The Voynich Ninja

Hi Ahmet, nice to see you here and thanks for answering questions. What is your translation of the vord daiin? 

(03-08-2020, 06:20 PM)RobGea Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Wow !

Or as we say elsewhere, "Bruh!"

(03-08-2020, 05:53 PM)Ahmet Ardıç Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Of course I did some speculation here.

Yes you did! 
I hope you back it up with evidence when you have time, it would be very exciting to read.


Are your theories falisfiable? I think this is an important question.

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(03-08-2020, 07:05 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Ahmet, do you know how to read German?

I tried to learn German for a while long ago. Then I gave up and did not continue. I was tried to learn German with using some phrases and with learning simple sentences. Today,  I cant speak German but I still remember some phrases in German. I have some (simple) knowledge about to read German. 

However, if I read any words in Turkish in VMS, why should I think they are in German? Of course, I assume that the author is probably a multilingual person and that she/he probably used some European words in VMS. If we are likely to see some European languages in VMS in the future, these words are more likely to be the version of 600 years old Italian and/or Greek.

So, in order to examine whether any word written in the VMS is in German (or in another language), I must not be able to read that words in Turkish first. Or, the word that I cannot read, must not contain a structurally similar extended word-suffix, or the studied word must not correspond with Turkish with its phonetic harmony. When I will find such a word, it will be necessary to search them in the old languages of the geography where the author travels.

Thanks,

(04-08-2020, 12:05 AM)Pepper Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Hi Ahmet, nice to see you here and thanks for answering questions. What is your translation of the vord daiin? 

Hi Pepper,

You asked an explanation about a short word with using a short sentence. However, the answer is not short. Because this word is used in many different meanings as both a word suffix and an independent word. For this reason, this word is used very often in VMS and this is a very normal situation.

We can write this word in Latin abc in the form SAĞN / ŞAĞN / SEĞN, SAM / ŞAM / SEM / ŞEM, ŞAIIN / SAIIN / ŞEĞN / ŞEİİN according to ATA alphabet transcription. 

I am not saying that the author was referring to all of these words by writing with this single word. There's absolutely nothing like that. Only this word has a Turkish equivalent of all different transcription combinations and some of their meanings are also common. Because the word root is the same. So, that as the word is read in context, the human brain (for a native speaker) automatically derives all variations, and selects the appropriate one for the context. An example of the brain automatically selecting the appropriate concept to the context in English would be the presentation of the word “fly.” Depending on the context in which it is being read, the brain will draw a distinction between “fly” the verb and “fly” the noun. A similar situation exists in Turkish, albeit with more options. If this is confusing, you can read the explanation below and see that all of them in Turkish.

I hope you will understand my English in first read.

The spelling of this word as SAIIN and as like SAĞN are so close to each other with in phonetic-value that they cannot be perceived as different words. The root of this word is the SA- ('SAĞ-' in some dialects), and it has the suffix '-ĞN'.

The suffix “-ĞN” (“-AĞN”/“-ĞIN”/ “-GİN”) is the phonetic equivalent of “-AĞIN / -EĞİN” due to the Turkish vowel harmony rule, for when the last letter of a root is a consonant, a vowel may be placed as a conjunction between the root and the suffix. These suffixes indicate prospect attainability, potentially achieving something, to be able to potentially attain/reach something, and expecting forthcoming form of something (-able). Sir Gerard Clauson in his book "Studies in Turkic and Mongolic Linguistics" (page 154) explained the suffixes “ĞIN”, and “GİN” as: ["-ğın/-gin function uncertain; e.g. kev- "to masticate" > kevgin "indigestible"; rare and unproductive and probably very old."]. In addition, Sir Gerard Clauson explained in his book "An etymological dictionary of pre-Thirteenth-Century Turkish" (Clauson) that: ["-ğ the commonest Deverbal Suffix; forms a wide range of Deverbal Nouns and Noun/Adjectives, Nomen actiones, etc".]

