The Voynich Ninja

(28-01-2018, 11:13 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If you read my message again, you will see that I noted that the writing and abbreviation style were consistent with 15th and very early 16th-century Gothic script. I have looked at thousands of and thousands of samples of this form of writing, have read hundreds of manuscripts in this style in numerous languages, and have collected almost as many samples and nobody who wrote in that style of script wrote "V" that way but many of them wrote "r" exactly as it is written on that label.

I guess we can consider ourselves fortunate to have someone with such vast knowledge of medieval manuscripts and medieval handwriting in this forum. I've completed perhaps no more than a fraction of my preliminary research to replicate the 16th-century decoding and already I find myself needing to consult you.

Some time ago, on the theory (proposed by others) that the VMS glyphs represent only consonants, I suggested that the four sequences of 17 glyphs found around a circle on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. could represent four repetitions of the vocalization Yihawa Yahowe Yihwo (the divine name in past, present and future). With the discovery that the marginalia points us to the 72-letter name (which includes an abundance of both consonants and vowels), this idea fell by the wayside but there is still reason to suspect that those 17-letter sequences could represent something useful for decoding purposes.

This brings us to the issue at hand. In an article by L. S. Chardonnens and J. R. Veenstra, I encountered another group of 17 Latin letters: agolb yaubva vaubua, which were inscribed on the back side of the Sigillum Doornenburgensis:



Do you agree with the agolb yaubva vaubua rendering or do you see another possibility for any of the letters? The matter needs to be taken seriously as there are reasons for thinking that the respective disk might have been in the possession of the VMS decoders:

1. In a book about John Dee's magic, J. F. Peterson notes that Dee owned "a certain round flat stone like Cristall which ... an Angell brought to doctor dye wherein he did worke and know many strange things . . .", found not to be applicable to Dee's mirror.



Though metal rather the stone, it does somewhat resemble crystal in this snippet. Visit the Ghost-Chasers-Episode-9-part-2 website for the full image.

2. The Sigillum Doornenburgensis was found hidden inside a brick believed by some to have been brought from the Oeverstraat in Arnhem (to help rebuild Doornenburg Castle [destroyed during WWII] with medieval bricks). As it turns out, Arnhem is precisely the place where Sir Philip Sidney died on 17 October 1586 after incurring a wound in combat against the Spanish. Sidney, who was a visitor to Dee's Mortlake estate, was also a friend of Giordano Bruno (who dedicated two books to Sidney) and Bruno in turn expresses familiarity with the Summa Sacrae Magicae (SSM) known to have been in Dee's possession. It makes sense that Sidney could have died trying to protect his friends who were working nearby.

3. Still another reason for believing that the Sigillum Doornenburgensis was in possession of the decoders comes from an apparent misspelling in the last line of their manifesto [Fama Fraternitatis] as you can see here in this snippet from the edition of 1615:



As far as I am aware, the Latin "alarum" (wings) is not normally written with insertion of a "b" but the "b" of "alabrum" could serve to draw our attention to "agolb" which ends in a "b". Also note that the "al" of "alabrum" is placed directly below the letter "g".

The following snippet comes from the same edition:



Do you think the German "D" (mysteriously placed at the bottom of the penultimate page) resembles the letter "g" of "agolb"? Note the words "communicato consilio", surely suggesting something helpful.

It seems no one knows what the words agolb yaubva vaubua mean. On the basis of mystic tradition ("their beginning is fixed in their end") only the first letter (the "a" of agold) and the last letter (the final "a" of vaubva) would be real letters. (The same or similar concept may apply to the divine names alpha ω and alga.) Thus, the last word, vaubva (a six letter word ending in "a"), likely stands for "Iehova", the final word of the Fama and the primary divine name of Christianity. The middle word, yaubva, a six letter word possibly beginning with "y", would have to be Yahveh or Yahweh, the primary divine name of Judaism. And lastly, agolb, a five letter word beginning with "a", would have to be Allah, the primary divine name of Islam. In summation, agolb yaubva vaubua probably stands for Allah Yahveh Iehova, that is, the diety of the three Abrahamic religions.

