The Voynich Ninja

(28-02-2019, 10:39 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.JP, I remain completely confused on this whole issue. The VMS dates to the early part of 15th century so I presume it predates most of the 15th-century manuscripts that depict a human Sagittarius. Are you claiming that the authors of those manuscripts got the idea of a human Sagittarius from the VMS?

Alternatively, if a 15th-century manuscript was completed between 1400 and 1404, the authors of the VMS could have gotten the idea of a human Sagittarius from there. Which was it?

Also, please confirm that the other 15th-century manuscripts depict a fox tail like the one seen in the VMS. Thanks.

I doubt the veracity of your first statement. 

Now you date the vms to the 15th century, when just previously you had been vehemently arguing a 13th century date.

No one is saying what you purport about copying from the vms. Obviously if a later dated figure is being considered, it is thought to have a common ancestor. Which was it? The latter is the likely possibility.

Confirm what now about what manuscripts? The ones after or before? The Sagittarius depictions do not have to have similar headgear, it may be a combination, or simply that the vms artist drew from an older example and dressed him to reflect a more current fashion, or one they simply liked better. They do not have to copy the fashion from a manuscript, they merely have to have seen it in the context of someone who might carry a crossbow. But here are a couple that seem similar to me, maybe not the exact headgear but i didn't look that hard for a match.


15th century Book of the Hunt, French

(28-02-2019, 11:21 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(28-02-2019, 10:55 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.It does NOT predate the 14th century human Sagittarius figures. Are you assuming human Sagittarius was only in the 15th century? Or only in the late 15th century?

That's my whole point. If there were human Sagittarii in the 14th century, why couldn't the original creation date of the VMS be the 14th century, with the current Beinecke manuscript being only a 15th-century copy? Likewise for the 13th century if another human Sagittarius pops up there? It is you and Koen, not I, who keeps insisting on the 15th century for VMS themes.

I have full confidence in your research capabilities. However, recall that I am claiming that the VMS was compiled by Cathars who are believed to have been prolific writers and to have had possession of many books, yet all that remains of all that is a few scraps of paper. Even the best research leads to faulty conclusions if a lot of vital information is missing.

Just a post or two ago, you said it was a 15th century manuscript, now you are back to positing it to be an earlier creation.

What does your claim have to do with JKP's research capabilities? You seem to be saying that the exemplars for what you state are gone, therefore no one can disprove your claim? That doesn't follow, given there do exist exemplars that don't help your theory.

(28-02-2019, 06:09 PM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Yes, JP, I am looking at ALL the evidence, but not just all the zodiac evidence. It's hardly clear-cut, otherwise the VMS wouldn't be classified as a mystery.

Let me summarize the main points of contention between your theories and mine so that we can then discuss ways to resolve the issue.

You are claiming that the VMS is a unique, original document created in Europe during the early 15th century and reflecting European culture of the early 15th century.

I think JKP keeps an open mind and takes great care not to box himself into any claim, no matter how much he may like it, unless he has unrefutable evidence. I think perhaps you are projecting again.

Quote:I am claiming that the VMS was composed in the Americas during the early 15th century as a copy of earlier documents reflecting European culture of the mid 13th century.

Really. This is not what you said earlier. Is this an updated claim to fix some of the problems with your earlier assertions that it was written in the Americas in the 13th century?

Quote:It seems that the only American animal that might serve as a source for vellum-quality parchment is the bison, a close relative of European cows. Thus, another protein test (this time for bison protein) might definitively resolve the issue.

I don't know, but suspect the original test already refutes this idea. 

Quote:I've had prior two-way email contact with the protein lady in York and I might be able to convince her to do the bison testing for free. 

I guess that is better than one-way contact to that effect.

Quote:Your task would be to convince the Beinecke Library (I do not get on well with them) to send her a tiny scraping for testing.

Deal?

If he doesn't accept, will this post self destruct? Cue MI theme song.

I wonder why you don't get on well with the library people?

Quote:PS. To encourage the Beinecke Library to allow further testing, you can try telling them that Linda thinks Shakespeare wrote the VMS marginalia. Thus, beyond a few signatures of doubtful authenticity, the VMS would contain the only extant examples of the handwriting of the real Shakespeare, which could easily double the fame and market value of the VMS. 

You can certainly try. But you know I don't think so.

(28-02-2019, 11:57 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
The VMS will NOT be solved by theories. The VMS will be solved by evidence.

A theory is a TOOL for focusing the research (one that is often over-used and abused), but it should be discarded or revised if the evidence does not support it.

Well said.

(01-03-2019, 08:26 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
There's also no proof that these are Louisiana swamps. Even if it's a swamp, there are swamps everywhere.

Yes, you're right. Those swamps could have been located anywhere around the Gulf of Mexico or nearby where spotted jaguars roamed.
[/quote]

In the Middle Ages, there were numerous species of spotted cats in Africa and around the Mediterranean region (there even used to be lions, rhinos and giraffes right up through the Levant and towards the Caucasus in older times, but climate change and human incursion have greatly reduced their numbers and their habitat).

