What are these tiny holes?

[Jorge_Stolfi]

Btw, I can’t recall for sure (and can’t check at the moment)  but was any of that marginalia ink tested by McCrone

Yes, sample 20 was taken from an "a" in that marginal writing.  

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From the table in the main document, page 3:

Sample 20: Folio 1R, Black ink from "a" under chemical stain, 2.5 cm from top, 0.6 cm from right.  Iron gall ink (very low iron), bone black, titanium compound, binder undetermined.
   
The actual measurements (from pages 42-45 of McCroneSpectraScans-4-20.pdf) are only the element composition, summarized in the fiile ink-analyses.txt . They took 4 X-ray emission spectra from that sample, presumably from 4 different spots of the same tiny sample:

s20 f1r  marg XE1 60.85 0.15 0.76 0.42 1.09 2.94 0.20 0.67 0.96 1.65 0.00 0.82 0.23 0.21 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
s20 f1r  marg XE2 49.14 0.09 0.46 0.14 1.22 0.53 3.24 0.33 0.30 6.61 0.00 0.31 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
s20 f1r  marg XE3 49.84 0.36 0.58 0.47 2.36 4.34 0.40 0.73 1.78 2.33 0.00 1.93 0.38 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
s20 f1r  marg XE4 55.91 0.85 0.00 0.55 2.60 5.66 0.40 1.38 3.02 5.94 1.94 6.69 0.84 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00

The iron (Fe) contents is very low in two spectra (my labels XE1, XE2), low in one (XE3), and very high in one (XE4). Titanium shows up only in XE4.   Phosphorus (P) is high on spectrum XE2. 

The diagnostics "iron gall ink", "bone black" etc are not specific identifications by their instruments.  They are guesses based on those element spectra and on what they expected to find on a medieval manuscript.  They said "iron-gall" because a dark iron-containing ink on vellum manuscripts is "always" iron-gall ink. However, "very-low-iron iron-gall ink" sounds like "very-low-grape Chianti wine".  Likewise they said "bone-black" because that is the phosphorus-containing ingredient that one would expect on a medieval dark ink.

Presumably on spectrum XE4 the electron beam hit a grain of some iron oxide mineral, that often contains titanium.  But titanium would not be present in green vitriol, the "iron" ingredient of iron-gall ink.

Scribes "always" used iron-gall ink when writing on vellum, because it is waterproof and scratch-resistant.  But iron-gall is a poor choice for writing on paper.  Other formulations, like lampblack ("india" or "china") ink and sepia are better for that medium.  For one thing, iron-gall ink goes bad after a while, whereas those other formulas have indefinite shelf life. 

Whoever wrote the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. marginalia did not have any reason to use iron-gall ink -- unless he was a scribe who routinely wrote on vellum, and that was the ink he had at hand.  Marci and Barschius would probably have used the ink they used for paper...

was [the ink of the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. marginalia] considered to be the same or similar as the Voynichese ink?   If so why did it apparently react so differently to (Wilfrid’s?) chemical application? (Didn’t most of the marginalia fade/wash away where chemicals applied, whereas the main script was largely unaffected?)

The spectra of Sample 20 seem to be significantly different from those of "majority" text and drawing ink, and also from the inks used on page numbers (Sample 15) and quire numbers (Sample 18).

The ratio of copper to iron in those spectra seems to be "interesting" too.  But more on that later, maybe,

All the best, --stolfi