I can expand on that last theme, but for now there is a more pressing issue that I would like to take up in this post: I think those three words can help solve a major problem with the 72 divine names which are listed below in alphabetical order. Each name is followed by a number representing its place on the SSM version of the Sigillum Dei (there are discrepancies with the Doornenburg version that need to be investigated) moving clockwise around the circle from a nameless "h" at the top:

abracalabrah (45); abracaleous (55); abryon (65); adon (11); agla (9); alla (51); alpha ω (7); araton (29); asmamyas (43); athedyon (22); athyonodabazar (19); ay (59); baruch (8); capkyb (32); delectycon (58); el (3); elgybor (41); eloon (53); ely (33); epafgricus (47); eye (57); eye assereye (69); flemoyon (37); geuer (21); gofgamel (50); joth (12); kyryos (34); lauagelaguyn (28); lauaquyryn (20); lauazyryn (54); layafalasyn (68); letamynyn (10); mamyas (40); maney (42); nathanathoy (44); narach (48); nomygon (62); nomyx (24); nosulaseps (64); occynomeryon (61); ocleyste (71); oristyon (25); on (5); onay (2); onella (39); onoytheon (23); orlon (66); oryona (63); pantheon (36); quyesteron (13); rabur (52); raby (6); radix (30); romolyon (46); sampsoyny (17); sanathyel (26); suparyas (35); tantalatysten (56); theos (1); thetebar (18); tunayon (14); tunayon (60); tutheon (72); vabalganarytyn (27); vagalnarytyn (49); xps (4); yalgal (15); yaua (31); ydardycon (70); ye (67); ysyston (16); yuestre (38)

(Note that the second "tunayon" might be an error for "tisyon".  The "tunayon" (60) is followed by "occynomeryon" (61) and on another listing of divine names we find "tisyon" two places before "occinomus". They both begin with the letter "t" which, for us, seems to be all that is important.)

So, JP, do see the problem with that list of names? On the surface, it looks like a good representation of Latin text based on letter frequencies. There are lots of vowels: 12 a's, 7 e's, 6 i's (the y's), and 9 o's. But there are no u's and "u" was commonplace in Latin. Moreover, there are no h's, also often seen in Latin.

Now just imagine if the first and second set of the 17-glyph alphabet (the ones containing EVA "f"  f ) transform into allahyahvehjehova and the third and fourth set (where EVA "f" is replaced with EVA "p"  p ) transform into agolbyaubvavaubua. That would give us, in addition to the wheel of 72 letters, another wheel with 8 h's and 6 u's plus some additional b's and v's. The need for a second cipher wheel could have arisen out of an inability to find a sufficient number of divine names beginning with the letters "u" or "h".

Recall that there are two sets of four pointers both on the Sigillum Dei of the SSM (the four crosses and the four bars on the inner heptagon) and on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. of the VMS (the four lines a script extending from the central gates plus the four arms extended with script). I'm thinking one set of pointers could work on the 72 letters and the other (in unison movement or not) should work with the allah … agolb … wheel. Granted that the VMS contains the divine revelation that they wanted to conceal (the marginalia has led us to that conclusion), the Sigillum Dei on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. would have to be an early 15th-century copy of the original Sigillum Dei, the oldest and very first Sigillum Dei.

It all seems quite ingenious to me. The glyphs mechanically convert into the full spectrum of the Latin alphabet (when glyphs in a rotated or oscillated line of Voynichese match up with glyphs in the sequences of 17) in a multi-layered encryption that is unlikely to ever be broken by the Inquisition. And then the divine names (many of them never seen elsewhere) lead to the writing of nonsensical books on black magic that unwittingly propel the secrets of decoding the VMS far into the future.

Gosh, I seem to be running off on wild speculations again. For the moment, JP, all I would like from you is confirmation that agolb yaubva vaubua is the best rendering of the letters inscribed on the back of the Sigillum Doornenburgensis. Also important, please let us know if you are able to place a date on the writing style from either side of the disk. It will be will be much appreciated.

Quote:Morton: So, JP, do see the problem with that list of names? On the surface, it looks like a good representation of Latin text based on letter frequencies. There are lots of vowels: 12 a's, 7 e's, 6 i's (the y's), and 9 o's. But there are no u's and "u" was commonplace in Latin. Moreover, there are no h's, also often seen in Latin.

Many of the old names of divine beings, spirits, angels, power words, etc., are from Semitic, Coptic, and Persian languages rather than from Latin. Even in recent times, many names like this are used as talismanic names in the Arabic world.

