The Voynich Ninja

The question "Where are the numbers in the VMS?" now and then is touched upon in Voynich discussions.

I would suggest to turn this question into the direction of reverse engineering and transform it as follows:

Where should we expect numbers in such manuscripts, to begin with?

The reader will reasonably ask: "what "such" manuscripts"?" Well, I don't know. Let's judge by the graphical content.

First of all, obviously, we would expect numbers in the page and quire numbering. They are there, indeed, but unfortunately they are in plain text, nothing special.

There also is that strange f49v.

What about other places where numbers would be appropriate?

If there are recipes, charms, or healing remedies, then numbers are often included.

In historic manuscripts, these numbers are sometimes Roman numerals, sometimes written out as words, sometimes Arabic numerals, and some are a combination of Roman and Arabic numerals (I've noticed some scribes use Arabic for small numbers and Roman for larger numbers and some do the opposite).


In medical recipes and healing charms, the numbers are included at intervals through the text (but not usually at the very beginning), in others, the numbers are near the end. Some recipes have no numbers, they only list ingredients (this is also true of some cookbooks, ingredients but no quantities).

I'd also point out that cardinal or ordinal numbers are often used instead of numerals - especially for older manuscripts before the popularization of Arabic numerals.

Number String indicates Gematria bottom jar f102v2
I'm selling books on my book Voynich Manuscript Middle English and I now have a programmer so in a few months will see if it makes sense out of the VMS!

@ stellar:

I mean numbers in Voynichese, not plain text numbers. The pic that you post we have already discussed (I guess those posts were lost during the Coventry event), in my opinion these are not numbers but just the same vertical strokes.

First you shift to reverse. And then throw in 'books such as these'. That makes it a tricky question to answer. But I would agree with JKP, that recipes would be more likely in terms of what the VMs presents. One might expect numbers in records and ledgers, or as chapter and verse is religious texts. But the VMs is not a text 'such as those'. I mostly agree with those who describe the appearance of the VMs as an alchemical-herbal. And as one might find numbers being used in other alchemical-herbals, similar expectations would be reasonable for the VMs. Not only the numbers of the things being specified, but the nature of the things being enumerated.

The request for numbers is interesting, but has it been productive? As a distant spectator, I would say it has not.

I see the VMS as being similar to a "hausbuch" in the sense of being a general reference, but being more targeted toward certain kinds of information.

These books included astrology, cosmology, health, and medical recipes, sometimes a bit of alchemy, occasionally some proverbs or poems—a very good fit for the VMS. They were, in a sense, like our modern version of a one-volume illustrated encyclopedia of general knowledge (as it was at the time). The small, portable size suggests it was intended to be carried along by whoever was using it.


The VMS strikes me as quite targeted, it doesn't appear to stray from a certain overall plan. I'm not saying I think it is specifically a hausbuch. It might be designed to look like a hausbuch or to be used as a reference in the sense of a hausbuch, for whatever purpose, just as the text is designed to look like Latin, but I think the illustrative focus on the plants is real, whether or not the text matches the drawings.

I can agree that there are certain parts of the VMs that can be easily seen as having the appearance of belonging to a hausbuch type of document. What leads me to the alchemical-herbal description is the number of pages devoted to plants. The number of pages that appear as plant monographs is such that the VMs would seem to contain more information on plants and herbal cures than is found in a typical hausbuch. And so I find 'herbal' is an important descriptive term. We could call it an alchemical-herbal-hausbuch.

But a hausbuch is intended to contain important and useful information. Has the VMs provided any important and useful information? It is a text that has been under investigation for a century. What has the VMs investigation revealed? Any of the important and useful information of a hausbuch?

If the VMs were an alchemical-herbal-hausbuch of information, it would be a cultural product of accumulated knowledge etc. While that perception may have appeared valid in the 15th century, it hardly seems so today. The VMs appears to be a cultural product from an unknown source, but it is not. There is no "Voynichese" cultural source to actually support this facade. The VMs is built on deception. It is a complete creation of an unknown reality. It's sort of like a hoax or forgery, but it has a purpose. The creation has a purpose; there is something hidden behind the facade.