You can see this word in some Turkish dictionaries (with certain meanings) in the form SAĞIN. But you can often see this word in dictionaries with the word-suffix '-mek / -mak'. So you can see this word in the dictionaries as like SAĞINMAK and SAĞMAK too.

The suffixes “-mek/-mak”: these are suffixes of Turkish infinitive. They turn the root word into a verb as well as also a concrete noun.(Clauson, Eyuboğlu, Guise)

SAĞINMAK: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
SAĞMAK: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(See Turkish equivalents in the dictionary in google word translator.)

In addition, the various meaning of the word SAĞIN itself is shown in some dictionaries.
SAĞIN: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

You could say that essentially, the letter A and E correspond to ATA Transcription with a single typeface. So we can read this word as SEĞİN.
However, the word SEĞİN is a Turkish word too.
SEĞİN: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

If you read the word in SEM format, it also has Turkish meanings.
SEM: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

If we talk about reading this word as SAM, we can say the following. This word is both a word-suffix and a word that has its own meaning.

The word SAM: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

The suffixe -SAM: The suffix “-SAM” indicates actions taken in first person. This suffix is directly described as “I/me” and is related to the suffixes “-SAM”, “-SIM”, “-SİM” or “-SEM” which all describe action’s owner to be “I, me, myself” (first person) (Guise).

In Turkish, some word-suffixes can be written separated from the main word/root since ancient times.

Likewise, the pronunciation of word SEM also has Turkish meanings. For example, we know that this word is used in the meaning of 'medicine' in Old Turkish. But the word SEM also has other meanings too. 
SEM: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

The pronunciation of this word as ŞAM and as like ŞEM has some meanings in Turkish.
ŞAM: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
ŞEM: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

If we talk about the spelling of the word ŞAĞIN;
Today, this word is written and read in the Anatolian dialects in the form of UŞAĞIN. In other words, the word has a U sound on the front side. We know that some dialects in Azerbaijan are still used in the form of ŞAĞIN in the same meaning.

In this spelling, the root word is the word UŞAK. But when it was take the word suffix -ĞIN, the K sound was lost in pronunciation and the word became as USAĞIN.
UŞAK: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

If we read the word as ŞEĞN, this lives in our language in the form of ŞEYİN. The root of this word is ŞEY. It usually appears in the root form in dictionaries.
ŞEY: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
ŞEYİN: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

As you can see, we have shown all the different readings of this word read in VMS according to ATA transcription. Moreover, we shared all related Turkish dictionary pages.

You may have noticed that this word is repeated in almost every page, with multiple numbers in VMS. Moreover, just like in modern Turkish, this word appears in VMS as both an independent word and as a word suffix. So, in this point, the overlap between Turkish and VMS is very clear. All I can tell you is that the word is not used in the same meaning, or in the same function with all of these repetitions in VMS.

So that's why there are many repetitions.

In the runic alphabet inscriptions from the Old Turkish Period, cases where two or more sounds were met with a single alphabet sign were recorded. So this is not just for VMS-specific too.

However, this type of alphabet has helped the author to encode confidential information. We talked about how this coding is done in our second youtube video in English.   You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

May be it is very difficult to understand this situation for a person who thinks English (or any other PIE rooted language) in his/her brain, but an example, even if a word has 10 readings and 100 different meanings, someone who knows Turkish will understand the meaning of the word when they read a sentence. In addition, Turkish speaking person will always understand whether it was used as a word-suffixe or as a separate word too.

So, This is suffix and word. Different readings of the word mostly from same root and a native speaker brain automatically selecting the appropriate concept or meaning form the meaning content. 

The author could write this word in a more separable form by using with simple alphabet characters only, if she/he were wanted to that.

If the author were wanted to that, she/he was not match some single sign in the alphabet with 2 sounds. So this type of writing is not very normal. However, the aim of the author was to create a coded MS which should have been not easy to read. The author was coding and developed a complex alphabet to make this MS difficult to read.