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Quote:Morten: Thus, the last word, vaubva (a six letter word ending in "a"), likely stands for "Iehova", the final word of the Fama and the primary divine name of Christianity. The middle word, yaubva, a six letter word possibly beginning with "y", would have to be Yahveh or Yahweh, the primary divine name of Judaism. And lastly, agolb, a five letter word beginning with "a", would have to be Allah, the primary divine name of Islam. In summation, agolb yaubva vaubua probably stands for Allah Yahveh Iehova, that is, the diety of the three Abrahamic religions.

Yes, I think this is possible. This kind of word-manipulation was not uncommon.

(08-07-2019, 03:45 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Many of the old names of divine beings, spirits, angels, power words, etc., are from Semitic, Coptic, and Persian languages rather than from Latin. Even in recent times, many names like this are used as talismanic names in the Arabic world.

Yes, I was thinking some of those divine names might have come from Arabic, others from Greek or whatever. But my main concern is in using the cipher wheels (comprised of letters that constitute the first letter of diverse divine names) to convert VMS glyphs to Latin letters on the assumption that the Latin language underlies some or much of the VMS encryption.

Again, please let us know if you are able to find anything unique about the lettering on either side of the Sigillum Doornenburgensis, something that would help place the sigil in either time or place. Thanks.

(08-07-2019, 09:00 PM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Again, please let us know if you are able to find anything unique about the lettering on either side of the Sigillum Doornenburgensis, something that would help place the sigil in either time or place. Thanks.

JP,

I'm now reading that, in order to maintain secrecy, the authors of all medieval sigillum used universal lettering that cannot be dated, so I guess that takes you off the hook.

The following is a snippet from the Sigillum Doornenburgensis (SD) that I find particularly difficult:



In accordance with the SSM, these letters, from left to right, should stand for v - g - a - r - e.

Comments:

1. Like the "g" of "agolb" on the reverse side, the "g" of Gofgamel is extended with a horizontal bar that obviously is part of the "g" and not a stray mark. Was the letter "g" commonly written like that across medieval times?

2. The "a" of Alla (immediately following the "g") looks more like a "q" (or the number "9") than like other medieval a's including those on the same sigil. Do we find an "a" looking like a "q" elsewhere?

3. The "r" of Rabur (which follows the "q" of Alla) looks more like the number "2" than like the r's seen elsewhere even on the same sigil. Do you think the 2 could really be a 2, representing the two words "yaubva vaubua" that follow "agolb" (Allah) on the reverse side?

The isolated "h" of the SSM sigillum is eliminated on the SD and an "h" replaces the "t" of Theos for the first letter (correctly giving us 72 rather than 73 letters in total); otherwise the two sets of letters are the same and very likely the version that we need to use for decoding purposes.

Earlier I noted that the glyphs f and p are what distinguishes sets of 17 glyphs on f57v. Interestingly, in quire 20, those two glyphs tend to appear in the first line of paragraphs and nowhere else. Thus, instead of using a second set of pointers (as I had suggested) to insert the letters "u" and "h" into the output, we may only need to observe the quantity and position of those glyphs in the first line of quire 20 paragraphs.

Similarly, for the wheel containing the 72 Latin letters of the great name, VMS encoding has to be based on positioning, ie. on placing a glyph (one found among the 17 glyphs) under the desired Latin letter. The other glyphs (a great many of the glyphs found in quire 20) would therefore be nothing more than place markers (fillers) not directly used in the encoding.

As I continue my research, I expect to be able to refine these decoding theories. With a bit of luck, I might even be able to say something serious about decoding the VMS before the end of the year. Already I feel that we are making significant progress.

(01-06-2019, 11:31 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.You still haven't explained the one that is clearly 8 letters and you seem to be selectively ignoring the first one which is one letter and explaining it with a different explanation, which is a questionable way to do it.

You were referring to the following sequence:

• t • oexoraba •

As we saw on the Sigillum Doornenburgensis, the first "t" gets changed into a "h". So that explains it: the "oexoraba" are static letters and the "t" is momentarily separated from them awaiting transition to a "h" which will then merge with "oexoraba" to form "hoexoraba", that is, the first of 8 sets of 9 letters. More crucial at the moment is determining whether or not we need to make use of those sets such as, for example, in a polygonal rearrangement of the order of the Latin letters that were initially extracted.

