wide range of decorative forms to choose from, and many of them quaint indeed. They ever have had a fascina-
Captain Bailey's Seasons'-dial.
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 189
tion for me since my childhood, when I gazed with bewildered curiosity upon their representation in old almanacs. From almanacs more ancient than those of my youthful days, many hints may be obtained for sun-dial designs. We can scarcely go back to Babylon where, 2000 B.C., the zodiac was formed ; but one of the oldest drawings of the zodiac is in an astronomical manuscript of the fourteenth century, in the Chetham Library. Each month has a picture medallion as a device, and each line of the following verses is explanatory of the device of month: —
" Over yis fire I warme myn handes. Wyth yis spade I delve myn landes. Here knitte I my vynes in springe. So merie I hear yese foulis singe. I am as joly as bird on bouz, Here wede I corn, clene I houz. Wyth yis sythe my medis I mowe. Here repe I myn corn so lowe. Wyth ys flayl I yresche my bred. Here sovve I my vvhete so red. Wyth ys knyf I styk my swyne. Welcome Christmasse wyth Ale and Wyn."
These spirited verses have a real Chaucerian ring ; and it amuses me to see that the spring house- cleaning is not a Yankee invention. This old manu- script contains an astrological volvelle, an instrument mentioned by Chaucer. It has seemed strange to me to be able to buy within a year one of these astrological volvelles, made, I am sure, from an- cient patterns in evidence since Chaucer's day. This old manuscript must be the original Farmer's Alma- nac ; and the French Kalendrier des Eergers is equally
190 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
longeval. I may be permitted to gossip a bit about almanacs since they have a cousinship with sun-dials. Zodiacal symbolism was conspicuous in mediaeval art. Nearly all the French cathedrals of the twelfth to fourteenth centuries have the signs of the zodiac painted or cut on their gates. Of course the zodiac of Notre Dame in Paris is the best known. Several English churches have zodiacal decoration, some be- ing very elaborate. In Padua there was a curious sun-dial of the months, wherein the sun's rays struck in turn the twelve symbols, which were painted by Giotto. The superb dial on the Church of Our Lady at Munich, with the signs of the zodiac, is shown in this book. Our modern hieroglyphics representing the signs of the zodiac were known in the tenth century. The signs of the zodiac are four thousand years old. Those of the Oriental lands — as for instance the zodiacal signs of India — are beautiful and decorative to a degree. Let us remain on our own continent, and take the calendar of the Aztecs, and we at once have a wonderful field of beauty, variety, and suggestion. The "age" of the Mexican calendar was fifty-two years ; this was com- posed of four cycles, each of thirteen years. The single year was named significantly a word meaning new grass. The cycles were designated as the flint,'' rabbit, cane, and house. Nothing could be more beautiful or appropriate for a dial-face than the Mexican representation of a cycle as shown on page 191. The outer edge was painted with an encircling snake holding the tip of its tail in its mouth and having a twist or knot in its body at each
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 191
of the four cardinal points ; within was a close bor- der of the four cycle symbols each recurring thirteen times. Within this were the signs of the month.
The Aztec symbol for the year and the month is equally beautiful and appropriate ; the former having in the centre their emblem of the sun, with a strik- ing border of the designs for the eighteen months ; while the Aztec month was di- vided in simi- lar manner into days. These are within the com- pass of any
skilled designer and workman, either in brass-
engraving or stone-cutting. A truly glorious
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sun-dial, one of profound his- toric association and of exquisite fitness for the purpose, might be made by adopting the design of the Aztec calendar- stone dug up in the city of Mexico a hundred years ago, and so eloquently described and explained by Gama, see page 193. This great sun stone is about nine feet in diameter. In the centre is a drawing of the sun as usually painted by the Mexicans, and this is surrounded by beautiful hieroglyphics. Of course the careful workmanship of this remarkable carving
Aztec Calendar.
192 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
need not be copied ; but the suggestive outlines and general shape could be followed, and with won- derful effect. As every line of this Mexican dial had a sun-meaning, its appropriateness would equal its elegance. The Peruvians had similar calendar- stones, also with beautiful decoration.
It will doubtless be offered as demur against the use of these Aztec designs the fact that they would be costly. They certainly would be when hand- wrought in stone or metal for a pillar-dial, and the pedestal would be costly, too. But simpler materials may be used ; the Aztec symbols can be employed for a vertical dial, they can be painted in colors on wood. For the wall of a summer-house or as the decoration on any outbuilding, such as stable, barn, granary, storehouse, I think this Aztec sun-dial would be strikingly ornamental. And any object that has a story, just in that is satisfying.
