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  Date of hypothetical medieval exemplar? [Thought experiment]
Posted by: Koen G - 25-03-2017, 09:16 PM - Forum: Voynich Talk - Replies (5)

I believe the VM images ultimately go back to a number of pre-medieval sources. This thread is NOT about that. It's about what could have happened in between. For any material to be carried from let's say the first century to the fifteenth, it is reasonable to assume a number of intermediate steps. Copies, additions, reinterpretations, updates, translations, and perhaps in our case, transcriptions.

We know that the physical object has been created in the early 15th century. This is one of the few things we can build upon with relative certainty. But, as you well know, any contents of a medieval manuscript, whether it be text, image or both, are not unlikely to have existed in some form earlier. Copies were made, traditions formed, fragments from various sources combined, altered, commented upon, and so forth.

There are a number of images in the VM which are medieval without a doubt. The crossbow, the castle walls on the rosettes foldout... I would like to find out when these were added. For example, is it possible that the VM was copied from a 10th century work? 

I will phrase this in a very concrete question:

What is the terminus post quem for a hypothetical medieval document from which the VM was copied?

  • For the imagery?
  • For the script?
Obviously things that pertain to the physical makeup of the manuscript are unlikely to help us much here, since they depend on the availability of materials to the 15th century scribes. But apart from that, which parts of the manuscript unambiguously point towards an early 15th century context?

I also have no idea when the script could have been given its current form. Are there indications that the script must have been a 15th century creation? For the record, this is not an idea I'd oppose, since to me this would mean that a source text was transcribed in the 15th century, which would be extremely interesting to know. But if this glyph set might as well have been a product of the 13th century, then that's interesting as well.

So has anyone studied any of this?

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  f3r
Posted by: Wladimir D - 23-03-2017, 03:00 PM - Forum: Imagery - Replies (5)

As you can see, these two drawings of the plant are similar. I took them from the article under the link Marco / Rene You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. on page 152.
   
One of the options for identifying this plant is Tussilago.
Translation from the Russian folk name of this plant - "mother and stepmother".
The top of the leaves is smooth and cold to the touch - it's a stepmother.
The underside of the leaves, pubescent and warm is the mother.
The red band at You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. MV can mean heat. Dots on a white background, as explained by JKP, can mean - pubescent leaves.
The absence of colors in MV You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is also explainable, Since this plant leaves grow 2-4 weeks after the death of flowers.

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  to do: long words visual inspection
Posted by: Davidsch - 22-03-2017, 02:48 PM - Forum: Analysis of the text - Replies (3)

(I hesitate to post this, because I always get "what do you mean" and "why don't you do it yourself" reactions on my thread postings, 
but, hey,  let's try it again, the worst thing that could happen is a ban.)

This question came to my mind and it needs investigating. It concerns long words, words longer than 7 characters. 

So, 8,9 10...+ long. 

Question:   Are they really long words by visual inspection?


Currently I do not have the time, but it's pity if this idea goes wasted.
In time I can do an automated statistical count and part break down analysis in order to check those results, or we can do it independently,
the most work is some visual inspection.

The longest words are:

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  Theory-building and data collection: let's talk about
Posted by: Diane - 21-03-2017, 12:48 PM - Forum: Voynich Talk - Replies (5)

Tried to start this conversation in another thread, but it got tangled with other stuff.

N.B> This is not about people; not about anyone's work; not about personal picture archives. 

Given that what is being termed 'data-collection' isn't so much - more a typing in of search parameters to the catalogue of a pictorial archive - how do we ensure we don't mislead those who might rely on our work in doing their own?

Important consideration, I think.  So I'd like to talk a bit about formulating a method to keep it reasonably rigorous, and avoid 'collecting data' for nothing more than providing retrospective support for a theory that might have been floating about - quite unsupported and insupportably - for decades, or even since 1912.

But if we don't already think we know what a picture is intended to say, and intended to represent, it is impossible to ask the data base to return us the matches we want it to.

It's rather  like having an archive of all known language recordings - catalogued by name, date and time of recording - when the user has only English and no deep acquaintance with the science of linguistics.