In an earlier post, I theorized that the glyphs f and p are connected with the Latin letters "u" and "h". It is therefore rather intriguing that the 72-letter name now begins with the letter "h". As you know, a great many of the paragraphs in quire 20 begin with the p glyph. Thus, one can imagine a link between the beginning of the great name and the beginning of paragraphs, whereby the paragraphs of glyphs beginning with p (along with the four groups of 17 glyphs) run around the circle of 72 Latin letters starting with its first letter (the "h").

In other words, the f and p may be position markers reigning over the entire paragraph, and each time one of those glyphs is reached in the first line, the rest of the paragraph might shift to the beginning of the circle accordingly. Thus, depending upon where you place a f or p, you can pretty much make any glyph in quire 20 convert into any Latin letter you so wish as long as a) the respective glyph can be found in the sequences of 17 and b) the letter can be found among the 72 letters of the divine name. Those 72 happen to include all Latin letters except for the "u" (but the "v" can probably substitute for that) and the "h" which can be deemed silent and not needed ("But the Records write it, as it is spoken").

In view of the failure of the great cryptographers of the 20th century to decode the VMS, it seems many people have assumed that VMS encoding must be extremely complex. But that might not be the case. Do you know if any of those cryptographers considered utilizing the divine name of 72 letters in their decoding efforts? Without the divine name, so it seems, it would be virtually impossible to decode the VMS.

My guess is that many of the cryptographers believed the VMS was largely a botanical catalogue and never realized that it could be attempting to depict the mystical plants of King Solomon ("To conclude this point, the example of Salomon is before the rest, and greater, whose wisdome and knowledge was such, that he was able to set out the nature of all plantes"), thereby making little or no effort to study the Solomonic grimoires that were popular in Europe during the late Middle Ages. But John Dee was familiar with those grimoires and surely that could explain why they succeeded in decoding the VMS.

Note that if you were to ask someone to draw mystical plants, he or she would almost certainly be influenced by plants seen in his or her past life. Thus, it is inevitable that some of the VMS plants would wholly or partly resemble real plants but that does not change the fact that those plants are mystical (my recent research leads me to that conclusion). In other words, people hoping for the recovery of secret cooking recipes from the Middle Ages are likely to be disappointed. For the plants depicted in the pharmaceutical section, however, the verdict is still out.

Note that as an excuse for the modern decoding failure, the existence of a missing code book containing thousands of tokens is sometimes postulated. But thousands of tokens are not needed. With the wheels on f57v, all that is needed is a code book (a sigillum dei) containing a mere 72 letters!

While I'm here, I have two more questions for you:



In the top image, you see the second word of marginalia on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (the quite visible "17" is still another pointer to the sigillum dei on f57v). In the lower image, you see a section of the list of divine names from the Summa Sacrae Magicae of AD 1346. Do you see any possibility of a connection between the two?

The "allar" on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is followed by:



Easiest to distinguish seem to be the Latin "u" in the middle of the first word and the Latin "h" at the beginning of the next word. As you know, the "u" and "h" are all-crucial because they cannot be found among the 72 Latin letters of the divine name.

Do you think the first character (just to left of the "u") could be an alternative way of writing the glyph k ? The reason I ask is because when a quire 20 paragraph does not begin with a f or a p, it tends to begin with a k or a t. Unlike the f and p, however, the k and t appear on all four sets of 17 glyphs.

Conclusion: The four "tower" glyphs (f k p t) may have some connection with the Latin letters "h" and "u" and may play a critical role in positioning the lines of quire 20 glyphs around the circles of the sigillum dei.

The possibilities seem endless and time is scarce, but still I remain optimistic of becoming able to repeat some of the 16th-century decoding within the next five or six months.

(15-07-2019, 09:52 AM)Morten St. George Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(01-06-2019, 11:31 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.You still haven't explained the one that is clearly 8 letters and you seem to be selectively ignoring the first one which is one letter and explaining it with a different explanation, which is a questionable way to do it.

