I can’t help but be drawn to illustrations of cosmology. They are frequently telling, and often like watching a train wreck. If, that is, a train wreck were to be suspended and labeled in a timeless clockwork quiet, evoking a fearful symmetry, closure and smugness.
Which is why this illustration by Orance Finé, in his La Sphere du Monde, from 1549, is so striking in it’s childlike simplicity:
For a context and to see some of Finé’s more fearful clockworks: BibliOdyssey.