The adept with the flask of the four elements

J. K., who wrote the 1920 elucidation, 1920 “A man clothed in red robe, with a red cap and a purple outer cloak. In his left hand he holds a long-necked flask, cucurbit, or glass retort, which is one-third filled with a yellowish transparent fluid, partly luminous, and to which he is pointing with his right finger thoughtfully, whilst walking upon the foreground of a beautiful lansdcape.” Splendor Solis, the English of 1920, page 43, the description of the second picture.

Symbolica Let us go to seek the natures of the four elements. The words run along the ribbon on the sheet itself, gold on black, and the archive reads them there as well as in the book. J. K. prints lansdcape for landscape and the archive leaves the slip where he set it.

Tap a motif on the picture, or a line below. Its note opens under the line, with the reading its author gave it.

1. Primary motif
2. 1The Vesselthe long-necked flask in his left hand, and the lettered ribbon flowing from its neck
3. Secondary motifs · 1
4. 2The Handthe right hand raised towards the glass, one finger out

A bearded man in a red robe and red cap with a purple cloak, carrying a long-necked flask a third full of yellow fluid, a black ribbon lettered in gold flowing from its neck, one finger raised towards the glass. By eye

The picture read whole, in the archive's words, from the sources quoted on the marks. Read on, and the picture follows: the motif under discussion keeps its colour.

Decoded: every motif is marked, and each mark carries the reading its author gave it, quoted from the text, or says that it is observed on the picture and not read. The reading above is the archive's own, made from those sources and no others.