You were referring to the following sequence:

• t • oexoraba •

As we saw on the Sigillum Doornenburgensis, the first "t" gets changed into a "h". So that explains it: the "oexoraba" are static letters and the "t" is momentarily separated from them awaiting transition to a "h" which will then merge with "oexoraba" to form "hoexoraba", that is, the first of 8 sets of 9 letters. More crucial at the moment is determining whether or not we need to make use of those sets such as, for example, in a polygonal rearrangement of the order of the Latin letters that were initially extracted.

In an earlier post, I theorized that the glyphs f and p are connected with the Latin letters "u" and "h". It is therefore rather intriguing that the 72-letter name now begins with the letter "h". As you know, a great many of the paragraphs in quire 20 begin with the p glyph. Thus, one can imagine a link between the beginning of the great name and the beginning of paragraphs, whereby the paragraphs of glyphs beginning with p (along with the four groups of 17 glyphs) run around the circle of 72 Latin letters starting with its first letter (the "h").

In other words, the f and p may be position markers reigning over the entire paragraph, and each time one of those glyphs is reached in the first line, the rest of the paragraph might shift to the beginning of the circle accordingly. Thus, depending upon where you place a f or p, you can pretty much make any glyph in quire 20 convert into any Latin letter you so wish as long as a) the respective glyph can be found in the sequences of 17 and b) the letter can be found among the 72 letters of the divine name. Those 72 happen to include all Latin letters except for the "u" (but the "v" can probably substitute for that) and the "h" which can be deemed silent and not needed ("But the Records write it, as it is spoken").

In view of the failure of the great cryptographers of the 20th century to decode the VMS, it seems many people have assumed that VMS encoding must be extremely complex. But that might not be the case. Do you know if any of those cryptographers considered utilizing the divine name of 72 letters in their decoding efforts? Without the divine name, so it seems, it would be virtually impossible to decode the VMS.

My guess is that many of the cryptographers believed the VMS was largely a botanical catalogue and never realized that it could be attempting to depict the mystical plants of King Solomon ("To conclude this point, the example of Salomon is before the rest, and greater, whose wisdome and knowledge was such, that he was able to set out the nature of all plantes"), thereby making little or no effort to study the Solomonic grimoires that were popular in Europe during the late Middle Ages. But John Dee was familiar with those grimoires and surely that could explain why they succeeded in decoding the VMS.

Note that if you were to ask someone to draw mystical plants, he or she would almost certainly be influenced by plants seen in his or her past life. Thus, it is inevitable that some of the VMS plants would wholly or partly resemble real plants but that does not change the fact that those plants are mystical (my recent research leads me to that conclusion). In other words, people hoping for the recovery of secret cooking recipes from the Middle Ages are likely to be disappointed. For the plants depicted in the pharmaceutical section, however, the verdict is still out.

Note that as an excuse for the modern decoding failure, the existence of a missing code book containing thousands of tokens is sometimes postulated. But thousands of tokens are not needed. With the wheels on f57v, all that is needed is a code book (a sigillum dei) containing a mere 72 letters!

While I'm here, I have two more questions for you:



In the top image, you see the second word of marginalia on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (the quite visible "17" is still another pointer to the sigillum dei on f57v). In the lower image, you see a section of the list of divine names from the Summa Sacrae Magicae of AD 1346. Do you see any possibility of a connection between the two?

The "allar" on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is followed by:



Easiest to distinguish seem to be the Latin "u" in the middle of the first word and the Latin "h" at the beginning of the next word. As you know, the "u" and "h" are all-crucial because they cannot be found among the 72 Latin letters of the divine name.

Do you think the first character (just to left of the "u") could be an alternative way of writing the glyph k ? The reason I ask is because when a quire 20 paragraph does not begin with a f or a p, it tends to begin with a k or a t. Unlike the f and p, however, the k and t appear on all four sets of 17 glyphs.

Conclusion: The four "tower" glyphs (f k p t) may have some connection with the Latin letters "h" and "u" and may play a critical role in positioning the lines of quire 20 glyphs around the circles of the sigillum dei.

The possibilities seem endless and time is scarce, but still I remain optimistic of becoming able to repeat some of the 16th-century decoding within the next five or six months.