Linguistics is a science in the strict sense; iconography isn't a science in that sense and putting queries into cataloguing systems like Iconoclass doesn't make the 'matches' raw scientific data. Scientific data is verifiable and thus its potential for being proven false. 

There are all sorts of issues with the notion that those archive catalogues are appropriate to study of the Vms imagery, including the purpose for which those archives-and-catalogue were developed.  Very limited charter; similarly limited range; categories reflecting that initial purpose...

Still, better an example of the problem, so we can start talking method for solution
f. 67v (Yep, the bearded sun again)

What parameters  - what date range? 

Can't say 'fifteenth century' when the task is to provide the manuscript's imagery - just the imagery - with a correct provenance and history.  And those are what matter - not when the manuscript was made, but where and when the content was first made.

No date.

Subject matter? Objects?
Well, I think 'sun' is fairly general.  Let's agree on 'sun'








Details.

Would you say this is a male, or  female sun?  Relevant or irrelevant?  Image reflects language... female suns are not all that common... could be important for those working on the written text to know ..

But let's suppose we add 'male' to description of the picture.

What about the crossed eyes? 

Important criterion, or not?  Could be a vital indicator of some particular culture's attitude towards the sun.  Could be an accident, too, just some old scribe with shaky hands.  

Do we include 'eyes crossed' in the search parameters... or not?. 

What about the artificial beard?  Mention that?  Yes/No?  Why/why not?

But let's suppose you've run two or three refining searches and ended up with just

"500BC - 1912 AD"; "male face"; "false beard"' "squint-eyed"

Do we accept this?  Why not?* 


[Image: img-thing?.out=jpg&size=l&tid=148780501]



* ... apart from its being a modern reproduction of a traditional form.

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Brick Statements Retracted he uses to many languages and omits glyph's
Posted by: stellar - 19-03-2017, 08:02 PM - Forum: Analysis of the text - No Replies

I'm Right my logical approach includes history and a concise narrative in 3 paragraphs!  And I maintain star names as well as astrology and plants.  I'm the bomb!

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  82r: A change of plans?
Posted by: VViews - 19-03-2017, 02:09 PM - Forum: Voynich Talk - Replies (6)

Hi everyone,
Looking at 82r the other day, I noticed a line I hadn't seen before:
[Image: image.jpg?q=f82r-480-1732-243-212]
The reason this grabbed my attention is because this line seems to be some remnant of a former plan for the page, which would have been erased. Could the vertical line originally have been through the whole page?
Interestingly, at the top of the page there are two "arches", and if we consider all these elements together, I wonder if the original plan for the page may have been a two column text, nestled under two arches, as can be seen in many medieval manuscripts' layout. (the following is just a lazy grab from a quick Google search, I'm not trying to say it matches this one, but just to give an illustration of the type of layout I'm referring to):
[Image: H475_canontables.jpg] Glasgow MS Hunter 475, 12th C Sicily,  21v-22r.

I'm curious to know what others think: Could this page have been meant to be designed differently? Could the creator of the Voynich have betrayed the fact that this page was inspired by a manuscript where the layout was in a two-column format with arches at the top?

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Star I was interviewed via Podcast about the VMS
Posted by: stellar - 15-03-2017, 06:22 AM - Forum: News - No Replies

24:15 minutes into the show (Voynich Stellar talking)

1:50:38 into the show Nibiru, Apophis and Voynich Stellar Talking

I was interviewed on the Paranormal.chat, my interview begins 1:50:38 with George Senda about Nibiru, Apophis and the Voynich Manuscript !  I believe I will be interviewed again regarding the Voynich Manuscript. [Image: smiley.gif]

Thank you to all at Paranormal.chat

And if you wish to be interviewed go to 
 LiveShow 99 *** on skype

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I don't know when the next show is?
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  The existence of Culture V*
Posted by: R. Sale - 14-03-2017, 12:25 AM - Forum: Voynich Talk - Replies (4)

Just as a Chinese manuscript is clearly the product of the Chinese culture, the VMs is just as clearly not a randomly surviving artifact of Culture V*. The VMs has put on an authentic appearance and would certainly seem to be a plausible artifact of an unknown origin from the time of its creation and it would retain that appearance long afterwards. But if we want to investigate the VMs and to pin it down with facts, then a decision needs to be made about the existence of Culture V*. So the modern point of view contradicts and negates the existence of Culture V*. And thus cut off from genuine cultural origins, the VMs is revealed as an impostor, a pretender and a dissimulator. It appears to be a thing that is genuine, but it is not.