In the Middle Ages, most of the wealthier nobility had spotted cats in their menageries. The leopard, for example, is frequently depicted in medieval manuscripts, and some drawings look like they might be cheetahs. They also knew wild cats (the small ones), lynxes and caracels (lions and some caracels are spotted when they are younger and there are even some lions that retain their spots as they get older, although they are fairly rare).

Spotted cats are not limited to the Gulf of Mexico.


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So you think one of the pond critters is a spotted cat?

If you are talking about the pond critter with a single row of spots, it looks more like a salamander or lizard than a cat.

[attachment=2692]

Look at it. How could you possibly identify this as a jaguar??

It has a long skinny nose, a long skinny body, and no external ears. It does NOT look like any kind of cat.

It looks like a typical medieval lizard or salamander with a single line of spots and a flower-tail (a common style of decorative tail that was popular in the Middle Ages). It might be the famous medieval "fire salamander". Here is a pic of a spotted salamander (it has a long tail):

[attachment=2696]

Photo credit: World Animal Foundation.

I'm not certain that it is a lizard or salamander (it might be an imaginary animal), but the VMS drawing does NOT look like a cat. There are no cats with long noses, missing ears, and a single row of spots.

(01-03-2019, 08:22 PM)Linda Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Your 6th century versus 7th century comment to JKP also seems to have been meant to cause dissonance. 

Now that JP, in a very recent post, has informed us of the source of that 6th century Sagittarius, I was able to check it out and the date is no longer an issue.

Malice is really not my thing. There is a problem with the Sagittarius claims. I've checked out JP's two-legged Sagittarius pages as well as his crossbow pages and nowhere do I spot a hat with tail that looks like the one worn by the VMS Sagittarius.



It's even gotten to the point where I suspect the VMS hat and tail might be pure fantasy, designed to cover up the tonsure of a medieval saint whose depiction with crossbow could have inspired the VMS Sagittarius. Most likely, tonsures were abhorrent to the Cathars. I think it would have been very nice of JP (who has access to thousands of medieval manuscripts compared to my none) to show us a medieval example of that hat and tail whether it be an archer or not, so as to link that style to a particular time and place, but unfortunately he has decided not to do that.

(01-03-2019, 08:43 PM)Linda Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.What kind of statement is the one about the Russians?

Alexa.com, an Amazon.com company that monitors web traffic, claims that 100% of the visitors to voynich.ninja comes from Russia:

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

It's probably just a temporary glitch. From time to time, even my own websites receive dubious traffic from Russia. I was only dreaming that they could have more common sense than Americans.

(01-03-2019, 10:32 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If you are talking about the pond critter with a single row of spots, it looks more like a salamander or lizard than a cat.

Yes, but I very much doubt that a salamander could have brought down the marsh deer that we see lying dead in water.

(02-03-2019, 03:31 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(01-03-2019, 10:32 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If you are talking about the pond critter with a single row of spots, it looks more like a salamander or lizard than a cat.

Yes, but I very much doubt that a salamander could have brought down the marsh deer that we see lying dead in water.

That's your story. And nothing more than a story. You don't know the relationships between these critters.

Plus the one I think you mean (the one that doesn't really look like a deer, that looks more like a dead golden-fleece-shaped critter than a deer, note the rounded bumps on the back) might not have anything at all to do with the salamander-like thingie.


For the record, some lizards are also spotted and some lizards CAN bring down prey many times their size with toxic bites. Also, some animals can be killed by the toxic fumes coming from ponds with fume vents and others seem to tolerate the toxins.


What kind of reasoning is this, Morten? Did you decide the salamander has to be a cat because it brought down a deer (that doesn't look like a deer)? Is that why you turned a non-cat into a cat? To fit your story?

(01-03-2019, 03:07 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.On a couple of them I saw equal numbers of men and women conducting a religious or administrative meeting. 

Only in a heretic sect called Catharism, which effectively became extinct in the 13th century, did men and women have equal rights.

So the Cathar premise is based on two of ten zodiac pages showing equal numbers of men and women. Why would it be only two of the pages? What would the only women pages represent? Why are there no only men pages?

Quote: 

On the Rosettes folio, we see the depiction of a mountaintop fortress that no one has been able to identify. A famous mountaintop fortress that was completely dismantled (not even the ruins were allowed to remain) was Montségur, the last stronghold of the Cathars. 

Do we have descriptions of it, or a drawing or painting, anything to correspond? Otherwise it is a nice but unprovable coincidence.

Quote:Meanwhile, in the swamps section, we see a Cathar baptismal ceremony and a gal holding a medieval instrument that was used to scrape clean the furry side of animal hides. The Cathars reportedly taught reading, writing, and parchment-making to their converts.

Why though, would they be baptizing and cleaning skins at the same time? Seems a bit messy somehow.

Quote:This is only the beginning of the evidence that causes me to dispute Wikipedia's claim (made in the second sentence of its VMS article) that "it may have been composed in Northern Italy during the Italian Renaissance." 

I dont know about that. In my own theory, the path led me to various places in Northern Italy. However other places also come up.

Quote:You do not need to be an art expert to surmise that the VMS does not display artwork in the style of Da Vinci and Michelangelo.

That is because we aren't dealing with such works. Nor would we be for your Cathars. Plus they both were born well after the time of the carbon dating. So it is not really an argument that helps you. 

The vms is, however, drawn in a style more similar to these.