The Voynich Ninja

(30-12-2018, 09:18 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I'd also say that as far as drawing skill goes, this plant actually surpasses contemporary works, obliterating its ugly duckling reputation.

You know, it's almost as if.....the VMS was done by more than one person!

(30-12-2018, 01:10 AM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The nymphea I saw in the "Pseudo-Apuleius" were all very unrealistic. The Nenuphar in the "Circa Instans" can be recognized pretty well. 

I would rather see the VMS in this tradition.

I am sorry I have been unclear: some aspects of the structure of Trinity College MS O.2.48 have been discussed by Rene You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.. It includes a copy of the Pseudo-Apuleius, but that is not what I was referring to. I totally agree that the Voynich herbal doesn't belong to to the  Pseudo-Apuleius tradition. By the way, discussing this tradition as a monolith is quite a problem, since it spans about a whole millennium (I attach the Leiden version of nymphaea). The basic process here was simplification and schematization: plant images were made more and more geometric and symmetrical. On the other hand, during this evolution symbolic elements (like zoomorphic roots) were sometimes added: this is something we see in the VMS too (though not in f2v).

I also don't believe that the VMS belongs to the Circa Instans tradition: the very few recognizable parallels (like the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. illustration) are not enough to link the VMS and the Circa Instans. The two examples you provided make clear how close illustrations in this tradition can be. The VMS is both different and more detailed: it doesn't seem to be a derivation.

The non-Pseudo-Apuleius part of the Trinity ms is a unique work: we have been unable to trace it to any known written or illustrated tradition.  This part of the Trinity ms abounds with anthropomorphic and zoomorphic details. I don't see this section of the herbal as an ancestor of the VMS, but as a similar and independent creation. In my opinion, the VMS also appears to  be a unique work. It certainly draws from contemporary herbals, but (like a few other late medieval works) it does so in an original way.

The question whether herbs in any herbal were drawn from nature or not has always been one of the key questions in the study of illustrated herbals. Helmut, maybe you have seen:
Felix Baumann, Das Erbario Carrarese und die Bildtradition des Tractatus de herbis, Bern, 1974. (*)

If not, I can recommend it (obviously to all German readers). It closely analyses this question mainly for this herbal, which has very accurately painted herbs.
See also:
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He concludes that the illustrations in this MS can be subdivided into different types:
- observation from nature
- observation from pressed (dried) samples
- following a schema, with some details from nature

Of course, the quality of these illustrations is greatly superior to those in the Voynich MS, and they have been executed (painted, not drawn) by an artist. This herbal is  bit of an exception to the traditions prevalent in the early 15th century. However, the author also looks at other herbals.

The main problem in understanding these illustrations is that for a modern person, illustrations automatically and naturally have the purpose of accurately representing the object. Assuming this purpose for illustrated medieval herbals is quite a big assumption.

In the early 15th century there was hardly any awareness of which features are determining the identity of a plant. The typical example for this type of question is whether the leaves are opposite or alternate. Even if a drawing has clearly one or the other, this does not mean that this is an accurate reflection of the intended plant, and it can happen easily that a drawing has a mixture of them.

It is not impossible that the person making the Voynich MS plant drawings was accurate, but this would be quite an exception for the time.

This is of course independent from the question of drawing from nature, because it is entirely possible to make bad drawings from nature.

- - -
Note (*): I am not aware of an English translation, which is quite a pity.

Thank you; Rene, for mentioning the Baumann book, I have read it some time ago and it was one of the reasons that led me to the conclusion that at least the bigger part of the plant illustrations   were drawn from nature and I thinkt  the VMs is very likely the first Eurpean example of scientific ilustrations and drawings in the modern sense, especially the small plants section

Here is the Nenufar from the Tractatus de Herbis (if not yet seen):

You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. , Tractatus de Herbis, 1440, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

IS the Egerton 747 the only other one where some type of scales have been drawn onto the root? I've seen a few with vertical lines, but nothing quite so scaly.

It does, of course, appear again in later works:


“Nenufar” = Waterlily [Arnaldus de Villa Nova, Tractatus de virtutibus herbarum, 1499]

These are from the Udine herbal and the Vermont Italian. It's possible they are Nymphoides. I believe the fish-root on the right indicates an aquatic plant:

[attachment=2611]


These have the same schematic lines in the rhizome as the pic you posted from Sloane 4016:

[attachment=2613]


In these post-VMS herbals, the water is explicitly drawn but the roots are crude:

[attachment=2614]


Bessler made an effort to indicate the textures in the rhizomes, but it's not as accurate as the VMS drawing and it came much later:

[attachment=2615]

I have many more pictures, but it's almost 9:00 am and I haven't had any sleep yet. I have to go.

In the search for the practical applications of Nenufar I came across this text. It describes the use of "Seeplumen - Wasser". One can therefore safely assume that aquatic plants were not only described but also processed according to recipes. In principle, the question arises as to whether the practical use is always a criterion in the identification of plants. To put it bluntly: no ID without a recipe ?


Puff von Schrick, Michael: Von den ausgebrannten Wassern , 1478, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

Many herbals have no recipes. Some have no text at all (not even labels). Occasionally a later hand has attempted to add labels (not always correctly).

Often the identification of these plants is based on similar herbals that have the same plants in roughly the same order (even then there are sometimes differences that puzzle historians and botanists).

Recipes were not always included. Some described where the plant was found and occasionally what it was used for (e.g., snake bites) and not much else. Sometimes the recipes (if they existed) were in a separate section or a separate manuscript.

hi Marco,

I was looking for this left image of lily: from which ms does it come? 

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(can not find it in the Trinity MS O.2.48)