The earliest-known symbol in the world, the widest-known symbol, and, I think, the most fascinating symbol is the swastika. Extended and varied is its bibliography. The most accurate ac- count of it is the monograph of several hundred pages prepared and printed for the National Museum at Washington. Of this I must tell that it was sent me by an enthusiastic man of science, who wrote, " I believe we have here every existing exponent of the swastika in the known world." I had the pleasure of sending to him, in a few hours after the receipt of his letter, a domestic swastika which was not included in the book : a square of an old patch- work quilt ; an everyday design found in old farm-
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 193
houses in New England, where it is named, in a triumph of irrelevance, Bonaparte's Walk.
Great speculation has been made over the rela- tion between the swastika and the sun, because the
Aztec Calendar-stone.
two signs have been associated by primitive peoples. The sun-symbols of the bronze age were the swastika, the ring-cross, the wheel-cross, indicat- ing the sun-car ; the triskele or three-armed cross ; the S-shape or sun-snake ; in Egypt, the sun-ship.
194 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
In the Kensington Museum is a large bronze trum- pet found in a bog in Wismar, Germany, near the Baltic Sea. It may have been used in sun-worship, for it is covered with borders and ornaments com- posed of these sun-symbols.
I would employ as a beautifully symbolic decora- tion for a sun-dial the sun-signs of this Wismar horn. They are simple ; and could easily be stamped with a die, or cut in stone or metal by a very plain work- man. It would be a pretty design and a meaning one, and would serve for pedestal and dial-face. The swastika alone would serve as a suitable decora- tion in all its varying forms. I offer this as a sug- gestion to some Arts and Crafts Society, that they employ their prentice-hands in making a line of inexpensive sun-dials decorated with the sign of the swastika. It is not the purpose of this book to introduce dial designs ; but the lack of originality, or rather the lack of notions of adaptation, in nearly all our dial designs is really surprising. Lack of design ! why I can think of half a dozen notions for decoration and design as I sit here writing.
A study of the symbolism and mythology of the aboriginal races of the new world affords ample evidence of the appropriateness of their word-pictures, hieroglyphics, and sculptures as designs for sun-dials. These evidences cannot even be named. The real being of the sun-dial is, of course, based upon the cardinal points, the progress of the sun, light and shade. Among the red men the adoration of the cardinal points was universal ; so deep was this adora- tion, this familiarity, that the Indian ever had the
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Seven Ages of Man. From Ancient Block Print.
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 195
points of the compass present in his own mind, and upon his tongue as well. His very existence as a hunter depended upon this knowledge. When his slow progress had brought him in the secrets of nature from the motions of the sun to the radicals of arith- metic, he took all knowledge as proofs of the sacred- ness of the four cardinal points. The world of the Mexicans was also to them a square world, literally hung up by cords at the sides, they thought; the ancient cities of Mexico, Quito, and others were equally quartered ; their palaces were all square.
Their temples were built with as due regard for the exact point of the compass as were the churches of old England or the farm-houses of old New England. The government form was quadruplicate. The Inca was lord of the four quarters of the earth. Possession was taken by throwing a stone or a fire-brand to each of the cardinal points. Study any faithful pictures of Indians, and see the ceaseless reiteration of the number four and the cardinal points. In many of the picture-writings even the days of the week are placed north, south, east, and west. The four yearly festivals of the Aztecs and Peruvians, their four points, their invocation of the cardinal points, their mourning for four years, their four ancestors, their four worlds and four ages, - -I could multiply these examples. The four gods of the winds were called upon by them as did the prophet Ezekiel call on the four winds in the Bible, as still do the Thibetans, the Chinese, the Parsees, the Brahmins.
The veneration of the cardinal points familiarized
196 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
these races with the symbol, which, beyond all others, has fascinated the human mind apart from its reli- gious significance, — the cross. The missionaries of the Church of Rome did not bring the cross to America ; they found the races of the new world employing the cross as an ancient emblem. In rain invocations, in fire-making, in mound-building, in many times and places, the cross was used, ever pointing each arm to one of the cardinal points of the compass.
All these things prove to us, as do hundreds of other examples, the dignity of simple numbers and the honored place of mathematics, — of dialling, among other branches ; and also show the absolute truth of Kepler's saying that the universe is an har- monious whole, and that numbers, like all nature, are in unison with the mysteries of religion. The beauty of numbers is not revealed to all ; favored souls like Frankenstein perceive it everywhere in nature, find the world filled with wonderful and beautiful forms. Had he lived to tell us bow to see, we, too, might find beauty where now is naught but unmean- ing lines. His discovery of the universal principle of pure mathematics, his magic reciprocals and har- monic responses, partake of the charm of magic rather than of mathematics.
The Shakespeare lover will find in the pages of the dramatist infinite variety of suggestion for dial design as for dial motto. None could be more fitting than the "seven ages of man." I should, for a dial, take none of the finished fancies of modern sculptors and painters, but some of the cruder
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 197
notions of earlier days, such, for instance, as a large block-print in the British Museum (facing page 194). Every line of this is significant and every word.
