The Voynich Ninja

Quote:That's a conclusion I don't necessarily follow, Anton. How many hands did Currier discern in the main text again? Some five or six? Which one does the Voynichese writing match? Why can't it have been written by a later owner who also mastered the script?

The concept of "Currier hands" (as opposed to "Currier languages") is something vague. I do not see any substantial differences between these aror and sheey and those aror and sheey which are found elsewhere in the main script. The same angle of r, the same apostrophe extending toward the bottom of the "c" (which is frequently observed in the main text), and, most notably, the same "decomposition" of y into "с" and tail. If anyone sees any substantial differences let them be discussed.

"Later owner" is possible, although, ceteris paribus, less likely, but nonetheless that would imply the person mastering both "German" and Voynichese which essentially is the main point which is advanced by the observation that we discuss.

About the spatial order, that would apply to the first line (but would not be corroborated by the shape of "x", for example), but as to the last line, the line interval here is held the same, so it's definitely been written after the spell was already in place, not the spell fit above it afterwards.

(31-01-2018, 04:45 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.That's a conclusion I don't necessarily follow, Anton. How many hands did Currier discern in the main text again? Some five or six? Which one does the Voynichese writing match? Why can't it have been written by a later owner who also mastered the script?

I gather you people are claiming that the VMS was written by an assembly line of monks and therefore the animal on the last page cannot be a marsh deer and the depicted gal cannot be the sole author of the manuscript.

My response: the VMS is an exact copy of the gal's original manuscript made by an assembly line of Inca artisans, possibly using alpaca skin for parchment.

(31-01-2018, 06:43 PM)Helmut Winkler Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Per my theories, it is impossible for the marginalia on the last page to be in the handwriting style of the 15th century,

I think it's not a good idea to bend facts to fit a theory. I  can assure you that JKP is right and the non-Voynich script  on f. 116v is 15th c.

Do you see geese flying around a tree on the first page of the VMS? Well, that’s the infamous Barnakle Tree, whose branches reach out to touch a variety of historical and esoteric texts from where we can infer that the VMS spent the 15th century in Peru.

I have re-phrased this slightly as my sources do not unambiguously describe VMS pages.

Umm... no.
There are no flying geese around a tree on the first page of the Voynich Manuscript.
If you are referring to the big red weirdo characters, I don't see anything specific about them that would bring to mind geese rather than, say, seagulls or eagles. They also resemble a lot of other things, as you can see in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. thread.
And they are not around a tree.
There is a plant on f1v, which looks nothing like your barnakle tree.

Also, you still have not addressed Koen Gh's post pointing out that your "cutout" looks nothing like a tapir.
I have highlighted the shape in pink below.
No one in their right mind can believe this looks anything like a tapir:

(31-01-2018, 08:27 PM)VViews Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Umm... no.
There are no flying geese around a tree on the first page of the Voynich Manuscript.
If you are referring to the big red weirdo characters, I don't see anything specific about them that would bring to mind geese rather than, say, seagulls or eagles. They also resemble a lot of other things, as you can see in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. thread.
And they are not around a tree.
There is a plant on f1v, which looks nothing like your barnakle tree.

Also, you still have not addressed Koen Gh's post pointing out that your "cutout" looks nothing like a tapir.
I have highlighted the shape in pink below.
No one in their right mind can believe this looks anything like a tapir:

The tapir is no longer an issue as a few days ago I updated my web page to call it an 'optical illusion' which is what it is.

I think it was quite nasty of Yale to make such a low resolution scan of the VMS pages and, in places where there were large holes in the pages, not to put a blank sheet behind the scan so that we would not confuse what was on the current page with the content of preceding pages. I will now fight Yale even harder on suspected cow protein malfeasance.

Here's the bottom line:

I am able to explain the astrology and other European paraphernalia as deriving from Cathars who fled out to sea in the 13th century to avoid being burned alive by the Inquisition. Voynich drawings substantiate Catharism: depictions of equal numbers of men and women around the governing council, depiction of the Cathar fortress of Montsegur verified by comparison with an independent medieval illustration of Montsegur, depictions of the Cathar ceremony of consolamentum administered by women, and depiction of an aversion to procreation.

But it seems you guys are unable to explain how experts have been able to associate Voynich plant drawings with 59 species of plants found in the New World, whereas, as far as I know, you cannot unambiguously associate anything with European plants, forcing you declare that the plants are imaginary. Moreover, didn't you guys just verify in another thread that a Voynich plant depiction is actually a depiction of a real animal? Why is the animal real and all the plants fake?

(31-01-2018, 10:19 PM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.forcing you declare that the plants are imaginary.

I have never stated that the plants are imaginary, and I don't believe anyone on this forum has said that.

