The Voynich Ninja

There's a new article about the VM by Gerard Chesire on Lingbuzz: "You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[font=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]"[/font]

Here is the abstract:

Quote:The process of palaeography is far more complex and time-consuming than the process of translation, as it requires additional intuition, instruction, involvement and intelligence in order to find the right words, rather than a simple substitution of words. This is one of the reasons why the writing system and language of the Ischia Manuscript took a while to fathom, as the document is unique in the complexity of its palaeographic requirements. This naturally perplexes those who expect or desire effortless translation, but logic dictates that all simple and easy possibilities must already have been eliminated by the experiments of many others over the decades. This paper provides instruction to elucidate and educate the novice about the palaeographic process needed for success with reading the Ischia manuscript.

Cheshire maintains his taboo of referring to the VM under the name "Voynich," but now it's called the "Ischia Manuscript."

In this article, he decodes a line of text as "l o a s a t a s é è l a s d o a s æ o s é a p é a t é e a s é a s o m é a" and then pretends it a form of Portuguese/Galician and offers a translation, "seedpods of rattle, it is they seeds, here bones it’s of foot of end it is and in the sock." It's all nonsense unfortunately.

At this point I am concerned rather than disappointed.

In these unusual times, it is perhaps best to seek diversion and amusement. Even the single paragraph quoted by Stephen brings quite a bit of that.

I am also not disappointed.

I find it rather sad that Cheshire can mislead some VMS-interested people, especially newcomers, with his works.
The attitude of single-handedly introducing a new name for the VMS speaks for itself. The departure from convention seems to me like an attempt to stand out from all other Voynich researchers.

Note that he has previously given the manuscript the name "Maria manuscript".

Whilst I am not fond of the name "Voynich manuscript" I fear that is the name we have to work with.

(18-12-2020, 12:26 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I find it rather sad that Cheshire can mislead some VMS-interested people, especially newcomers, with his works.

I know what you are saying, but I am not so worried about that.
He is not alone - there are literally dozens of 'weird' solutions out there.

Anybody who might be interested in this manuscript should be doing at least some homework.
This should allow them to realise after a little bit of time, what makes sense and what does not.
The internet (everybody's main source) is quite clear about the value of Cheshire's work. There are others that could generate more doubt: the meso-American theory from known academics, whose work has even attracted awards.

Still, people are apt to believe whatever they wish, and this cannot be controlled. (Fortunately, I would say....)

The main practical problem that I find is that there are quite a few people who believe that the Voynich has already been deciphered. The problem with this is that I can contact someone regarding specific documents or a specific question and explain that I am researching the Voynich manuscript, however they may tell me that they had read that it had been deciphered, which would seem to invalidate my research in their mind before even addressing my specific interests. Generally I don't tend to explain that I am researching the Voynich manuscript and this is usually not necessary; if one is looking for enciphered letters then it doesn't matter what the end goal is. Still it is annoying that people have this preconception.

This paper provides amusing amounts of alliteration.

(18-12-2020, 06:51 PM)RobGea Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.This paper provides amusing amounts of alliteration.

As Richard Gere says in Chicago:

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