Outakes from Maze Chapter

From Maze

Mazes in Puzzlebooks

According to Kern, the oldest depiction of a maze, which is also a maze, dates back to 1200 B.C. The emergence of maze puzzle-books, however, is considerably more contemporary.

Giovanni Fontana has been given the status as the father of the multicursal maze, back at "the dawn of humanism, about 1420" (Kern 136). "Fontana describes three ancient labyrinth structures; he made his design like that of Daedalus" (138). The earliest of his inscriptions (p. 138) was found in Venice and dates back to 1420. (Kern 138). 600 years ago.

Puzzle-book mazes as we know them today... (Jeremy is going to chime in here, still)

Convergence at this time of several domains, all emphasizing branching narrative choices, narratively immersive environments, and interactivity: tabletop wargamming’s shift to Tolkienesque underground fantasy, interactive fiction, Choose Your Own Adventure gamebooks.

RPGs

Dungeons and Dragon as the prototypical second-person tabletop RPG game. (Will dig up some old DM manuals and D&D modules, to see what's in there about mazes.)

Game Books

While Choose Your Own Adventure books are not strictly mazes, the emulate the labyrinthine aspect of mazes, of facing crossroads with multiple paths. (Question: does any CYOA book actually have a maze in it? Maybe one of the Zork ones?)

A notable book that literalizes the maze-like aspect of CYOA books is the 1985 appropriately named Maze, by Christopher Manson (published by MacMillan in 1985) (online version)

SCRAPS

Arguably one of the most intriguing characteristics of 10-Print is the maze-like pattern it produces. Or is this output actually a maze? The history of mazes, particularly in Western culture, does not answer that question easily. Nor does the attempt to call this a maze as distinct from a labyrinth, though the latter term seems to be sedimenting with the meaning of elaborate and twisting unicursal passageway. Retrieved from "http://weizenbaum.mit.edu/mediawiki/index.php/Mazes_Chapter" _______________________ The Egyptian section:

The Cretan myth has inspired archaeologists to search for the ruins of such a labyrinth. Nonetheless, the structure may have its origins in Egypt, where Herodotus describes a labyrinthine building:

Inside, the building is of two stories and contains three thousand rooms, of which half are underground, and the other half directly above them. I was taken through the rooms in the upper storey...and it is hard to believe that they are the work of men; the baffling and intricate passages from room to room and from court to court were an endless wonder to me, as we passed from a courtyard into rooms, from rooms into galleries, from galleries into more rooms and thence into yet more courtyards.

Herodotus found it "hard to believe" that the upper rooms were "the work of men." They were "an endless wonder" to him. Mazes inspire awe with their intricacies and complexities and their designers become the stuff of legends. There is a fascination with the manner of their construction perhaps most because their patterns are not obvious at first glance. They are a masterful construction of obfuscation and entanglement. ___________

Williams notes that this labyrinth is not a puzzle. Nonetheless, it appears on coins, walls, and other ancient surfaces including some graffiti scratched on a pillar in Pompeii. Despite its Cretan origins, the Cretan Labyrinth comes to be known as "Troy-town" or "City of Troy," a name which will re-emerge referring to the English turf mazes.

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Other Egyptian Labyrinths date back to 3400 BCE and a labyrinth in the tomb of King Perabsen of the Second Dynasty. In her book, Mazes and Labyrinths of the World, Janet Bord examines appearances of maze in other parts of the globe. For example, she mentions the “long barrows, megalyths, camps and henges of Britain and north-west Europe” as signs that these sorts of patterns, labyrinthine or maze-like, were “not in the first instance diffuse outward from an original birthplace, but developed independently in more than one area” (10).

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The search for the antecedent of the physical mazes perhaps is the wrong path to pursue. The history of mazes should not start with the earliest mention or depiction of mazes but with the formulation of walled architecture or social spaces with intersecting passages. Furthermore cave structures, for example, the paths modeled in Adventure, offer naturally occurring mazes. So while the location or shape of this mythical maze becomes a grail quest, the labyrinth becomes the icon of the story of the maze and the two concepts become entangled. Mazes and labyrinths become places of beastial horror, puzzles that require the collusion of paramours. Mazes become elevated into the pantheon of heroic challenges, literally the stuff of legends. Without a doubt, this mythological status has fueled the search for physical mazes and labyrinths from antiquity to the present.

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Making mazes out of plants does not end with turf, but becomes the sign of wealth in the the hedge-row mazes. One famous example included Louis XIV's hedge maze featured 39 fountains and "cost the equivalent of more than three million dollars to build" (Pickover 16). Another mythical example was the Bower of "Fair Rosamond," which reportedly hid the mistress of King Henry II (A.D. 1133-1189). The maze in this case hid not a terrible beast but instead protected an illicit paramour. However, by one account, discovered by the queen, she was forced to choose between the bowl of poison and a dagger. She met her fate at the bottom of the bowl (Miller 164). ______________________