f68r: inspired by the Star-Mantle?

[MarcoP]

What do you all think about this artifact as a parallel for the 68r folios?

This certainly is a fascinating object. I haven't read the paper by David Ganz you linked, so this are just superficial impressions. At first sight, I see these points that might parallel the two diagrams f68r1/2:

• both the mantle and the diagrams represent labeled celestial bodies (if VMS stars are stars after all)
  
• both artifacts appear to be images of the cosmos (this is explicitly stated by the inscriptions on the mantle, but only a hypothesis for the VMS diagrams)
  
• if the mantle once was circular, they also share a circular shape
  
• personifications of the Sun and the Moon appear prominently in both artifacts (but in the mantle they are full figures, while only heads appear in the VMS)
  

Differences:

• the Voynich diagrams are illustrated by undifferentiated "stars" (but for details like size, the number of "spikes" or the precence of a central circle - these details might all be or not be accidental); the mantle is illustrated by recognizable traditional figures of the constellations (a snake for Hydra, a dog for Canis Major, two people for Gemini etc) and personifications of the seven planets
  
• the Voynich diagrams are a couple with two symmetric poles represented by the Sun and the Moon; in the mantle, the most important point seems to be the central hole corresponding to the emperor's head
  
• quite curiously, the mantle contains a planisphere made of two circles (bottom left You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view., top center You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.); these two objects are quite more complex than the figures of the single constellations; these two details are properly constellation maps and might be per-se somehow comparable with the two Voyinch diagrams (if they are star maps)
  
• the mantle includes Christian elements that seem absent in the more abstract VMS diagrams: e.g. Saint Mary (assimilated to a star "stella maris inclita"), a cross with the four canonical symbols of the evangelists (above the label You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)