This weeks 'scientists labouring under assumptions of superiority' story comes to us courtesy of live science.comThe inlaid patterned tiles grace the walls of many structures worldwide, in patterns of mind-boggling intricacy called "girih." Historians have always assumed that medieval architects meticulously developed the patterns with basic tools....
Most mosaic tile walls in medieval Islamic buildings are based on a polygon and star pattern, with lines atop them creating a zip-zag look [image]. Since polygons don't fit together properly without near-perfect symmetry, it would have been very challenging to make the patterns look right, historians say, but they assumed a basic straight-edge and compass were used to get the job done.
Ok, look again at those dazzling tile murals and imagine some potter struggling away with ruler and compass. Not a convincing argument to start with. Why are scholars surprised to find what seems to amount to a 13th Century pattern book being used across the region? It would be nice to read something about ancient ceramics in the press, just the once, that didn't demonstrate how removed from the process of making the 'experts' have become.
Cobalt, the mineral usually used for the blue in glazes in ceramics is pretty tricky to work with, a little goes a really long way, and only when it's fired does it look blue. Now if they were to find the test tiles and the glaze recipes that were also probably doing the rounds with the patterns...
that would be wonderful, but they are probably not looking for that...
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