These characters in the last picture are very reminiscent of the Tibetan alphabet or Medieval Tibeto-Burman Language.. If i read them correctly they mean "remember" or "memory" Characters on page 414. 
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The 'Ro....' word i cannot make out but when researching the tibetan alphabet cam across this word Ro-langs which means to bring back the dead 
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(15-07-2019, 12:05 PM)Monica Yokubinas Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.These characters in the last picture are very reminiscent of the Tibetan alphabet or Medieval Tibeto-Burman Language.. If i read them correctly they mean "remember" or "memory" Characters on page 414. 
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.  

The 'Ro....' word i cannot make out but when researching the tibetan alphabet cam across this word Ro-langs which means to bring back the dead 
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

With weak eyesight once again causing havoc, for a moment I thought you were referring to the Theban alphabet (for which there are articles in my very large "to read" folder) but, of course, that is not the case.

It seems no one has satisfactorily identified the origin of Voynichese script so perhaps having drawn influence from a faraway place is more likely than not.

A while back, I postulated that Voynichese could have been created in Toledo, Spain, around the middle of the 13th century. I based that speculation upon noting that Toledo was, at that time, the only cross-cultural center of translation in Europe as well as a place of convergence for certain cabalists and Cathars. Toledo's ability to translate seemed paramount due to a potential indication that the VMS was encrypting multiple languages ("In which Scroule were written in Ancient Hebrew, and in Ancient Greeke, and in good Latine of the Schoole, and in Spanish, these wordes;").

More recently, I've found support for Toledo in a relevant external source:

"In the which counsell of 811 masters which camme owte of naples athence and tholetus we dyd chuse on whose name was honorius the sonne of eucludus master of the thebanes."

I'm pretty sure that "tholetus" has to be Toledo.

I see that the Escuela de Traductores de Toledo translated a Persian (which brings us a little closer to Tibet), and I find it fully plausible that something from that part of the world could have reached Toledo during the epoch of the Crusades.

But unfortunately, Monica, Google Books has no wish to make page 414 available to me. If possible, it would be just super if you could post an image of the comparison so that we can all evaluate it. Thanks, and best regards.

Quote:Morten: Do you think the first character (just to left of the "u") could be an alternative way of writing the glyph k ? The reason I ask is because when a quire 20 paragraph does not begin with a f or a p, it tends to begin with a k or a t. Unlike the f and p, however, the k and t appear on all four sets of 17 glyphs.

The best suggestions I've seen for the first letter of that word are l, k, and b.

Note the line above the "cz". That is a macron, an abbreviation symbol (like an apostrophe). It means letters are missing. The last letter, the one that looks like a "z" might also be an abbreviation symbol (rotated m) which usually means "m", "em", and occasionally "um".

Thus, if the first letter were "l" (as one possibility), then the various possible expansions could be lucem, lucum, lucrum, lucrem, lucorem, lucitem, etc., constructions of that nature. The macron (apostrophe symbol) can stand for more than one letter and sometimes numerous letters were left out. The rotated m symbol also often included a vowel before the m as part of the symbolic representation.

(16-07-2019, 02:00 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The best suggestions I've seen for the first letter of that word are l, k, and b.

Note the line above the "cz". That is a macron, an abbreviation symbol (like an apostrophe). It means letters are missing. The last letter, the one that looks like a "z" might also be an abbreviation symbol (rotated m) which usually means "m", "em", and occasionally "um".

Thus, if the first letter were "l" (as one possibility), then the various possible expansions could be lucem, lucum, lucrum, lucrem, lucorem, lucitem, etc., constructions of that nature. The macron (apostrophe symbol) can stand for more than one letter and sometimes numerous letters were left out. The rotated m symbol also often included a vowel before the m as part of the symbolic representation.

Thanks JP. I was hoping you or someone would comment on that word because I feel it could be important for the decoding effort and there was nothing I could say about it with any degree of confidence.



But that was yesterday. Today is another day. And today I see a dot (•) after the letter you think might be a "l","k", or "b" and that draws my attention to the following image:



I see a darkened backstroke (\) as part of the "x" and can imagine attaching it to the bottom of the "P" which would give us a figure resembling the first character of that marginalia. I also see a macron above the "p" and I see that the Christus divine name is followed by the "on" divine name.

