Chapter 30 Art

[Cameron]

In the His Dark Materials omnibus book there are small images at the beginnings of each chapter. Most of them can be understood quite easily (a spilled bottle for the chapter The Decanter of Tokay), but there are a few that I can't interpret. Namely, the one from chapter 30, The Clouded Mountain.

Here it is:


Does anybody know what it might represent? I've turned the internet upside down looking for any information on the art. I think they appear in other editions of the books as well, but I don't know which.

[dannyyyy]

i thought it was the artistic symbols on the walls of the clouded mountain

[aurora borealis]

I also found myself wondering what this might be.
Maybe, like dannyyyy suggested, it's a symbol on the walls of the clouded mountain, although I don't remember there being any symbols on the walls. I just read the chapter , but maybe I missed it.

Other Ideas I had, though i'm not sure:
This one kind of relates to dannyyyy's idea: The symbol in the middle looks to me a bit like a lyre (the instrument) turned on its side. and there's something resembling a cross through it... so Lyre, perhaps Lyra?, and the cross..... this is just guessing though, it might not be that at all.
My second idea is kind of strange, but anyway, it might be the small group of angels (Mrs. Coulter sees in the clouded mountain) carrying the litter, but drawn from the top, like bird's eye view.

In any case, this is indeed a rather confusing one.

[Cameron]

Hmm interesting ideas. The lyre never occurred to me; maybe it is comprised of different parts like that instead of being a whole.

One of my first thoughts was that maybe it represented the intention craft. In the chapter of that name, the craft is described as having 6 legs and odd protuberances. Thats all I've got on it though. One other idea I had was that maybe it was Metatron's scepter or something similar, if he had one that is.