The verses should be read across the page. They are but doggerel Latin. The stages of man's life have been divided into ten in ancient manuscripts ;
Four Seasons' Dial-face.
but Hippocrates (460-357 B.C.) and Proclus (412— 485 A.D.) made seven ages. A mosaic on the pave- ment of the cathedral at Siena, supposed to have been laid in 1476, gives seven ages. This block- print is believed to be older still.
The four seasons offer naturally suggestions for a dial-face. These are known to many nations, and the crude symbolism can be made to fit a dial-face in
Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
quaint form. This fine dial-face with the designs of four seasons is made by F. Barker & Son, London. As four figures supporting a pedestal, the Sea- sons are seen on the dial at Wroxton Abbey, Ox- fordshire.
The figure of Father Time bearing the dial is significant, and has been often employed on vertical dials, on window-dials, and also cast in lead or bronze, or carved in marble for garden- dials. Here is one of Time and Cupid cut in stone. Real passing of Time has had its effect on the faces, as on human faces, which are now grotesque instead of roguish and severe. Among the " Naturall ' sources of emblematic design for sun-dials, and especially for garden-dials, no more delightful or well-filled stores can be found than in the botanic world. This might be in the direct application of conventionalized ornament from a single plant, — the seed, root, stem, leaf, and flower could all afford detail which would indicate the life of a flower for a year. The Lotus designs offer an already worked out and thoroughly finished scheme
Sun-dial at Belton House, Lincoln- shire ; Seat of Earl Brownlow.
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 199
of emblematic decoration. From this is an easy step to flower language. A sun-dial might have a floral design which readily could speak in the words of old Dr. Donne in his Elegie : —
" In these the alphabet Of flowers ; how they devisedly being set And bound up, might with speechless secrecy Deliver errands mutely and mutually."
Leigh Hunt wrote, with his customary lightness of touch, of
" Saying all one feels and thinks In clever daffodils and pinks ; In puns of tulips ; and in phrases Charming for their truth, of daisies Uttering as well as silence may, The sweetest words the sweetest way."
The maidens of Hindoo and Persian races can easily interpret messages of love indicated by flowers, and other messages can be conveyed with equal exactness. There was a day in France when a springing Violet set at the hour of dawn on a dial's face would read, " Another morn will bring to us Napoleon again ! ' and floral decoration might be chosen that would speak in full the lesson of the sun-dial as we each interpret it. Messrs. F. Barker & Son of London have an ornate dial-face show- ing a flower for each month of the year.
An intimate study of the floral art of Japan would afford many suggestions for the floral design on a sun-dial, not only a study of one flower, but its grouping with other flowers and leaves, its man-
2OO Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
ner of growth, its age, its fixed position, and its formal signification, — all would have bearing. Jap- anesque lines of great simplicity could be used for the pedestal. I can fancy the distinction of such a sun-dial set in an Iris garden or in front of a Wistaria arbor.
Floral Dial-face. F. Barker & Son, London.
In the choice of a plant for supplying decorative motives for a sun-dial in our own country, I have a fancy for native American plants. Many of our com- mon flowers offer fine forms for conventionalized ornament. Let me glance from my window and choose at random from the borders of old-fashioned flowers. Many which we fancy are native came, we discover, from the Orient ; but here is one whose name tells a tale of American nativity, while the
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 201
plant offers also suitable forms for our use. It is the Spiderwort, — Tradescantia Virginica^ — interest- ing in our early history as being one of the first of our plants to find a home in England, being carried there from Virginia by the botanical explorer, Tra- descant, before 1629. The plant perpetuates his name and that of his father, " an ingenious curious gardener" to Charles I.
The pretty French name is Ephemerie de Virginie. It has a peculiar fitness for a sun-dial decoration since the flowers open only in the daytime, and for a single day. The flowering of this plant is of great scientific beauty and perfection; the buds in the umbel hang down, are gracefully recurved; but just before the flower opens in the morning sun they stand erect, and when the flower fades, the withered flower and seeds once more bend down. This should be the motive in the hour markings, and can be exquisitely carried out. Under a magnifying glass the plant has additional beauty in the delicate stamens clothed in silky fibres and the gracefully poised anther; these offer lines for the gnomon. It is such a cheerful, sensible plant in real life ; never greedily spreading though perfectly hardy, living happily either in damp or arid ground; it needs no care, but sturdily opens its cheerful blue or white blos- soms both in our old gardens and in many a wild location. It has scant medicinal qualities in spite of its name, and a belief that it would cure the bite "of that Great Spider," an imaginary creature of the old herbalists. I was always told as a child that the plant was called Spiderwort because the sharply
2O2 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
bent grassy leaves resembled a spider's legs, which they certainly do ; they can be modelled in conven- tional forms for the dial pedestal, to give an effect of great stability.