As I now recall, we debated that word months ago, and back then I pointed out that it appears just to the left of a feur-de-lis shield and that we also find a fleur-de-lis shield on the title page of a related herbal, close to the depiction of a rare flower. As it turns out, that rare flower is unambiguously referenced in the extraneous writings of one of the decoders, in the line that precedes the following snippet:



There, in the last line, we find our macron. As you know, the "vpō" converts into "upon" which simultaneously gives us a) the Latin "u" which follows the first character and b) the divine name "on".

Although there appears to be some doubt about precisely what we find under the marginalia's macron (apparently, it's not even certain whether those characters are VMS glyphs or Latin letters!), it seems that for whatever they are, chances are good that they represent the Latin letters "on" or perhaps the three letters "pon".

I'm going to have to return to this matter at some point in the future and will keep you updated on what I find.

On an academia website, I recently received a private message insinuating that some of my posts in this forum here were hard to understand. I don't know if that included my last post but I imagine it is possible that some of you were mystified as to how and why I explain a marginalia macron by resorting to a macron found in an English-language poem.

I'd like to assure everyone that my theories are not as whimsical as they might seem. There's logic behind the macron connection beginning, a few years ago, when I downloaded the Herball encyclopedia of 1597 with view to seeing if it depicted any of the VMS plants. To my great surprise, I found something in the opening pages of Herball that I would never expect to find in a scientific work: a reference to the publication of the VMS prophecies:



Note that Salonensis Gallo (Salon, France) makes it unambiguous. Thus, the relationship between VMS and Herball goes far beyond the mere depiction of plants from top to bottom. There has to be a direct connection.

In the VMS, on the top of f17r, we find a mysterious macron and over to the right of it there is an image in the shape of a fleur de lys which, one can presume, might be the gateway to resolving the mystery of the macron. On the title page of Herball, we also find an image (now upside down) in the form of a fleur de lys. Here you see the two images:



The symbols on the Herball image are noteworthy. Firstly, on the top left, we can distinguish a "4" with a horizontal line that turns downward with a short offshoot that suddenly turns to the left and strikes the middle of the "o" below. It is unlikely to be a coincidence that a prominent VMS glyph looks like a "4" and has a horizontal line that strikes the middle of the "o" that follows:



On numbers, we can distinguish an Arabic "4", an Arabic "1" (or a Roman "I") being the extended downward shaft of the "4" (the part below the offshoot), a Roman numeral "L" on the top right, and a sequence of three Roman numerals "X" on the bottom. By my calculation, these numbers add up to 85 (L + X + X + X + 4 + 1) and in the foldout pages for f85 in the VMS we find what was surely the original inspiration for the fleur-de-lys design:



In effect, the Herball encyclopedia links back to the VMS.

The fleur-de-lys image on the title page of Herball is found on the pedestal of a poet (a poet laureate by virtue of his headband) who is depicted holding a flower in his right hand. This here is the poet and his flower followed by a Wikimedia color photograph of said flower:



Poets write poems and the introductory pages of Herball allude to a specific poem:



At the bottom of the penultimate page of that poem (printed in 1593, just three years after publication of the complete prophecies), we find something of interest:



As you can see, the first line accurately describes the poet's flower, and observe that there's a macron in the last line. Another macron cannot be found elsewhere in that lengthy poem and, as a general rule, macrons are not normally employed in the English language.

Note that there is an isolated letter "H" just below the word "their" that follows the macron. Since this "H" was not placed in the middle of the page where one might expect to find it, it seems reasonable to assume a hint to replace the "their" with an "H", effectively giving us a macron followed by an "H".



As you can see, like the poem's macron, the VMS macron is followed by the letter "H" albeit here a small "h" but nonetheless an "h". In effect, the English poem, like the English herbal, links back to the VMS.

Recall that the letter "h" (or "H") is the first letter seen on all medieval depictions of the Sigillum Dei. This is relevant because, to the left of the VMS macron, the marginalia alludes to the divine names Allah, Rabur and Christus (Pax symbol) of said Sigillum Dei.

Know that the poem in question is based on a classical myth whose storyline was altered in order to create an unambiguous (Is there another purple flower checkered white?) pathway to the macron. In effect, we are being informed that the VMS macron stands for the Latin letters on, pon, or pō (which would imply a double macron, one underneath the other) and presumably this information will help us to decode the VMS.

In conclusion, methinks it was very nice of the author of the VMS marginalia to provide us with a self-portrait, wasn't it?