Why the Notes Get So Small
A symbolic diagram has to show relationships at a glance: a mark may be read in connection with its position, neighboring marks, or the pattern as a whole. Practitioners therefore often keep explanations close to the part of the diagram they interpret. The margin becomes a working space, not an empty border—and space runs out quickly.
To fit more onto the page, writers may compress words, rely on familiar shorthand, or write in very small script. Some notes may make sense mainly to the person who made them, because that reader already knows the system and the associations behind each mark. To someone else, the page can resemble a secret code, even when it is simply a crowded set of working annotations.
A Diagram Is Also a Record of Interpretation
These pages combine a visual arrangement with the practitioner’s reading of it. Keeping the interpretation beside the relevant symbol helps preserve which observation belongs where; moving everything into a separate explanation could make those connections harder to follow. The tradeoff is legibility: the more meaning a practitioner tries to keep within one compact diagram, the less room remains for ordinary handwriting.