So what is the purpose of the VMs, if it is all nonsense? But the VMs is something else. It is a masquerade. The VMs is a puzzle. The VMs is a facade behind which something else is hidden. And it is difficult to hide something of a sheet of parchment and still maintain the original identity. The author, as a great dissimulator, separates the illustration of the Oresme cosmos into two parts, leaves a big clue and still maintains a connection with the original through the similarity of detail - through what has been and continues to be an unrecognized level of similar detail.

Simply by separating the cosmos into two parts, the author has confounded countless investigators. The level of detail in the VMs is such that the text contains a sophisticated use of canting based on traditional heraldic designs, that have all but evaded any modern detection. Just ask about papelonny. Knowing the name and the pattern are among the essential details needed to understand how the hidden parts work. But the availability of such detailed information was probably better disseminated among the heralds of yore (if you will) than it is among any group today. The VMs author knew the details, the scallop-shell patterned cloud band for example; things that we do not know. And this is nothing to do with obscure or arcane knowledge. These are the the details of commonplace historical and scientific facts from the relevant times, and while the basic facts have been given a simple disguise, the examination and comparison of detail, once it is known which details to examine, show strong similarities in pattern, form, number, placement and structure with the original and traditional examples. And yet, at the same time, the VMs is clearly something that is not straight forward in an expositive sense. There is no Culture V*.

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  Princeton University quoting JKP
Posted by: MarcoP - 11-03-2017, 07:47 PM - Forum: Voynich Talk - Replies (13)

I stumbled on the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. by art historian Jessica Savage discussing zodiacal Cancer and "lobster-like" crabs.
J.K.Petersen's Voynich Portal is quoted. Cool Smile

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  [split] f43v
Posted by: -JKP- - 09-03-2017, 11:13 AM - Forum: Imagery - Replies (35)

Thread split, discussion for identifying this plant can go here - KG


(09-03-2017, 09:59 AM)MarcoP wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(09-03-2017, 08:32 AM)ReneZ wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The illustration on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. allows an interesting comparison with an image in one of the Wellcome copies of the "Buch der heiligen Dreifaltigkeit": WMS 164. (Apologies if I mentioned this before).

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On the left is a 'sun plant' and on the right a 'moon plant'.

Especially the moon plant has a decent superficial similarity with the Voynich MS plant.
A dragons and some snakes also play a role here....

Thank you, Rene!
The plant on the right in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. indeed has some similarity with this specific "Lunaria". 
It's also interesting to see how common color annotations are in XV Century manuscripts. It is something I wasn't aware of, before reading your comments on the subject...


I don't think the VMS plant on the right is Lunaria (either the real Lunaria or the mythical one).

In medieval manuscripts, mythical Lunaria is almost always drawn with a central stalk with the moon- (luna-)shaped leaves running up each side. The ones that follow the myth most closely will often have one "leaf" for each day of the moon's phase.


Teasel has upturned leaves that are often depicted like "cups" and in real life the leaves of cut-leaved teasel do look like cups and catch moisture.


But note that the VMS plant is a plant with branching stems, in contrast to Lunaria (right). It's not a central stalk with moons up along the side. Teasel also has fairly substantial roots. The similarity of the VMS plant to the sample Lunaria pic is superficial if you look at the stalks and the flower-heads. I don't think teasel is the only possible ID. I know a couple of other plants that could qualify, but I think it's the most likely one. Here are some examples:

[Image: TeaselVMS.png]  [Image: 370699053caa1ed651771563b534bd03.jpg]

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