The Voynich Ninja

JKP wrote:

"I've never said anything that indicates I think the VMS was a wholly original work created in a vacuum, without influence from the past."

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I never meant to imply that this was the case. By "original" I only meant not a copy of earlier writings (not a duplication of the VMS itself in whole or in a gathering of parts) and not a work without influence from the past. Regardless of whether the VMS was first written in the 13th century (with a copy made in the 15th century) or in the 15th century, there would be influence from the past. Such influence is especially evident on plant layout from top to roots, on the astrology pages, and on the cosmology pages. As of yet, I have not seen signs of past influence only on a few elements in the swamp and herbal medicines sections.

(18-03-2018, 06:39 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.A number of the people who say that the VMS has escaped medieval influence believe it to be a hoax, a later rather than earlier creation, so they do not all believe it to be an earlier manuscript.

Funny that you mention hoaxes as just a few days ago I saw a flick about them. The film's creator, who does not name himself but claims to have lectured the NSA on the VMS, provides us with a list of ten Red-Flag indicators of forgery, as follows:

"1. Contains anachronistic content

2. Elicits multiple, widely contrary expert opinions

3. Has poor, contrary and/or missing versions of provenance

4. Owner/seller lies about provenance

5. Contains incorrect uses of iconography

6. Improper tools, methods, and/or material used

7. It looks "too new"

8. There is a reluctance to produce, and/or test, original

9. Copy of illustrations from books and catalogs

10. Financial or other incentive is offered for positive opinion"

Guess what? The VMS scores a direct hit on ALL ten indicators of forgery!

My take on this is as follows: Not in a million years would I believe that Wilfred Voynich, in 1910, was able to foresee the invention of radiocarbon dating (1940s) and therefore seek (and find!) more than a hundred pages of blank, 500-yr. old vellum to use for his forgery.

I have no qualms about the lack of evidence that Kircher was ever in possession of the VMS (the MSG Theory concurs), or no record of the VMS in catalogs, or that Wilfred might have been a shady character and all the rest, but all that can be true while the VMS itself remains genuine.

This guy points to New World plants and animals as evidence of forgery, but under MSG Theory (that the VMS was compiled in the New World) those arguments collapse.

He also points to Rosicrucian drawings as evidence of forgery, but under MSG Theory (that the Rosicrucians were in possession of the VMS) these arguments likewise collapse. Rather than Voynich copying the RC drawings, we could have a reverse situation, where the VMS influenced the RC drawings.

Since the Rosicrucians were scientists known to have been involved with optics, VMS vials (for the crushing, mixing and storage of herbs) could even have influenced microscope design!

Sir Francis Bacon: "We have also glasses and means to see small and minute bodies perfectly and distinctly; as the shapes and colours of small flies and worms, grains and flaws in gems, which cannot otherwise be seen, observations in urine and blood not otherwise to be seen."

I've been reading more of D'Imperio's book and came across an interesting statement:

"In the upper right corner, there is a faint, scribbled symbol like a shield or a crude fleur de lys, criss-crossed with lines."

This is what she is referring to:



Curiously, 17 x 5 brings us to page 85, whose foldout displays an unambiguous fleur de lys.

Shakespeare, on the title page of his botanical encyclopedia (published 1597), portrays himself standing on a pedestal "criss-crossed with lines." This is his pedestal, upside down:



Notice any connection with D'Imperio's concept of a shield / fleur de lys?

In a prior post, I demonstrated how the numbers on Shakespeare's shield add up to 85, again pointing to the VMS fleur de lys.

The discovery of Shakespeare's portrait and pedestal (by a renown historian, not by me) made international news a few years ago.

The VMS shield is accompanied with marginalia, possibly written by Shakespeare himself, which begins as follows:



I read this as meilhor altar, meaning better to alter, but I am not sure of the words that follow. Does anyone have a better reading on this?

NOTE: By MSG Theory, due to Shakespeare's extensive familiarity with the VMS recipes (expressed throughout his writings), he is believed to have led the decoding effort. He is also the likely author of the three dots discovered by Koen on page 107r.

