The Voynich Ninja

I suppose this actually deserves a more elaborate answer.

Indeed, there is vermin that feeds off parchment, or funghi that live on parchment. This is something one can read in the internet, and so did I.

The insect holes that are found in the Voynich MS are concentrated in the very few first and last folios. This shows that the insects in question were not interested in parchment, because they did not continue deeper.
This was explained to me by an authority in old books and manuscripts: Abigail Quandt, best known for her work on the famous Archimedes palimpsest.

She works at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore. I had opportunity to talk to her, and several other highly reputed MS conservators, when the Voynich MS was at the Folger library in Washington in November 2014. Their names may be found in the Yale library photo facsimile, in the section 'Acknowledgments'.

I have always refrained from mentioning these people's names in the various Voynich MS fora, because there are unfortunately some people in the Voynich amateur communities who will not hesitate to approach these professionals with completely disrespectful comments and questions. I am not talking about suspicions here, but about factual knowledge, and I will leave it exactly here.

The insect holes in the very few first and last folios come from vermin that feast on wood, the conservators clearly say.

Exactly the same pattern may be seen in another MS acquired from the Jesuits by Voynich, namely a Boccaccio MS now preserved in the University of Chicago. This observation was made by Ellie Velinska.
The importance of this is that the two manuscripts came to Rome in very different ways. The effect is therefore clearly something that happened after 1665, when the Voynich MS was sent from Prague to Rome.

Rene, do these observations indicate that the MS was necessarily wooden-bound? What about the unbound MS having been stored in a wooden box? Is that realistic?

My impression, from reading about it, is that most book satchels were leather, but there were some book boxes that were wood.

However, as far as I can tell, these boxes were usually used after the manuscript was bound. But... my knowledge of this is superficial (I haven't researched it in depth), and it occurs to me there must have been some way to transport unbound manuscripts to the binder, as well.

Some images of book boxes, one of which is wood:


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If the worms ate equally in bottom and top covers, it seems that it may have been previously bound in wood. If they ate more of the bottom than the top, for example, then perhaps it was stored in a box.


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There were MANY different ways of stitching books. Probably each bindery had one or two preferred ways of doing it. Here is just one example of Coptic binding (wood?) and stitching:



Image credit: Gleasongleanings blog

Anton, the holes are concentrated near the three outer edges of the pages.
This is where the vermin would crawl out of the binding.
If it were a box, they could be all over the page.

I think I will refrain from commenting on some things in future, but if we accept that the holes were made by 'bookworms', I suppose they mean something like Anobium punctatum and I don't think they said more than that. it does not   follow that the Voynich was bound in wood, it can as well have stood between woodbound books  or even on a wooden shelf, the size alone of the Voynich makes a binding in wood and leather unlikely, at least in my opinion

The terminology she used is 'insects' and 'insect holes'. She further states that it seems likely that the type of wood in questions was beech. But that is indeed not a firm statement, only 'likely'.

My confidence in her analysis is very high.

Helmut, I've been thinking about what you said...

The VMS is small, meant to be portable (yes, an assumption, but it's about the size of a calendar book that was made to be carried and it is somewhat "encyclopedic" in content like a reference book) and small books are, in a sense, like modern paperbacks, portable and soft-covered.

My subjective feeling is that you are right... it doesn't seem likely that the original user (or intended user) would have chosen a wood binding.

But what about a subsequent owner, someone who had it rebound to keep it in a library, someone who couldn't read the strange writing and thus would have no reason to carry it around? someone who was a collector of curiosities. Might someone like Rudolph have it bound in wood simply to match the other books?

The issue of the supposed wooden cover is very interesting and deserves a separate thread. (I think we may already have one). There are some questions that arise in respect of that.

I have a very clear source for the statements about the earlier binding of the Voynich MS, and these observations have also been included in the 2016 Yale issue of the Voynich MS (essay by Zyats et al.).

Now it may seem somehow reasonable that smaller books would not have been bound in leather-covered wood, but is that really the case? It is very easy to find counter-examples in the net.
For example:
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but I won't argue that this is representative, because it is just one example from another age.

Books with a binding of beech wood were also much lighter than those bound in oak.

It would be helpful if any reputable source could be found for the statement that smaller books were rarely bound in wooden boards (covered with leather).

British Library database of book bindings:

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Unfortunately, they didn't include the measurements for the examples, so they have to be looked up individually by the shelf number.

Many manuscripts have been rebound by the holding repositories, often for conservation reasons. This may be the original binding. Eastern Mediterranean, c. 1312. The book is 203 x 140 mm. Canvas binding on wooden boards, with a rough cross bearing the inscription ΑΠΟΣΤΟΛΟΝ incised on the upper cover.

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I don't know how representative this is and unfortunately don't have time to look through enough of them to know.


Can we assume that board bindings would last longer than leather? Does leather start to crack and wear out in a few decades if it is not oiled?

Can we assume that "more important" books would be better bound and thus last longer? (I don't know the answers to any of these questions.)