The Voynich Ninja

Finally we agree on something. I think it's also quite probable that it's Petasites, but your interpretation of the text as "Latin" is still quite disturbingly subjective.

That inset picture is an extraordinary parallel for the "fruit/flower". I still think there's more to be said for banana though. And yeah no "Latin".

sorry for the mistake, seen it by myself. it does not read "ave MDL re meo", it must read "a vend L re meo" -> after selling 50 things I go".
 
again,
sorry.

Yes, those smart doctors and professors are funny. Everybody trying to claim "decoded" but nobody can show particular page.From pages 67r,105,r1r,25v,84r,99r,71r,42r,38r,28r,45v,32r,48r,33r and21v no such a thing even a word about astronomy,magic or whichcraft...sorrry  lads. We just switching on our fantasies when we saw a strange and understandable things.There is something in the book :,but like 1r said: "my knowledge is free to take".So there is nothing was mentioned to hide(almost) Pages with the plants take around two to three hours to translate,text and language is was very simplified that's why its take so long.  Only theories which can be used on that book is finding reasons to make the strange alphabet for the book which was to share.
Advice,stop rape the manuscript. Any questions ?

(03-07-2018, 09:00 PM)Dr. Michael Hoffmann Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Dear community,

my name is Dr. Michael Hoffmann. I am a geneticist, and I am pretty sure that I have decoded Voynich. 21 pages are translated completely, and the first line of 120+ pages of the manuscript also. I started working on Voynich some weeks ago, because I am on sabbatical and I needed a project.

The text inside Voynich is latin, and for translation it requires I) a decipher chart (which is in the attachment) and II) knowledge of frameshifts (i.e. syntax movements). Since I am the only one today who can read that script I am searching for followers helping to translate the whole manuscript. You do need knowledge of latin, at least that what we call a "grosses latinum" in germany. A degree in science is essential to accept the frameshifts/syntax movements; although some pages do not follow that rule, which might be due to the fact that Voynich is written by at least four different authors, and all of them obtain a different style.

Inside Voynich, spoiler alert, you can find poems and also texts about finance, as well as thoughts of, at least at that time, strange things, and cooking recipes. At least two of the authors are female. On a cooking recipe I am actually working, and it is page 150 of the digital copy provided by the yale university. This recipe is entitled "the five wings". If you are interested in discussions about Voynich translation, please feel free to contact me.

And please find as an example attached translated page 92 of the digital copy provided by yale (latin and german). It is about the treatment of perotinitis (disease of the guts) with extracts of blue lotus. As in most cases the plant depicted on a page is decoration, on this page (and on some others that deal with medicine) it is not. I hope you can read the attachment, I had to minimize the original because of the 500 kb limit rule here.

I know that I ruined some myths here. However, with a scientific approach you can finish everything. Yeah.

I hope some of you find my post interesting,
with best regards
Dr. Michael Hoffmann

ps: because of the prefix I chose (book) I can state that I have published this story on amazon. I do not have send this story to science or nature simply because translation is not my work, it is a hobby.

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Voynich encoding system revealed

Greetings! Sorry man, there is no such a word what you talking about in your translation.I'm so upset,i spend three hours just to check that....for nothing. Page 92 said a story about raped woman which got sick and recognized she has syphilis (that's what doctor said)She was cured by that plant(  Inula Conyza)A decoction of Ploughman’s Spikenard was frequently used for bruises, ruptures, and internal wounds; the juice from the plant was used to soothe itchy skin. The leaves were burnt as an insecticide to destroy fleas. Well, as i said, the language(text) is so simplified  ,There is is hard to say how fast she went to the doctor,but probably in the very next morning.Whatsoever after she was cured from internal wounds ,but she died from syphilis .Well,don't spend your time on theories ,find a buyer for the "code" ....just my opinion and advise.
Bu the way an author was a man,a Holly man which never charged anyone for the service.

Dear Michael (if I may)

I apologise if any of the following points have been made; they didn't appear in the several pages of comments which I read before the tone turned very technical and bit over-sharp.  

My first point is that every writer needs constantly to do a 'reality check' and demonstrate that they are doing this.  In the case of Beinecke MS 408, the past century shows how easily enthusiastic theories about the written part of the text very easily become elevated above the solid rock of historical fact and knowledge to date.

Quite apart from developing your translation, and explaining your impression of the alleged encryption's method, you need to demonstrate that such a method for encryption is known from historical records dated earlier than 1440: because the manuscript's manufacture (to the best of our knowledge) occurred by 1438.  This date has not suited a number of hypothetical 'histories' so even on that you may discover efforts to replace an attestable item with a theory-derived item.

Secondly, you need to have - or work to develop - some knowledge of codicology and of art.  This is because there is no use proving that your proposed enciphering method is attested for, say, 17thC Africa if everything else about the primary evidence denies such a date and provenance.  

I have been criticised, myself, for suggesting that the professional opinion of someone with specifically relevant background (years of focused practical study and experience) should weigh more heavily than the after-dinner musings of someone less interested in the object than in his (or her) musings.  However, the aim of such preference is not to have any ''idea' seem more impressive, but to have the manuscript correctly provenanced and understood. 

