The Voynich Ninja

Now that I have a few spare moments (not as many as I'd like) and access to my notes, here's a thought about this image:



The Trinity Plant (left)

I think there's a fairly good chance that the Trinity plant on the left, labeled "deronica, veronica, deronoga" is Veronica abyssinica.

It mentions Ethiopia in the text and this plant is native to Ethiopia and some of the higher-elevation areas around it.

Veronica abyssinica has deeply toothed leaves, sometimes so deep botanists refer to them as crenelated, and it has medium-small pink or purple flowers growing out from the nodes. It's considered a medicinal plant.


There are many species of Veronica in the various herbals but not all of them have these deeply toothed leaves. The Ethiopian species does. There are a few other Ethiopian Veronicas that might fit, but they are less well known and documented and may not have been known in the middle ages.


The VMS Plant (right)

The flowers of the VMS image on the right look like some of the asters or crassulae. Stonecrop has flower-tops that curl like this but the leaves are typically flshy and smooth.

It doesn't quite look like heliotrope (only a few species have leaves that might be drawn like this).

Some species of Pyrola have curled flower-heads and toothed leaves but the flowers are not like this, they are like little oval bells.

Costmary has been suggested and it might fit with the idea of an angel in the root (another name for the plant is Herba Sancta Marie). The flower heads don't curl, they branch, and the leaves don't fit well, although they are serrated, but if the illustrator was relying on a root mnemonic for identification, it's possible the rest is stylized.

Some species of Vernonia (Chrysolaena) have serrated leaves and curled flower heads, with most of the leaves near the base. It also has little fingers in the calyx. I don't know if there's a connection between this plant and birds or angels, but maybe "Chryso" comes from an early name associated with Christ??

Rock cress (e.g., Arabis collina) is definitely of interest. It has deeply toothed leaves, curled flower heads and is widespread throughout Europe and the Levant. A few leaves creep up the stem, but the majority are basal.

(27-04-2017, 08:19 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Just out of curiosity, does anyone know what the tree on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is? I've gotten used to the script a bit and I think I can make out;
The name of the tree is "Quibanos". The tree grows in "anglica" 
- - then there's a bunch of abbreviations I don't understand yet - - 
and then, I guess: the tree was brought into the island by sea from Ethiopia (??)

By the way, there is something special about reading an abbreviated text like this. I don't really read the letters but rather at a glance I recognize the "shape" of an abbreviation. Like it doesn't really matter whether they drop one letter more or less. The abbreviations are almost like markers for the plant's name, for where it's from... And the paragraph markers are also really handy for seeing immediately where a section starts about a new plant. I'm starting o get a better feel for certain gallow hypotheses that have been proposed before.

Hi Koen, once again, I cannot help with this tree, but it certainly is a fascinating item! I am glad you are having fun reading this ms!

(28-04-2017, 05:53 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Now that I have a few spare moments (not as many as I'd like) and access to my notes, here's a thought about this image:



The Trinity Plant (left)

I think there's a fairly good chance that the Trinity plant on the left, labeled "deronica, veronica, deronoga" is Veronica abyssinica.

It mentions Ethiopia in the text and this plant is native to Ethiopia and some of the higher-elevation areas around it.

Veronica abyssinica has deeply toothed leaves, sometimes so deep botanists refer to them as crenelated, and it has medium-small pink or purple flowers growing out from the nodes. It's considered a medicinal plant.


There are many species of Veronica in the various herbals but not all of them have these deeply toothed leaves. The Ethiopian species does. There are a few other Ethiopian Veronicas that might fit, but they are less well known and documented and may not have been known in the middle ages.

Thank you JKP. Veronica abyssinica sounds like an excellent candidate. The reference to "doronogi" would then be an error of the author. I think that with exotic plants errors in the text and/or illustrations are to be expected even more than with ordinary plants.

