The Voynich Ninja

What is absolutely certain is that he did not draw anything that he could not see.
His sources were the first photostats of the MS (of which I only have a bad copy of a copy of unknown quality), and access to the original in case he needed it.

My bad copy of the copy of unknown quality shows a similar, but not quite so clear shape.

It doesn't quite look like a salamander or lizard (both of which are sometimes green) but one of those next to a frog would not be out of place.

It almost looks like an aerial view of a fish.


But the long point on the "nose" would not be right for a fish, salamander, or lizard. It's vaguely like a hummingbird.

I don't even have a good guess. I have no idea what it is.



Theo. Petersen shows a little something extending from the right-hand side. I never noticed that but now that I look at the scan again, there is something on the right that is very faint. He doesn't include that very faint-looking line pointed out by Marco. There does appear to be something there too, but whether it's a "tail" or a stalk is not clear.

The big plant to the right of the mystery blob is repeated in the big-plants section on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and the larger drawing doesn't have any sprouts on the rhizome, or anything nearby.

[attachment=4896]

Could be a dragonfly, both found around water.

Frog and dragonfly were popular Egyptian tomb reliefs.
"Many tomb reliefs depicting activities such as fishing are brought to life by the addition of images of frogs and dragonflies."

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Clemens replied already: 
"I will then be more than happy to examine next time I see the mss.  A warning: the curators have not been allowed back on campus in any regular capacity until after COVID subsides, so it might be some time before I am able to see the mss in person."

I looked it up in the facsimile and attach two photos.
It's a bit vague, but that's how it is in real life I'm afraid.
If you look at the image, it has a long section of body tapering into a tail which is painted in a strong green; and a head which is not painted.
I suspect it is a tadpole halfway through metamorphosis, with tiny legs.
The bigger picture is a photo of the image under a magnifying glass, the cropped image a direct photo.

[attachment=4912][attachment=4911]

First I thought the spike on the nose was just part of the fold, but it seems to cross run diagonally across the fold, so it's really ink.
A tadpole is a good idea, it would make sense next to a frog. However, the spike really makes me suspect that they meant something that stings like a bee.

(15-10-2020, 01:28 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

I will ask Ray Clemens what he thinks. Although chances are that he will not be able to look given the fragile state of the foldouts.

Having handled the VMs at some length back in 2006, I can say that it is only the nine rosette page that is terrifyingly fragile, the pharma pages were basically ok.

Anything flying would have had wings, which this creature lacks.

There are a lot of bugs that hang around the same places as frogs. Some of them were used in medicinal recipes, some in magic rituals. Many bugs have antennae or long snouts.

Maybe it's a bug. If it is, it would be impossible to identify unless the context gave more clues. There are many bugs with these basic characteristics.


I like the idea of a tadpole but it's hard to make sense of the long pointed thing.