It's not "lh" it's a double ell. It's written in Gothic cursive and there's really no doubt about it being double ell if you are familiar with Gothic cursive script. Look at the last page and you can see that whoever penned this and the text on the last page does not write "h" that way. No one did at the time this style of script was in vogue (which was primarily the 15th century). It either had a hook leg or a rounded leg, not an angle leg as seen here. Also, it was very common to not dot the "i" (or to dot only some of them). It is an "i" with a beginning serif, just as they are written on the last page. Note the slight gap between the serif and the ell.


Also, the fleur de lis shape looks like a flower head in the same drawing style as the other flower heads in the manuscript.

(23-03-2018, 04:19 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.It's not "lh" it's a double ell. It's written in Gothic cursive and there's really no doubt about it being double ell if you are familiar with Gothic cursive script. Look at the last page and you can see that whoever penned this and the text on the last page does not write "h" that way. No one did at the time this style of script was in vogue (which was primarily the 15th century). It either had a hook leg or a rounded leg, not an angle leg as seen here. Also, it was very common to not dot the "i" (or to dot only some of them). It is an "i" with a beginning serif, just as they are written on the last page. Note the slight gap between the serif and the ell.


Also, the fleur de lis shape looks like a flower head in the same drawing style as the other flower heads in the manuscript.

I saw "li" as an alternative to "h" which could alter the underlying language but not affect the meaning of the word.

It looks to me like the authors of the VMS made a huge effort to make it as perfect as possible, that is, not to display visible imperfections. Thus, it frankly makes no sense at all for those same authors to then damage such perfection by scribbling in various marginalia. 

It is my understanding that ink cannot be dated and that ink was made from similar components across the ages. One of the hoax promoters even claimed that the VMS ink could have been made as late as 1912.

As for handwriting, I concede that a style first seen in the 17th century is unlikely to have been used in the 16th century, but the reverse is not true. You cannot claim that a style seen in the 15th century could not have been used in the 16th century as you appear to be doing.

Great scholars of the 16th century would have been familiar with many different types of handwriting, and there are reports that some scholars personally made use of different styles of handwriting depending on the occasion: formal, informal, legal, or whatever.

In brief, you have failed to convince me that Shakespeare could not have written the marginalia on page 17r where we find a fleur de lys shield pointing to his pedestal.

Recall that on page 85+ we see an unambiguous drawing of the fleur de lys so the VMS authors were clearly familiar with this symbol. Also, let me remind you that, historically, the fleur de lys is predominantly associated with France rather than Italy.

Quote:MSG: In brief, you have failed to convince me that Shakespeare could not have written the marginalia on page 17r where we find a fleur de lys shield pointing to his pedestal."

I wasn't trying to convince you of anything. I was pointing out, have been pointing out all along, that you tend to choose only the explanation that fits your theory and don't look at all the possible explanations for each of these observations, even when there is stronger evidence for a different interpretation.

That's not science. It's not good research. I don't know what it is, other than trying to impose your preferences on the data rather than letting the data lead you to the answer.

(23-03-2018, 05:58 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

Quote:MSG: In brief, you have failed to convince me that Shakespeare could not have written the marginalia on page 17r where we find a fleur de lys shield pointing to his pedestal."

I wasn't trying to convince you of anything. I was pointing out, have been pointing out all along, that you tend to choose only the explanation that fits your theory and don't look at all the possible explanations for each of these observations, even when there is stronger evidence for a different interpretation.

That's not science. It's not good research. I don't know what it is, other than trying to impose your preferences on the data rather than letting the data lead you to the answer.

My response on objective evaluation of the evidence is as follows: The animal depicted on page 80v shows no signs of having a very long tail and consequently is far more likely to be an armadillo than a pangolin.

I have a new contention to make: The bright colors and patterns seen on the vials in the pharmaceutical section bear greater resemblance to the work of native American artisans of the early 15th century than they do to the work of European artisans of the same period.