As far as European plant identifications go, there are several members who have made their own list of identifications, I suggest you go have a look at Ellie Velinska's blog, or JKP's blog, or MarcoP's blog, to name a few, they have all made parallels with plants either based on modern photos or on the way the plants were depicted in medieval European manuscripts. Even before this forum existed, dozens of ID's were proposed on the mailing list.
There are also forum members who believe that the plants are not European, but Asian or Middle Eastern and they all have made dozens of identifications too.
In fact, I would say that imaginary plants is perhaps the option that has received the least attention here. 
It is a shame that you throw around statements about other peoples' conclusions without having even bothered to look at the work that they have put in.

As for the Yale scans, they are completely standard for digitized manuscripts, both in resolution and in presentation, as you can verify if you go and look at any of the thousands of manuscripts that are available online, at Beinecke or at any other libraries.

(31-01-2018, 10:19 PM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....

But it seems you guys are unable to explain how experts have been able to associate Voynich plant drawings with 59 species of plants found in the New World, whereas, as far as I know, you cannot unambiguously associate anything with European plants, forcing you declare that the plants are imaginary...

Every New World plant has a plant in the Old World that looks similar, at least in terms of plants that look like those in the VMS.

Many New World plants are circumpolar (especially those that are northern or tropical) which means they are indigenous to both New and Old Worlds.

Even those that are not indigenous to both continents were naturalized in both places by humans when they crossed to the New World in boats and by the ice bridges. They brought plants with them from Polynesia and northeast Asia thousands of years ago, which were well established in the New World by the 15th century. The Vikings probably even brought some when they settled briefly in Labrador.

Many of those "59 species of plants found in the New World" are controversial plant IDs, ESPECIALLY considering there are plants that are morphologically similar in the Old World. The Talbert and Tucker IDs are based on an unproven THEORY that the VMS was created in the Old World.

Quote:Morton St George:
...
Moreover, didn't you guys just verify in another thread that a Voynich plant depiction is actually a depiction of a real animal? Why is the animal real and all the plants fake?

No one has said all the VMS animals are real or that all the VMS animals are fake. And no reputable researcher has said that all the plants are fake or all the plants are real either. Most researchers appear to agree that a number of plants may be real and some may not be, and a number of animals are real and some may not be. Even if we think an animal or plant is real or not, most of us remain open to other ideas.


I hope you aren't getting your ideas about what researchers think about the VMS from the press because they do a pretty bad job of summarizing people's ideas and sometimes they outright misrepresent it.

(01-02-2018, 12:29 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(31-01-2018, 10:19 PM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....

But it seems you guys are unable to explain how experts have been able to associate Voynich plant drawings with 59 species of plants found in the New World, whereas, as far as I know, you cannot unambiguously associate anything with European plants, forcing you declare that the plants are imaginary...

Every New World plant has a plant in the Old World that looks similar, at least in terms of plants that look like those in the VMS.

Many New World plants are circumpolar (especially those that are northern or tropical) which means they are indigenous to both New and Old Worlds.

Even those that are not indigenous to both continents were naturalized in both places by humans when they crossed to the New World in boats and by the ice bridges. They brought plants with them from Polynesia and northeast Asia thousands of years ago, which were well established in the New World by the 15th century. The Vikings probably even brought some when they settled briefly in Labrador.

Many of those "59 species of plants found in the New World" are controversial plant IDs, ESPECIALLY considering there are plants that are morphologically similar in the Old World. The Talbert and Tucker IDs are based on an unproven THEORY that the VMS was created in the Old World.

Quote:Morton St George:
...
Moreover, didn't you guys just verify in another thread that a Voynich plant depiction is actually a depiction of a real animal? Why is the animal real and all the plants fake?

No one has said all the VMS animals are real or that all the VMS animals are fake. And no reputable researcher has said that all the plants are fake or all the plants are real either. Most researchers appear to agree that a number of plants may be real and some may not be, and a number of animals are real and some may not be. Even if we think an animal or plant is real or not, most of us remain open to other ideas.


I hope you aren't getting your ideas about what researchers think about the VMS from the press because they do a pretty bad job of summarizing people's ideas and sometimes they outright misrepresent it.

I believe that there are people who would be willing to make a high resolution reproduction of the VMS for Yale completely free of charge as long as they made it publicly available. I'd do it myself if I had the equipment. 

Yale has been stifling research on the VMS from the very beginning. It took decades to get carbon dating and now I hear they are restricting access to the VMS even by acknowledged academics. Someone made a huge mistake bequeathing the VMS to that *snipped by admin* institution. Since the VMS is, in effect, a World Heritage document, I am hoping that one day UNESCO will be able to force them to produce a high resolution reproduction for the world to see, and to allow dermatology experts to inspect the parchment for animal source.

