The Voynich Ninja

Those are completely different things, Don. Your image is 13th century (see the clothing) which makes it deeply medieval. A whale is a large fish (for them) so if you've never seen one (they haven't) you draw it like a large fish. With scales.

If, however, you are a post-medieval inhabitant of a New World colony, your perspective on realism has become different (renaissance and all that). If you spot a strange creature with bands, you will draw it with bands. 

The first known European depiction of a sunflower is by Dodoens in 1568. Realism, within the limits of the medium.



After the 15th century, correct observation became very important. People would have drawn the creature as it was observed, not as it was supposed to be in their christian mindset. If they spotted an armadillo, they would have drawn it with bands, because those are its most salient feature. Heck, in Dutch they are called "gordeldier", "belt-animal".

"BUT what if the Voynich author was unable to draw well?"

I'm glad you ask, because that's where it gets totally ridiculous (as if it wasn't already). Tucker "identifies" the illustrator as Juan Gerson, a New World artist famous for his religious scenes on church ceilings. This guy was born and raised in the New World, but learned how to paint in the conquerors' style. If there is one guy in history who would never in his right mind have drawn an armadillo with scales (like the Old World pangolin unknown to him) it was Juan Gerson.

I think I found an earlier European sunflower drawing (hand-drawn if I remember correctly), maybe 1520 or so? But I have SO MUCH plant information I'm not sure where I filed it.

I don't think the drawing has to be a sunflower. Many of the asters and especially Gerberas have complex seedheads if you think of the scale in a different way. However, I haven't ruled out sunflower because parchment from around 1420 or so could have been used around 1520 or so. I think it's more likely that it was used earlier, but I don't think early 16th century can be completely ruled out. Scriptoria probably had a certain amount of material stockpiled.

(01-10-2018, 10:08 AM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think I found an earlier European sunflower drawing (hand-drawn if I remember correctly), maybe 1520 or so?

It would be interesting for the discussion to see if it exists and what it looks like... I haven't been able to find anything earlier than Dodoens' image.

The whole sunflower thing still doesn't sit right with me, even if you allow for "old vellum". The leaves are plain wrong, they have to be heart-shaped. One could shove this away by invoking a certain form of subjectivity or impressionism, lack of drawing skills or incomplete observation. But all of those destroy the argument, because it would mean the artist was either not interested in naturalistic representation, or not capable of it. And if one or both of those are true, it means the drawing is unreliable, and does not offer sufficient ground to support the giant leap towards the New World.

I have a mostly finished blog (it's been "mostly finished" for about three years, along with about 30 other "mostly finished" blogs) on alternatives for the sunflower identification. Unfortunately, there's no way I can find time to finish it before the weekend.

My best proposal so far is an artichoke that has been left to mature, in order to harvest its seeds. It's got countless seeds not unlike those of a sunflower, but they are hidden under a layer of fuzz. So if the image is about artichoke propagation, it's not half bad.

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Or few dozen of other options of course. Since we don't know the scale it could be any of a number of Sunflower's relatives.

Here's what really caught my eye about the "sunflower" drawing.

Those are not medium-large bracts along the edge, as are found on the seedheads of sunflowers. They are something much more finely textured. The person took some trouble to draw it that way.

I've noted some other details about it in my mostly finished blog. It really frustrates me that I don't have enough time to finish things I have started. I'm not a procrastinator by nature, so "putting off" something until I can find a bigger block of time drives me mad. 

I split this off the Tucker thread.

Given the leaves of the plant, wouldn't it make sense to consider some cereal crop as well?

(17-10-2018, 08:04 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I split this off the Tucker thread.

Given the leaves of the plant, wouldn't it make sense to consider some cereal crop as well?

Yes, it would. They were often drawn with leaves like that.

Speaking of alternate IDs, I finally posted my unfinished blog about other possibilities for the sunflower. It's been sitting in draft mode for years, along with about 30 other unfinished blogs and another 30 that I deliberately pulled years ago that I probably should repost.

It's still not really finished.

I have additional IDs for the sunflower and the reason it sat unfinished is because I wanted to include information on the "other"" sunflower side-by-side with this one, but I can't find public-domain or usable pictures I need to illustrate them properly (I've been hunting a long time). I finally decided that posting a partly finished blog is probably better than never doing it at all (at least in the case of this plant). If I ever locate the pictures I need, I'll add them as a postscript:

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I didn't post about it in the blog, Koen, because I didn't have time to look for good examples, but your suggestion of grain is completely possible.

Millet was in many of the old herbals, and was often drawn with extravagant seed heads compared to other grain drawings (especially the one they called Indian Millet). They weren't shaped like the VMS, but if the VMS drawing were saying, "This plant has tons of small round seeds at the top of a long stalk," then it would fit millet in a conceptual way. It wouldn't explain the hairy fringe around the perimeter, but I still wouldn't discount the possibility.