So what you need to do is to demonstrate that in the real, physical world of not later than 1438 we have some tangible proof that someone literate in Latin produced (a) a text created around your posited system AND (b) produced imagery in comparable style and 'hand' to the Voynich manuscript's AND © that they did so in an area where contemporary manuscripts were being produced which employed vellum or even parchment quires of the same raw dimensions as the Vms' standard quires and formed them into a finished book using similar stitching style and thread.  (In manuscript studies, whether the thread has an 'S'- or 'Z-' twist is a marker of provenance. 

As has been so often the case, Michael, I think you have fallen into the error of imagining that the Vms is not yet read because it's written text has not been 'deciphered'.  In fact, the very idea of its being in cipher is little more than an idea, and one more than a little out-of-keeping with our present understanding of early fourteenth century cipher methods in Latin Europe.

You want qualified scientists to promote your personal theory; IMO we need qualified persons from across the range of manuscript sciences and related areas of specialisation... to stop anachronistic nonsense being promoted as if it were 'history' or 'art history' or 'cipher decryption'.

A case of live and learn, isn't it?

I'd also note that the inset picture of Petasites hybridus Butterbur is another - of the myriad - instances where a plant is brought forward, less to explain what is in the Vms than to argue some less than solidly based theory about origins for both imagery and unclassified written text.  We haven't yet obtained anything more than theoretical arguments for and against its being enciphered at all! (Did you know that, Michael?)  

If the aim in referring to P.hybridus was to explain the primary source (not an effort to persuading us to believe an idea about the text's encipherment), then you must consider and treat every part of the Vms' plant-picture in detail.  

Doing this, one finds that by comparison P.hybridus'  leaves are of quite a different structure and class from those shown in that Vms picture.  P. hybridus does not have root remotely like that displayed within the Vms' picture.  Nor is P.hybridus a plant with layers of hollow stem - plainly shown in the Vms' picture. 

 In short, whatever the Vms' picture may be  - and it has been identified as banana-plant(s) first by a pharmacist who did not offer analytical discussion, and independently by an iconographic analyst, who did - you cannot just 'dismiss' informed and detailed studies which reach their conclusions after (and not before) engaging in the research.  In the present instance both those persons have   solid qualifications and years of experience in their separate professions, and the second person did explain the analytical menthod, documented the analytical process in detail, adduced comparisons comparable not only in subject matter but stylistics and motifs before concluding that the plant was an exotic.  The study went on to sketch the background to cultural and material exchange with Europe before 1438, outlining trade routes and the relevant economic history before concluding that the plant cannot have been pictured as it is by any 'Latin' (i.e European Christian) before 1438 and therefore that the image we have must be copied from one that was first made elsewhere.   

A decade ago it was not uncommon to see apparently baseless narratives (deemed 'theories') pushed and promoted by 'dismissing' more informed and detailed studies, but it won't do these days - not with researchers on board such as Anton, Emma, Koen, and Marco (to name a few).  

Michael - I suggest you stop trying to promote your views until you have considered the manuscript in greater depth, using a wider range of primary and secondary sources to inform your ideas.

NOTE:
With the delay on comments appearing in this thread, I'm never quite sure if one hasn't failed to post.  So if this appears with another sent earlier, I apologise for seeming to reply twice.

(04-11-2018, 06:02 AM)Diane Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Doing this, one finds that by comparison P.hybridus'  leaves are of quite a different structure and class from those shown in that Vms picture.

No, they are quite similar. Even the tears in the edges of the leaves are one of the distinctive characteristics of many species of Petasites (this tends to happen on the larger leaves and later in the season when it goes to seed). And for the record, the rounded shape of the VMS  leaves is more similar to some species of Petasites than they are to banana.

(04-11-2018, 06:02 AM)Diane Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.P. hybridus does not have root remotely like that displayed within the Vms' picture..

It's quite a variable species. In some regions the root is more rounded like the VMS plant. In fact, in the regions in which it is round and swollen like the VMS root, it is sometimes bright red (even redder than in these examples):

(04-11-2018, 06:02 AM)Diane Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Nor is P.hybridus a plant with layers of hollow stem - plainly shown in the Vms' picture. 

You are mistaken. One of the distinctive characteristics of Petasites is that the petioles (the stem part that attaches the leaves) are hollow. (Source: "A botanical and pharmacological description of petasites species", Tys, Szopa, Lalak, Chmielewska, Serefko, Poleszak, Curr. Issues Pharm. Med. Sci., Vol. 28, No. 3e, Pages 151–154; 2015).

please find attached page 63. the herb depicted there is known as "mönchspfeffer", which is "vitex agnus-castus". I included a real picture of the plant, which is license free. google provides nicer pictures.

because the text is intended to be a riddle, in the authors spirit I would like to provide the first two sentences here only, and you can try to translate the remaining part. Please note: I found that the symbol for "qu" can be used as "cu".

the text in english says:

1 because of reproductive forces skies are burning, look and think about the cause, undress yourself again, so that you do not swim your desire and (become) hard as stone, until swimming allow to rub,
2 it gets worse the field, but alone though the source against I go. nod, as forth scraper sharpen that at.

The depicted plant is used as an anaphrodisiac.

I do not have in mind whether I mentioned that "L.a." at the beginning or elsewhere in a text should not confuse you. It is latin and means "lege artis"; that phrase can be found on pages where more serious conditions are described, like on page 9 (tausendgüldenkraut) or on page 28 (indian tobaco).