(31-08-2020, 02:04 PM)-JKP- Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think there may (sometimes) have been a lag of a decade or so between what we see in manuscripts and what was actually worn.
I don't pretend to know, but as long as we are comparing manuscripts with manuscripts, this makes no difference.
We just see how the garments have been drawn in manuscripts and paintings, and specialists have been able to conclude that these fashions did not last for a long time.
The Voynich MS can be placed in a certain time frame by comparison with other dated manuscripts.
Exact dating of manuscripts does exist. Sometimes the colophon lists the date (or other evidence, such as the content, provenance, or codicology establishes a date).
But when we are studying the VMS, visually similar examples are sometimes quite scarce. How many exact matches to the containers have we seen? despite the fact that hundreds (maybe thousands) of people are searching for them? Koen's find is rather epic.
I looked for years for tunics before I blogged about them and yet all the best examples fit into a handful of blogs (when counting mine and Koen's blogs together, it's only a few).
Exact dating from a smaller sample set is more difficult. Many manuscripts do not have a date. They have a rough estimate. And many of the ones that match the VMS do not even have an origin. The closest sample I found to match the 116v text is of unknown origin. The best the repository came up with was that it might be from one of the major centers that used Gothic text. So a century-long date estimate and no origin means we are making best guesses, but with these guesses come assumptions.
Does it look like it's from around 1420 because it was made in 1420? Or is it a 1440 manuscript faithfully copied from a 1420 version (including the illustration styles)?
If you include only manuscripts that are precisely dated, it is very rare that one falls outside of the 1400-1430 window. This stile is just so very specific. It is not something that would be worn by the general population, so you have a relatively small part of society that sets this trend. In the data, you can really see it spike and plummet.
Yes, it is possible that it was copied later. But if professionals use this fashion to date artefacts to 1400-1430, then why shouldn't we?
We don't know when it was worn. We know when it appeared in MS (and other) illustrations.
(31-08-2020, 03:07 PM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.We don't know when it was worn. We know when it appeared in MS (and other) illustrations.
Right.
I spent a lot of time looking at clothing artifacts in museums (both in real life and online). They have a difficult time dating them unless they knew it belonged to a specific noble (like a king). Sometimes a specific form of stitching or weaving pattern (a change in technology) would help if they knew approximately where it came from. You could spend your whole life researching a particular kind of fabric or weaving, or way of putting the garment together.
In my previous posts, I was not arguing a big change in how we see the VMS tunics. I was only pointing out that there might be a lag of a decade or so before the illustration styles change from what was actually worn. I know how illustrators work, and this is something that occurs even today. Professionals often state a range of a whole quarter or even a whole century, so what I suggested is a very small divergence in comparison.
Glancing through my files (I had to do this quickly because I'm working now), I noticed that this manuscript has an exact date:
Sarnen Benediktinerkollegium BKS Cod. membr. 8. 7 September 1427
It has quite a few clothing matches to the VMS, plus Speculum Humanae is pretty high on my list of "topics of interest" when it comes to subject matter.
But what's interesting is that even though it was presumably created in Switzerland, the scribe was probably from Austria, and there are at least two different illustrators. Since scribes and illustrators often traveled, we don't know where the illustrators are from unless their style can be expressly identified (which is sometimes possible, but not always).
Okay... time to work. Gotta go. Have fun all.
ReneZ et al.,
Let's get back to the parchment.
ReneZ said:
One thing can be stated:
the probability that the parchment of the Voynich MS is after 1438 is 2.5%"
I have the feeling that we are still looking at information that is based on all four VMs samples taken together. What if there was only one sample and that was the most recent one? What would be the probability that this parchment is after 1438, something approximating 50%? So that if there actually were two separate batches of parchment production, the most recent date holds precedence for the earliest potential date of VMs completion.
Likewise with dating based of illustrations, such as clothing. I have proposed that VMs White Aries references events of the Fieschi popes c. 1250, but I never dated the VMs to that era, not even prior to C-14. Various investigators have identified the VMs critter of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. with the emblem from the Golden Fleece dated 1430 and subsequent. Oresme's cosmos is dated c. 1410 and subsequent. These things can be regenerated from the artist's memory and from tradition. And here again it's only the most recent date, whichever identification one feel has validity, that counts, and the VMs then comes afterwards, not the whole thing necessarily, just those last fiddly bits, perhaps.
So, if Oresme is valid (BNF Fr. 565), if the clothing is valid, if Melusine is valid (Harley 334), if the Golden Fleece is valid, then the date is after 1430 and there are historical connections to the Duchy of Burgundy. VMs as a finished creation comes after the last dated event.
Likewise with the production of the parchment, the recognition of the potential reality of a second and more recent date of parchment production is a clear indication that VMs chronology may not be as narrowly restricted as some might like it to be. The current data cannot be restricted to a single interpretation.
Rather than claiming a specific interpretation, different interpretations of the data open alternative possibilities.
They only dated 4 pages, so thats roughly another 50 chances for a more recent radiocarbon date to turn up
The golden fleece existed before the Order of the Golden Fleece, and its iconography existed many centuries before. This is a poor argument to move the date.
Fashion on the other hand, is, well, fashion. It is the first thing that gets updated. In art, it is sometimes the only thing that gets updated. Clothes tell who a figure is, they need to be understood correctly by the intended audience.
If we want to do like professional specialists do, we look at the clothes. The date of the clothes overlaps beautifully with the date of the radiocarbon dating. We have rare facts here. I don't understand, why struggle instead of embracing this precious foothold?