I only had a very quick look at something written by Talbert but I got the impression he was trying to claim that the VMS was written in Mexico, not in the Old World as you say. But since he seems to be claiming that it was written in the 16th century, which apparently ignores the carbon-dating findings, I have written him off as a quack. Unlike the cow protein claims, there was a proper scientific paper to back up the carbon dating.

A valid theory must take into account _everything_ that is depicted in the VMS, which includes a lot of Europe and a lot of the New World rainforest. Theories that do not do this need to be rejected, and so I reject outright the notions that the VMS was compiled in Italy, in the ME, or in Asia. Based on what we see depicted in the VMS, medieval Europeans who migrated to the Americas are the only realistic source of authorship. European imagination, however good it might be, cannot imagine real plants and animals of the New World.

The girls are naked because that was normal dress in the Amazon rainforest back then, and, to a lesser extent, even today. When a real world explanation is available, it is ridiculous to claim that sexually-perverted Italian monks liked to draw nymphs. There is no "biology" there. The drawings depict every aspect of life and survival in a rainforest mixed in with a bit of fantasy: the gals attach themselves to the roots of herbs that give them energy.

For the same reason, I am challenging parchment made from cows: it cannot account for the New World depictions. But now new evidence also casts doubt on my marsh deer theory. Whereas I reject claims that some two dozen Latin characters on page 116v self-prove to have been written in the 15th century, I see no reason to doubt the findings of handwriting experts who claim that five or six people wrote the VMS.

I think five or six writers could finish the VMS faster than lots of wild marsh deer could be hunted down for parchment. The VMS, therefore, may be just a copy of the manuscript written on deer parchment by the gal depicted on the last page.

A flock animal that could quickly produce large amounts of parchment in that part of the world would be the alpaca. Thus, I can theorize that Viracocha Inca (the white man who ruled the Inca empire from 1410 to 1438) ordered the Inca artisans to make an exact duplicate of the manuscript he brought there from the rainforest. The VMS, therefore, could be written on alpaca skin parchment.

I understand that alpaca skin is thinner and more pliant than deer skin, and that it has been used for book bindings. But if sheep and deer skin can be used for parchment, I imagine that alpaca can also. Does anyone have any thoughts about alpaca as parchment?

Quote:Morten St George:
Yale has been stifling research on the VMS from the very beginning. It took decades to get carbon dating and now I hear they are restricting access to the VMS even by acknowledged academics. Someone made a huge mistake bequeathing the VMS to that *snipped by admin* institution.

You make it sound like they have some obligation to share their property. It belongs to them, not to us. The U.S. is not a communist country. Yale is not a public institution. It's a private university.


I am grateful to them for improving the scans. When I started researching the VMS, I was working from low-res black-and-white photocopy scans. They gave us better ones. They have also produced a very nice facsimile.

I don't blame them for limiting access. It's a fragile 600-year-old artifact.

(02-02-2018, 02:11 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

Quote:Morten St George:
Yale has been stifling research on the VMS from the very beginning. It took decades to get carbon dating and now I hear they are restricting access to the VMS even by acknowledged academics. Someone made a huge mistake bequeathing the VMS to that *snipped by admin* institution.

You make it sound like they have some obligation to share their property. It belongs to them, not to us. The U.S. is not a communist country. Yale is not a public institution. It's a private university.


I am grateful to them for improving the scans. When I started researching the VMS, I was working from low-res black-and-white photocopy scans. They gave us better ones. They have also produced a very nice facsimile.

I don't blame them for limiting access. It's a fragile 600-year-old artifact.

I agree with much of what you say but do not think it should apply to items that can be fairly considered part of the cultural heritage of humankind. Such items belong to all of us. Moreover, on the VMS, Yale is disrespecting its own position as a leading educational institution.

It's doubtful that the VMS was bequeathed to Yale for it to be hidden away. I don't know what was formally stipulated on the bequest, but I suspect it was hoped that Yale would resolve the mysteries of the manuscript.

My scan of the VMS is of poor quality. Enlargement to better distinguish the writing quickly turns into blur. These days, teenage kids can make better resolution scans than that. I checked out purchasing the facsimile book but reader reviews say the resolution is equally bad. 

In view of the manuscript's age, I agree that the general public should not be allowed to see and touch it. That's why it is necessary to make the highest possible resolution available, and to undertake a full range of tests on manuscript's chemical composition. That would reduce or eliminate the need to see it directly.

In particular, a high resolution scan might give visibility to dermatological patterns in the parchment, making it possible for dermatology experts from around the world to determine the animal used for parchment. Maybe that is what Yale is trying to prevent?