An ancient writer, Guillim, says of the Colum- bine, " 'Tis pleasing to the eye in respect of its seemly shape." Its seemly shape and the fact that it is a native American plant make it also suitable for the decoration of a sun-dial. Any study of its growth, the form of sepals, petals, stamens, will afford ample suggestions for design.
I find that a true love of flowers is in general allied to a love for the philological derivation of the plant name, and at any rate with a desire to know the his- tory of the plant. Of course I have a special interest in the Tulip because I knew it in Persia when I lived there in my first incarnation in that land of sunlight and flowers.
Many books have been written upon Roses and Lilies. There is a Daffodil book, a Crocus book, but none on the Tulip, though it has had a his- tory worthy of extended record, — a more varied and extended history, indeed, than has the Daffodil. But the Tulip, though admired by all — by nearly all — and certainly beloved of the Dutch people, is not a flower of sentiment, as is the Rose, the Daffodil, the Lilac, the Pansy. The Dutch people showed their admiration for the Tulip in many ways subordinate to the incontrovertible one of placing their liking on a moneyed basis ; they used it as the chief of decorative work whether in woodwork, pottery, painting, or embroidery. The
Sun-dial in Yard of Friends' Meeting-house, Germantown,
Pennsylvania.
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 203
Tulip is a curious design, not only in the elaborate crewel embroidery of bed-hangings and petticoats, but in quilts of patchwork piecing, in homespun and home-woven bed coverlets of linen and wool, and also in a curious knitted stitch used in counter- panes, bed valances, and the like. The Tulip was as omnipresent in worsted and metal within Dutch doors as it flaunted in scarlet and yellow bloom in Dutch borders. It was seen in Dutch metal work, stamped in brass, and wrought in iron; and I have a pewter teapot incised with a Dutch motto and Tulip design.
Among the people of German extraction known commonly as " Pennsylvania Dutch," the Tulip held as honored a place as in Holland itself. On the iron fire-back of the open chimney, on the tiles of the close stove, the Tulip design was ever found. Scant petalled Tulips sprung up around the sturdy four- poster, the family bed ; they twined like a vine around these posts defying all rules of botany. They were carved on the wooden bowls and spoons ; even the wooden shoes bore a carved Tulip as a tulipette, just as the silken shoe of the English maid bore a silk and lace rosette. Here is a busk carved by a sturdy Pennsylvania Dutch lover; no amorous hearts and darts, no silly love-knots, garland this fierce bar of wood. The Tulip had a better significance for both man and maid. And her linen apron, an apron of strong homespun linen, wears a band in red and blue crewels embroidered ; not in Rosebuds or Lilies of the Valley, like this pretty and frail India muslin trumpery of English Cicely ; but here, again, is a
204 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
Honestone Dial-face from Saxony, with Coats-of-arms. Date, 1760.
Owned by Author.
goodly red Tulip with blue and yellow leaves spring- ing from the apron's hem. Truly — to paraphrase an English rhymster, —
" Her long slit Sleeves, stiff Buske, Puffed Verdingale With Tulips thus make her Angelicall."
Tulips of more graceful form were wrought in the clasps of the neck-chains and chatelaines of silver
Symbolic Designs for Sun-dials 205
worn by the goodwives of these Pennsylvania settlers, as they rode to the Sunday services of their curious sectaries, or chatted on their neighbors' " stoops " on Saturday night. I have seen a chatelaine key bag, and keys all wrought with a stiff Tulip design. And the clasps of Bible and hymn-book which sometimes hung on these silver chains bore also a design of Cross and Tulip, which was a prime favorite.
Of the "Three R's " of an ordinary education in colonial times, writing was ever the most esteemed, the most imperative ; and in general penmanship was fine. To write ill was deemed a disgrace. Spelling was rampantly varied, but writing must be good. It was easy to write with elegance with a quill pen, and whether elegant or inelegant in its results, there was a still greater value : never, so it is asserted, does he who writes with a quill pen have that dread disease of the nerves, writers' cramp. I may add, in pass- ing, another assertion as to writers' cramp: the con- stant employment of a lead pencil in writing will help sadly to produce that distressing affliction.
Now from all this infinite variety of Tulip design there is certainly ample choice for sun-dial decora- tion and form, and had I time for the doing of it, I know I could shape out a Tulip sun-dial which would be perfect in a Dutch garden. It should not too closely resemble the Tulips all a-row around it, for that were tiresome ; but the severe and scant lines of the dial pedestal should be the long grass lines of the Tulip leaves, and the dial-head should open to show somewhat of a Tulip face.