Having something hidden on the pages of a manuscript can be a problem, but there are ways to work around the difficulties. Finding something intentionally hidden in a manuscript, and demonstrating that it was intentionally hidden by the author also has its difficulties. Let's just say that it was placed there for the reader to find. Then it's just a question of whether the reader finds it or not. Mostly it's been not. When both the topic and the elements are not known, recognition does not occur.

The potential reconstruction of the Oresme cosmos with VMs parts is an interesting possibility. Perhaps the two essential parts are separated for purposes of deception, but a clear, simple nebuly line is there (f68v) as a clue. The Fieschi connection to the tradition of the red galero (f71r) is disguised by a radial orientation. The visual possibilities are confirmed by traditional placement. The extent of hidden construction is demonstrated by the placement of the heraldic papelonny patterns, to correspond in quadrant and sphere with two blue-striped patterns on the following page - or two. Not to mention - the pun. All this is hidden behind the facade in the pages. And it cannot be found by those who do not know the pattern and its name. But they were put in place by someone who did know the heraldic tradition quite well. Meanwhile in some modern references, these traditional details of the heraldic furs are now omitted and even the possibility of investigative discovery is closed off.

The VMs author knows the science and the history of their time. And they know it well, very well. And so they expect the reader to do the same, - to find the reality of science and history as it was perceived at the time that some unknown VMs 'author' person(s) put pen and paint to parchment to make the VMs. And it might now be said, even as the method of disguise has been discovered in each case, that this author has established one clear point in science and another in history and that both would have been well and widely known to other educated contemporaries. The question is whether the grounding in historical fact is sufficient to support further investigation behind the facade. If there is a purpose for this carefully disguised construction, where does it lead?

R.S. wrote: "But a hausbuch is intended to contain important and useful information. Has the VMs provided any important and useful information? It is a text that has been under investigation for a century. What has the VMs investigation revealed? Any of the important and useful information of a hausbuch?"

The fact that it is written in an unusual way says to me it was for a specific audience, and may have been important and useful to that audience, whether it was a patron, a person, or a small group. It seems unlikely so much work (perhaps several years of work) would go into something that was not important to someone.

There is a You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. on why people encode things and in that thread I mention the doctor who gave his daughter several reasons for encoding his medical information. He wanted it to be for himself (even though it was information available elsewhere) and he pointed out that information has more value, or at least a higher perceived value, if it is not readable by everyone.

I think that the first question might be; Unusual to whom? I don't disagree with your comments, but I do propose a different perspective. That the informed association of the parts of Oresme's cosmos would not be all that difficult for the educated elite in the time of the VMs manufacture to recognize. Even to the modern VMs investigator, the actual structure of the cloud band in the Oresme illustration has been nothing but an insignificant nit. The fact that the VMs contains the same kind of elaborated scallop pattern as the Oresme illustration seems to add a further confirmation to the suggestion that Oresme's illustration may have been known to the VMs author and in a set of various other persons. The deception used in the VMs is to separate the inner and outer parts.

Optical illusion is the type of deception used in another instance. Surely there are those among the author's peers who would recognize the armorial insignia of the pope who initiated the tradition of the cardinals' use of the red galero. But that has also turned into an insignificant historical nit. And the definition of papelonny is essentially lost. That makes it unusual for us and much harder for us to understand these specific cultural references than it would have been for those contemporary with the VMs creation. We have lost the details, the author and some of those contemporary to that circle know these details.

When separation and illusion confirm deception, how are correct interpretations to be known? By their position, by objective placement that accords with known tradition. Proper hierarchy and the favored heraldic location. The author also made use of heraldic canting. What will modern readers make of a pun unrecognized? They won't laugh. The author's contemporaries would not have had such difficulties.