JKP wrote:

The curled tail in the VMS scorpion is similar to some of the lizard-style Scorpius sculptures in 12th to 15th-century church portals in northeastern France/Normandy that featured zodiac cycles. The tail was not always elevated (some were sculpted from the top rather than the side). The lizard-style Scorpius in manuscript art appears to have been derived from earlier sculptural art, since the sculptures precede the lizard-style Scorpius  drawings by a couple of centuries.

Today I had a fresh look at your scorpion:



In a prior post I suggested that the star could be Antares, the brightest star of the constellation but I have now changed my mind on that. I now think that it is not a celestial star at all but rather the Cathar symbol for a spirit, that is, something that has broken out of the cycle of reincarnation in the material world to enter into eternity in the spiritual world.

As I noted previously, there was a reference to a scorpion in the book believed to have been written in heaven and brought down to earth by Christ. That text alludes to the zodiac via "Aries" and among the zodiac animals only the scorpion has a mors (sting). Thus one must assume that this scorpion lives in the spiritual world. But common scorpions still exist in the material world, can be seen all the time, so the indicated scorpion must be a different type of scorpion.

In other words, the Cathars were forced to create a unique scorpion, one that does not resemble the traditional scorpions. If anywhere you see an astrological scorpion that looks just like the VMS scorpion, it likely came from a Cathar source as only they had motive to create a unique scorpion.

Similarly, the people seen holding stars on a stick in the astrology section would be dead people, Cathar perfecti who received the sacrament of consolamentum and thus ascended to the spiritual world. 

Let's now have a look at the VMS drawing of Montsegur, the last stronghold of the Cathars built on top of a mountain with vertical slopes (depicted):



Notice the doorway that leads into an open "field" (D'Imperio's term) of stars. Those are not celestial stars; they represent the roughly two hundred perfecti who were burned in a giant bonfire created in a field below the fortress. These perfecti undertook consolamentum and hence ascended to the spiritual world, and are here represented by stars. The number of stars plus the number of glyphs inside the field add up to roughly two hundred.



This is a medieval depiction of the bonfire where a handful represent the two hundred. Note that the fortress has a single coned tower with balcony and windows, just like the VMS depiction.

Cones were more of a feature of French rather than Italian architecture. The fleur de lys was also French. You yourself have discovered that the astrology depictions come from northeastern France. Nobody has claimed that any of the marginalia is written in Italian.

It surprises me that Wikipedia is continuing to insinuate that the VMS was composed in northern Italy. With this unfounded contention Wikipedia is doing severe harm to anyone trying to uncover the true origins of the VMS. I might cancel my donation next year  

(24-03-2018, 12:08 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....The animal depicted on page 80v shows no signs of having a very long tail and consequently is far more likely to be an armadillo than a pangolin....

That statement doesn't hold water in the context of medieval critter drawings. Someone else will say: "An armadillo has plates and a pangolin has scales, so it's much more likely to be a pangolin" and another person will come along and say it's a bumpy-wooled ram (there are bumpy-wool varieties of sheep), so it's more likely to be a ram than a pangolin or armadillo".


I've already linked my blog on how medieval illustrators drew animals, but in case you didn't read it, here it is again.

You really should look at the pictures before you interpret the "pangolin/armadillo/sheep/aardvark" critter too literally:

You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.


There are also threads on this forum investigating the little dragony critter that's nibbling or smelling a leaf. There's no agreement at all on either this critter or the "pangolin" critter even after very capable researchers spent months collecting medieval drawings and discussing them.

(24-03-2018, 02:38 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....

It surprises me that Wikipedia is continuing to insinuate that the VMS was composed in northern Italy. With this unfounded contention Wikipedia is doing severe harm to anyone trying to uncover the true origins of the VMS. I might cancel my donation next year  

A substantial portion of the Wikipedia information on the VMS is taken from the Beinecke site and from the blogs of people on this forum (some of it is copied almost word-for-word from people's blogs).

Some of the information on the Beinecke site (including the statement about where the VMS originated) has been there for years and hasn't been updated. They're probably not motivated to update it until new information that can be verified with a high degree of certainty is put forward and that's not easy to do with the VMS.