The Voynich Ninja

VViews - thanks. Those priests apparently carried around two cymbals, which looked like small circles. However, I haven't seen much relevant evidence from Rome itself. Things become more interesting when we enter formerly Hellenistic territories

Back to the two circles - when I saw the thumbnail of this one, it looked intriguing, though apparently it's just wheels on a chariot in side view.
I found this image very illuminating on something else entirely though, offering a possible solution for a prominent feature of the VM... any idea? 

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(18-11-2016, 06:34 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.VViews - thanks. Those priests apparently carried around two cymbals, which looked like small circles. However, I haven't seen much relevant evidence from Rome itself. Things become more interesting when we enter formerly Hellenistic territories

Back to the two circles - when I saw the thumbnail of this one, it looked intriguing, though apparently it's just wheels on a chariot in side view.
I found this image very illuminating on something else entirely though, offering a possible solution for a prominent feature of the VM... any idea? 

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Koen, great example.

The look and feel of it, the arches, the bucket, the patterns, the "spray" of the torch, the sceptre, the headgear...


The dots/stripes motif and the "arches under the seat" show up You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. too. No chains on the arms of Cassiopeia. The arches under the seat are interesting, but I discovered that they are not uncommon. Scribes are sometimes drawn this way because their chairs were sometimes made with arches in the woodwork, but the one you linked, the one in the chariot is intriguing because I almost sense a double meaning, that the arches are part of the chariot bucket motif but also evocative of the coliseums in which some of the chariot races took place.

Also, I've been semi-assuming that the "bucket" motif in the VMS was based on loges or the bastille extensions one sees in old castles and castle walls, as both of these were the inspiration for many of the "buckets" one sees in medieval diagrams. It never occurred to me that the VMS buckets might be inspired by chariot buckets, probably because chariot buckets don't usually look this much like tubs, they are often open in the back and frequently the upper rim curves down toward the base to create an entirely different shape. I'll have to add chariot buckets (or, at least... drawings of chariot buckets), to the list of possible inspirations.


I just paged forward to You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view., to see how the illustrator drew chains, but it doesn't have them. It appears to be a braided rope.

And here we have the inspiration for the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (which reminded me that some similarities may be coincidental).  But I did find it interesting that the Libran scale had three trays.

I was about to ask about those three trays, intriguing isn't it.

Apart from the general feel that you describe, I was surprised to see a chariot drawn so clearly as a bucket. Might the VM nymph barrels be meant to evoke  chariots of the stars, wheeling around the pole? And does the pattern say something about the supposed character of the star?

These manuscripts are tricky though. Their imagery is of an unquestionable antiquity. Some aspects of their imagery are not understood by experts since so many ancient sources have been lost. But at the same time they have been copied and reinterpreted by medieval scribes.

One of my favourite examples, there's a similar ms where Virgo looks like Hitler holding a sword. These are the wonders you get when scribes make copies of copies of things that are too old for them to understand.

(17-11-2016, 09:19 PM)VViews Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I'm adding a zoomed view of the central figure of f70r2, because there are a couple of features there that really puzzle me:


Just under the figure's chin, there are two semi-circular shapes that touch the edge of the main circle. I wonder what those are?
Also, between the semi-circles and the figure's hair there appear to be some marks, but I can't tell if they are supposed to be hair or something else.
The marks on the right side (around 9pm on the inside of the circle) almost look like they could be a partially erased vord, but maybe that's just an illusion created by the extreme zoom.

I looked around to see if anything might explain those "tufts" on the bottom and found these. I didn't know where they were from, I just collected them and then looked up the time/place afterward...



It turns out this form of "shoulder veil" (I don't know what it was called) was all the rage from the mid- to late 1300s in Germany. Note that the one top-right has a chain or string of beads just brushing the forehead. I don't know if this style was found elsewhere, or if it might explain the lines below the VMS face, but it's interesting.

The tufts might be beard hairs. In some regions, most of the chin was shaved and only the surrounding area allowed to grow, resulting in long sideburns and long under-chin hairs. Here's an example of a Saxon You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and 19th century You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view..

Thanks for these examples, JKP. That top right one defitinitely bears many resemblances to the features we see in 70r2.

I also thought of sideburns or rather of sidelocks (such as payot) for the marks you describe as tufts. Unfortunately I haven't had time to look for illustrations of them for the relevant period. I'll try to do that this weekend.

I think its interesting that this figure is so androgynous, and that we are constantly switching between male and female attributes or styles to try to explain the various details.

If you google on  Cyprián Karásek Lvovický you will see his lunar eclipse diagrams, 
where the luna eyes in eclipse luminarium are looking at each other,
yes, with crooked eyes.


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Cyprián Karásek Lvovický (of Lvovice) (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.: Cyprián Karásek Lvovický ze Lvovic, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.: Cyprian von Leowitz, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.: Cyprianus Leovitius) (July 8, 1514? in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. – 1574 in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) was a You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. astronomer, mathematician and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view..

A couple more bifurcating beards. They are in a Swiss document from about 1440:

Such a beard would make sense, it is often found on kingly figures. Like this one, from Picatrix manuscript. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

I have a hard time seeing any beard on the figure though. Am I looking at it wrong?

(22-11-2016, 03:14 AM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Such a beard would make sense, it is often found on kingly figures. Like this one, from Picatrix manuscript. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

I have a hard time seeing any beard on the figure though. Am I looking at it wrong?

It depends on how one looks it it. It's a lot like that picture of vases that also look like faces depending on whether you look at the negative or positive space.

If you interpret the yellow part as a hat, for example, then the "finger" lines coming out of the cheeks could be mutton chop sideburns and the part at the bottom could be a chin beard.

If, however, if you look at the yellow part as hair, then the parts at the bottom look more like clothing, like a rolled collar or something like that.


And... it's also possible it's neither hat nor hair but the fact that there's something resembling beads or curls on the forehead suggests it might be an anthropomorphic face.