The Voynich Ninja

The idea of the Thema Mundi was part of medieval astrology. It can be seen in the chart and is said to represent the sun, moon and five visible planets at the time of creation in relation to the signs of the Zodiac. The Moon is in Cancer, the Sun is in Leo, and the planets are arranged down the solar side, though they also have potential astrological connections in order down the lunar side.
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Placing the Moon and Sun together is a clear indication of an astrological sequence: Moon, Sun, Mercury, Venus, etc.
As opposed to the medieval astronomical sequence: Moon, Mercury Venus, Sun, etc.

The significance of the sequence pattern and the astrological connections was introduced as part of the investigation of VMs f67r2.
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From the Thema Mundi, to get to the 4-1-1-1 pattern takes only two simple changes, Mars is switched to its primary sign, which is Aries, and Saturn is changed to its alternate, which is Aquarius. So, it is a 'valid' pattern in an astrological sense, and it is fairly simple, considering other possible alternatives.

The earliest historical match for the use of the 4-1-1-1 pattern is the 1494 Leipzig edition of Johannis Sacrobosco. Since this cosmic diagram differs radically from a recently previous image by the same printer with no astrological references, there is a question of the pattern's origins, which may be tied to a certain Wenzel Faber, but where might he have gotten it? And how is it that the VMs appears to use the same pattern of planet to zodiac connections?

(03-11-2023, 06:49 PM)R. Sale Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.From the Thema Mundi, to get to the 4-1-1-1 pattern takes only two simple changes, Mars is switched to its primary sign, which is Aries, and Saturn is changed to its alternate, which is Aquarius.

Pierre d'Ailly in his Vigintiloquium or De concordantia astronomie... (a treatise that consists in 20 arguments, several variants of the title in printed editions) composed in 1414, also gives Saturn's original position in Aquarius but Mars in Scorpio, Venus in Taurus, Mercury in Gemini.
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Quote:Verbum decimumnonum.
[...]
Postremo ponemus planetas in eorum domibus (in quibus creati sunt) cum gradibus earum exaltationum.
Exceptis sole et luna qui in locis earum exaltationum ponendi sunt ut sequens tabula declarabit.
Saturnus ponitur in aquario in domo sua: alias in gradu suae exaltationis 21.
Jupiter ponitur in sagittario vel in piscibus secundum aliquos qui dicitur quod ibi magis gaudet in domo sua in gradu suae exaltationis 28.
Mars in scorpione in domo sua in gradu suae exaltationis 28.
Sol in ariete in gradu arietis suae exaltationis 19.
Venus in tauro in domo sua in gradu suae exaltationis 27.
Mercurius in domo sua in geminis in gradu suae exaltationis 15.
Luna in thauro in gradu suae exaltationis 3.

It seems that every astrologer had their own favorite arrangement.

From Laura Ackerman Smoller, History, Prophecy, and the Stars: The Christian Astrology of Pierre d’Ailly, 1350-1420 (1994, Princeton University Press) p. 65:

Quote:Having rejected what he calls the a posteriori method of figuring the world’s age by conjunctions, d’Ailly proceeds to an a priori determination. He acknowledges that he can offer only a conjecture, for his calculations require drawing up a horoscope with the location of all of the planets at the moment of their creation on the fourth day.25 D’Ailly was by no means the first to interest himself in the horoscope of Creation (or thema mundi). The subject comes up not infrequently in astrological literature — and in art — though with no great uniformity in solutions.26 It was an astrological common place that the degree of the ecliptic known as a planet’s exaltation corresponded to the position in which the planet was created. With such reasoning Julius Firmicus Maternus in the fourth century had sketched out a thema mundi, which was taken up in Macrobius’s widely read Commentary on the Dream of Scipio. Firmicus Maternus and those following in his footsteps assigned Aries to the prominent position of the mid heaven (medium celum) in the world’s horoscope and had the sun in the sign of Leo.27 Christian tradition, however, dictated that the world was created when the sun was at or near the vernal equinox (Aries 0°), so that the Creation, the Annunciation, and the Crucifixion might all fall (in theory) on the same date. Hence, the sun would have to be in Aries, and not in Leo as Firmicus Maternus would have it.

D’Ailly’s horoscope, accordingly, differs substantially from Firmicus Maternus’s. Drawing, as he claims, on Albumasar, he presents a horoscope that also has Aries in the midheaven, but with drastically different planetary positions. The planets, he says, are in their exaltations.28 The positions correspond more closely, though not exactly, to the exaltations given by Alchabitius than to those of Firmicus Maternus.

Note 26:  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

I haven't found a source yet for Albumasar's and Alcabitius's versions of the thema mundi.

Quote:According to Aesculapius, therefore, and Anubius, to whom especially the divinity Mercury committed the secrets of the astrological science, the geniture of the world is as follows : They constituted the Sun in the 15th part of Leo, the Moon in the 15th part of Cancer, Saturn in the 15th part of Capricorn, Jupiter in the 15th part of Sagittary, Mars in the 15th part of Scorpio, Venus in the 15th part of Libra, Mercury in the 15th part of Virgo, and the Horoscope in the 15th part of Cancer.

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This is the same arrangement as the one ascribed to Macrobius (5/7 match with our 4-1-1-1 pattern), I don't see a different one by Julius Firmicus Maternus in there.

@nablator

Thanks for the interesting info. If d'Ailly can put both Venus and the Moon in Taurus, then I guess it's open season. That's really going to mess with the patterns, if they double up like that. I'm not much of an astrologer and now I can see why. Not only do the experts disagree, but the sources are also divergent. There is the Macrobius' version with seven planetary - zodiac connections in sequence. And with the Sun in Leo. Then there is also an apparently more religiously influenced construction which has the Sun in Aries. Not sure about the rest of it.

Then there was also the 'Sacrobosco' cosmos with the seven astrological symbols stacked vertically, ostensibly identifying the respective orbits, but not actually connecting the planets to specific zodiac signs. The article mentioned problems of "potential heresy".

Was the 1494 Leipzig cosmos intended to be a Thema Mundi representation or something else? Leipzig is surely based on Macrobius. It used the classical planetary - zodiac connections. It has the Sun in Leo, but seven in a row is not 4-1-1-1 even if five out of the seven are the same. The current info from the historical record shows that the 4-1-1-1 pattern pops up in Leipzig in 1494 in apparent connection with Wenzel Faber. Any connection to the VMs f67r2 is open to speculation and to investigation. Thanks.