In other words, this alphabet is the situation specific alphabet to created only for VMS, which has been created with consisting of both the syllabic alphabet, the simple alphabet and the tamga-scripts and the numbers. For this reason, now we are reading a simple word in very different ways.

The interesting thing is that even when we take the meanings of different words, the meaning integrity of the sentences is often not broken in meaning. I think this is a situation that created by the intelligence of the author, but it cannot be a coincidence. It is probably not possible to simulate this situation in a language other than Turkish.

Best regards,

Ahmet Ardıç
ATA Team Alberta

Is there a specific point that can differentiate between a Turkish speaking person who traveled in Europe and a European person who learned to write in Turkish?

(07-08-2020, 12:00 AM)R. Sale Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Is there a specific point that can differentiate between a Turkish speaking person who traveled in Europe and a European person who learned to write in Turkish?

Hello R. Sale,

I do not see any difference between this two options. We are talking about a dialect or a sub dialect of Turkish, or we are talking about Turkish that used by an Ottoman minority person, this person can also be a European or an Asian person. Obviously, in the future, linguists will say more clearly which of these possibilities is more possible. We are also in the earlier stages of reading of VMS. Therefore, it is necessary to think more about these specific details together with the experts.

Of course I have a few personal opinions on this subject and I already share them. As I progressed in the VMS readings, I think that the author of the VMS may have deliberately used mixed dialect. Perhaps this may have facilitated the author to code words and may be create a code that is difficult to break.

Thanks,

Ahmet Ardıç Wrote:Moreover, just like in modern Turkish, this word appears in VMS as both an independent word and as a word suffix. So, in this point, the overlap between Turkish and VMS is very clear. All I can tell you is that the word is not used in the same meaning, or in the same function with all of these repetitions in VMS. 

I notice that you emphasized this three times.

This overlap happens in many languages. There are numerous suffixes that can also stand as words. Depending on the language, patterns like -ham -burg -mont -ten -man -ton function both as suffixes and as individual words, so this characteristic is not specific to Turkish.

Ahmet Ardıç Wrote: In other words, this alphabet is the situation specific alphabet to created only for VMS, which has been created with consisting of both the syllabic alphabet, the simple alphabet and the tamga-scripts and the numbers. For this reason, now we are reading a simple word in very different ways. 

For those who are interested in seeing examples of Tamga scripts, here is an article and some examples.


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It is a somewhat pictographic script that includes characters similar to some of the very early Asian scripts. There are also quite a few circle-line characters.

Dear Ahmet,

I wanted to give some more constructive feedback to You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. , which was quite amazing and just made me want to say "Wow", but someone else already said it before me.

A lot is known about the life of Voynich, and you may not be fully aware of that.

Any theory about the manuscript that goes against some of the established history of it, has a major problem.

This is true for the theory that Voynich faked it, that Edward Kelly faked it, or that it was written in Meso-America. We know that it was produced in the early 15th century, and that it was in Prague/Bohemia at the start of the 17th century. We also know that it was with the Roman Jesuits from 1665 onwards. There are of course also many specific details that we do not know.

So by adding the type of speculation to your work, that is written in the post that I linked, you are creating a problem for your theory.

However, this is not at all necessary.

There are several completely logical and historically acceptable ways, how a MS that was in Turkey in the 1500's could end up at the court of Rudolf II.

Ogier Ghislain de Busbecq spent many years in the Ottoman empire, and acquired numerous items for his patron Maximilian II, who was the father of Rudolf II.

Leonhard Rauwolf traveled extensively in the near East, and later sold some of his books to Rudolf II.

Rudolf II was very interested in tulips, and bought many bulbs that came from the near East, probably Turkey.

Certainly, there were many contacts and any of them could (theoretically) bring a book from Turkey to Prague.