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+--- Thread: Some letters aren't letters (/thread-1549.html)
Some letters aren't letters - ReneZ - 23-02-2017
I made the following statement elsewhere:
(23-02-2017, 11:35 AM)ReneZ wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Suggesting that some symbols represent vowels assumes that the symbols represent either letters or sounds.
Both are natural assumptions, but I have very severe doubts about them.
The following symbols: q f p m y are demonstrably not to be identified with letters.
That's five out of (say) 25. How confident can one be that the others are?
And even if they are, what to make of a mixture of letters and non-letters?
This (naturally) caused some reactions.
To discuss such things in a meaningful way is usually difficult, because, in order to be precise, one really has to write in great detail, and chances to be misunderstood or misinterpreted are always great.
(23-02-2017, 06:47 PM)Emma May Smith wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I do not know why the characters you state are "not to be identified with letters".
I find absolutely no problem with both q and y being straightforward characters which represent phonemes. The characters f p m can be linked to other characters and have strong positional rules, suggestive of being variants.
I would like to stress that, when I wrote "letters or sounds", for me these are two different things.
Sounds = phonemes.
With letters I mean characters of an alphabet, or as in German "Buchstaben".
It is possible to show that the five I mentioned (but also the less frequent g ) are not representations of plain text characters, but the reasons (arguments) are different, and fall into three classes.
The same arguments cannot necessarily be applied to the question whether these symbols could represent phonemes, so I specifically wrote "letters". However, there are also problems with that.
Many proposed solutions of the Voynich MS text include a table that translates the Voynich symbols to plain text characters, and then present bits and pieces of plain text. (Note that "many proposed solutions" are not You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. here. I am talking about specific cases, including solutions that I have received by Email over the years).
If such a table maps the 5 or 6 characters in question to plain text characters (and especially if f p m g are not variants of other characters) there can be no doubt that this is wrong.
There is (much) more to be said about this, but not right now.
RE: Some letters aren't letters - Koen G - 23-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - -JKP- - 23-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - nickpelling - 23-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - -JKP- - 23-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - Emma May Smith - 24-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - Emma May Smith - 24-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - Anton - 24-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - ReneZ - 24-02-2017
RE: Some letters aren't letters - Koen G - 24-02-2017