A Modern Analogue to the Redhorn Panel Map

In today's America, the most easily recognized symbols are probably those of sport franchises. These are connected to locales much as certain divinities were connected to stars and their places in the sky. Using contemporary symbols, we can create a map rather like that of Picture Cave.

A Modern Analogue to the Redhorn Panel Map	The Modern Map with a State Outline Map Subtended

Someone who happened to be familiar with the symbolic valence or mere identity of the objects contained in the picture could understand that it is mapping out the relative positions of a number of geographic entities. The only geographical outline is a sketchy rendering of the state of Kentucky. This is like the inverted deer of the cave painting, which is rendered in imperfect outline. As is well known in America, the Viking and the Bear represent two rival football teams, the Minnesota Vikings and the Chicago Bears. The ocular symbols on them mark the position of Minneapolis and Chicago, respectively. The bear is reaching out with a measure of hostility towards the man. This is analogous to Redhorn whose dot marks the place of Alnilam, reaching out (some think in an unfriendly way) to White Plume, whose dot marks the place of Sirius. The winged lunar symbol is shaped like the moon itself. This is captured in the modern analogue by representing the state of Michigan like a right-handed mitten, to which its shape is often compared. The wings are those of their hockey team, the Detroit Red Wings. Like its Picture Cave analogue, the modern version is shaped like the object that it denotes and is also winged in a symbolically revealing way. In the Redhorn Panel, at the far right the constellation known as "Deer Head," which we call the "Pleiades," is placed at the base of a deer head, so that the identity of names makes clear the position of what asterism is thus marked. This would be like marking the position of Winchester, Virginia by the trigger of a winchester rifle. In identifying the name of the rifle, one immediately understands to what city it must apply.