(27-04-2017, 03:32 PM)MarcoP Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I am still lost about “barthifos” (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. second plant of the left). In theory, the names in other languages should be helpful, but I am more familiar with Latin than the other sources mentioned here. 
I guess the abbreviation at the end of the Hebrew name is something like a superscript “9” and should stand for -us: “landufius”?.
The Tartar “columbanos” / “columbanes” sounds very Latin to me: I think it either is not Tartar or was badly corrupted. Searcher's suggestion of Vervain is consistent with this name (taken as a Latin name) but not with the other data. 

Anyway, "Columbanos", "columbinus", "columbarius", etc. must relatate to doves (dove's plant). There are only a few names similar to Columbanos: Columbaria herba (Scabiosa), herba Columbaris (Vervein), You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(Geranium) and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (Menispermum palmatum, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.). It is interesting that the last one is mostly fits the data, although it is difficult to say it about the image. There are no early official sources (encyclopedies, etc.) about this item, unfortunately, but, possibly, it was known much earlier under the name Colombo, etc.???

One of the earliest thoughts I've had about the herbal illustrations in the Voynich MS, or perhaps rather a question was:
"could the drawings be the result of someone painting herbs on the basis of a non-illustrated herbal text?".

This idea has, in a way, stood the test of time, in the sense that this is still a possible explanation for many of the features.

Some elements very strongly suggests that they have been drawn from nature or from a live example of a herb. They are 'better',  or more realistic than in most contemporary herbals.
This includes the flowers of the viola / daisy (f9v), the root of the supposed water-lily (f2v) and the entire drawing on f21r, which looks more like a modern photo of knotgrass than any of the many old herbal illustrations of poligonum ( You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ).

At the same time, many herbs look like composites.
Finally, numerous drawings look like fantasy herbs.

It is as if the 'artist' in some cases knew exactly what to draw, while in other cases was putting elements known to him and unknown elements together.

The supposed waterlily on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is particularly intriguing, since it combines the root and leaf of a waterlily with the flower of a lily (which was also pointed out by Alain Touwaide in November 2014). An example of a similar lily flower was already shown You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. , but there are many others, and Alain compared it with the lilies in Sloane MS 4016.

Of course we don't know for sure if this is what happened in the Voynich MS.

However, I find it of great interest that the Cambridge herbal is showing evidence, as pointed out by Marco You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. , of exactly this thing happening. The herb 'gelosia' is drawn based on a textual description of the herb.

For this part of the Cambridge herbal, the illustrations do not show any resemblance to known tradtions so far, but the list of herbs that it includes does.
In the Voynich MS we don't have this handle of course.

(09-05-2017, 06:20 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.One of the earliest thoughts I've had about the herbal illustrations in the Voynich MS, or perhaps rather a question was:
"could the drawings be the result of someone painting herbs on the basis of a non-illustrated herbal text?".

This idea has, in a way, stood the test of time, in the sense that this is still a possible explanation for many of the features.

Some elements very strongly suggests that they have been drawn from nature or from a live example of a herb. They are 'better',  or more realistic than in most contemporary herbals.
This includes the flowers of the viola / daisy (f9v), the root of the supposed water-lily (f2v) and the entire drawing on f21r, which looks more like a modern photo of knotgrass than any of the many old herbal illustrations of poligonum ( You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ).

Hello Rene, the idea that the illustrations in the VMS might derive from a herbal text with no illustrations didn't occur to me until I read Darren Worley mention that possibility. I guess he had the idea independently from you. Finding out that the Trinity College ms provides such detailed descriptions of the aspect of the plants, coupled with such unusual images, has made that hypothesis even more interesting to me.

InYou are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view., I discussed some details of plants in the last section of the herbal (the one with Common-Greek-Hebrew plant names). Differently from the VMS, many illustrations in this section use artificial, geometric shapes. I think this is due to the fact that the text uses abstract descriptions, such as “round” or “squared” leaves. Occasionally, some parallels with other plants are used, such as the flower in the central plant of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. which is said to have “the shape of a lily”.
Indeed, one can think that something similar happens in the text of Voynich f2v.

