crocodile mystery

In my last post, I described this month’s crocodile mystery as more of a rhetorical device than a question to be answered: what does this box prompt us to imagine what might be? All images in this post can be…

I’m a bit early with the March crocodile, but sometimes it’s hard not to wish February done. And so here’s another variation on our crocodile mystery theme, this time asking you not what an item is, but what it might…

So the short answer to last week’s crocodile mystery is that this is a picture of Gwen Lally in the role of Henry V: Gwen Lally as Henry V How did I know that’s who this was? Well, click on…

Something a little bit different with this month’s crocodile mystery: this is an object that I both know and don’t know what it is. At one level, it’s not hard to figure out what is being depicted. But who and…

No, it’s not Lady Gaga’s hairline or the frizz on one of those creepy troll dolls. These were not real guesses from our readers, but the musings of Collation editorial staff when faced with an absence of comments to our…

To welcome you all into 2013 and back to The Collation’s regular posting schedule, we offer this crocodile mystery for you to ponder: As always, leave your thoughts below and the answer will be revealed next week!

As three of you immediately identified in your comments, last week’s crocodile mystery was the fastening in the center of a volvelle, holding the various layers in place and allowing them to turn: volvelle from Cortes’s Breve compendio, leaf 37r…

If it’s a new month, it must be time for a new crocodile mystery, and so: click to enlarge As always, we invite your your thoughts below on what this might be and what we might learn from it!

The main trick with November’s “crocodile” was having to figure out the scale. It looks at first glance like a woolly button on a pin-striped shirt: The November ‘Crocodile’ But when a ruler is included in the shot, you can…

And now, for your viewing pleasure, we present this month’s crocodile mystery. What is it? How was it made? What size is it? Would it sell well as a postcard in the Folger gift shop? This caption intentionally blank. Please…

So last week’s crocodile mystery was nailed by Aaron Pratt within a half-hour of my posting: what you see below is, as he notes, an embroidered binding depicting David and Goliath and covering a Book of Psalms, in this instance,…

Once again, given the vagaries of The Collation’s schedule and upcoming federal holidays, I’m posting the next month’s crocodile mystery at the end of this month. So don’t worry about how quickly the year is flying by: it is still September…