The previous section of the herbal (which typically has recognizable plant names with unusual illustrations) in most cases uses parallels with other plants. For instance, honeysuckle (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) is described as “having a shape similar to bindweed or ivy which coils around trees …. Its flower is purple and similar to lily, having the same smell as lily”. In this case, it seems clear that the illustration is not dependent on the text, but is derived from actual knowledge of honeysuckle.
On the other hand, one could speculate that the oak and ivy Voynich illustration You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. derives from a textual description similar to that in Trinity 75r: a plant “similar to ivy which coils around trees” and having clusters of black berries (with no description of the leaves).  
In general, the fact that the second section of the Cambridge ms mostly uses botanical similes, while the last (Common-Greek-Hebrew) section uses more abstract descriptions, seems to me to make the second section a better parallel for the Voynich herbal.

In both sections, when the text uses a non-botanical simile to describe parts of the plant, bizarre elements appear in the illustration. E.g. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. describes the plant has having “flowers similar to ducks”. In this manuscript, the frequent introduction of zoomorphic / anthropomorphic elements seems to be largely independent from plant names and strictly dependent on the textual descriptions.  Again, one cannot exclude that something similar happens in the VMS.


I agree that Voynich You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is particularly intriguing when compared with the illustrations in the Cambridge ms. If the plant was meant to represent water-lily, the root and leaf are too good to be derived from a textual description: they were clearly originally drawn by someone who knew the plant very well. Could it be something else than waterlily, described as having roots and leaves similar to Nymphaea and a flower similar to waterlily? Was it derived from a good but flowerless illustration of waterlily and the illustrator decided to add a lily-like flower?

I wrote above:

Quote:The supposed waterlily on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is particularly intriguing, since it combines the root and leaf of a waterlily with the flower of a lily (which was also pointed out by Alain Touwaide in November 2014). An example of a similar lily flower was already shown here, but there are many others, and Alain compared it with the lilies in Sloane MS 4016.

but as Marco kindly pointed out, the link ('here') was wrong, and it should have pointed to  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. .

The herbal in question is still online, but the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. .

EDIT: just to add....

Marco wrote:

Quote:the idea that the illustrations in the VMS might derive from a herbal text with no illustrations didn't occur to me until I read Darren Worley mention that possibility. I guess he had the idea independently from you.

Indeed, I am sure that he did, and I can't repeat enough how the same ideas keep occurring to different people through the years.
Reading through the old mailing list archives one can see this happening all the time.

It is not always easy to search these archives, but I could find my comment on this topic back on 22 Oct 2002.

(09-05-2017, 04:16 PM)MarcoP Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I agree that Voynich You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is particularly intriguing when compared with the illustrations in the Cambridge ms. If the plant was meant to represent water-lily, the root and leaf are too good to be derived from a textual description: they were clearly originally drawn by someone who knew the plant very well. Could it be something else than waterlily, described as having roots and leaves similar to Nymphaea and a flower similar to waterlily? Was it derived from a good but flowerless illustration of waterlily and the illustrator decided to add a lily-like flower?

Marco, I have a fairly long blog that answers your questions that I posted in 2013 along with some of the other plant IDs and then took down again because, well, the honest truth is I thought I could solve the VMS and I was worried this particular blog, which goes into more detail than the others, would give away too much.

I can't get at the files right now, it will have to wait until evening, but I will post it now, as these questions about 2v keep coming up and I wrote about them in significant detail.

There is a very simple explanation for f. 2v and that is that it is showing two different plants touching by accident.The two script blocks look as if they did belong to two different plants as well

(10-05-2017, 08:02 AM)Helmut Winkler Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.There is a very simple explanation for f. 2v and that is that it is showing two different plants touching by accident.The two script blocks look as if they did belong to two different plants as well

I don't think this is the case since the stem connects the flower, leaf and root in a natural way. Exactly what you describe does happen a few times in the Trinity herbal though.