The Voynich Ninja

On a general reading, based necessarily on the illustrations, the VM addresses the medieval pharmacological problem of how to harness - extract, concentrate and preserve - the celestial powers of herbs. 

It is not, it should be noted, a medical text. There is no account of human anatomy and physiology and their correspondences to celestial bodies, nor any depiction of diseases and symptoms. Rather, it is conspicuously pharmacological. It is an apocathary text concerning the production rather than the application of materia medica. 

We should also note that it is solely concerned with herbs. There is no visible account of other materia medica such as gemstones or metals. It is a text specifically concerned with the powers of herbs. It concerns herbal pharmacology.

It is sometimes said to be alchemical - there are some glyphs and symbols in the text that appear in alchemical texts - but it does not fit easily into that categiory, except inasmuch as all pharmnacology of the relevant period was likely to be under some influence of alchemical ideas moving into Europe from the Orient, and noably into Italy through Venice. 

In this respect we might identify it as distinctly proto-Paracelsean. There were various schools of European alchemy. Primarily there was metallic alchemy - concerned with the transmutation of gold and such - found, typically, in mining cities. But Paracelsus - from a rustic background in alpine herbal medicine - and about a century after our ms. - championed an approach based entirely on plants and entirely dedicated to medicine, rather than the vain pursuit of gold. 

The pharmacological innovation made by Paracelsus - and the centrepiece of Paracelsean herbal alchemy - is the production of tinctures which Paracelsus called spagyrics. These are ethanol based herbal tinctures. Paracelsus embraced ethanol as the solvent in his tinctures, and distillation as a key method, and in this one move brought alchemy to European herbalism in a sysematic way. 

Alcohol, ethanol, distillation, was, of course, an exotic innovation. Prior to its introduction through Arab sources European herbalism was not ethanol based. It featured the use of wine and vinegar, certainly, but not distilled solvents. Alcohol had superior properties. It was called the Aqua vitae. It never soured and it extracted all the active potencies of the herbs. Paracelsus, above all, brought ethanol to European herbalism. 

Being prior to Paracelsus,, the Voynich ms. does not seem to feature the use of alcohol. There are no obvious signs of it. For a start, there is no depiction of distillation and no depiction of FIRE whatsoever. (For a supposedly alchemical text it is totally devoid of the arts of fire.) Nor is there a depiction of grapes, or winemaking, or any preparations for distillation. As a pharmacological text it is not concerned with distillation. So it is different to the Paracelsean tradition in that essential respect.

Apothecaries certainly used ethanol in the relevant period, but earlier methods continued. The herbal traditions of the Benedictines for instance, and folk herbalism generally, were not ethanol based. Rather, there were other methods of extracting, concentrating and preserving the active potencies of herbs. 

In the abscence of any signs of alcohol, then, the Voynich ms. presents another pharmacological method. Quite possibly, it was not an actual method, but a proposed method, or an innovation on an existing technique, but in any case what we see in the illustrations is a technique of water extraction, the production of aqueous extracts.

Aqueous extracts were overshadowed by ethanol based extracts in European herbalism - especially through Paracelesean tinctures - but it is still an established method in herbal pharmacology. 

Today it is still used in Muslim medical systems, such as Unani medicine, or - closer to the Voynich - in Anthroposophical medicine and elsewhere where there is a spirirtual or philosophical objection to the use of alcohol. 

As well as this, we find techniques of aqueous extraction in traditions of mountain herbalism, where particular mountain waters, and mineralized waters, are valued as the solvent and vehicle. This is found in many traditional and folk herbalisms, such as in parts of China, in Tibet, and there are herb producers today in places like Colarado who boast of aqueous extracts made from special mountain waters. 

In modern times, though, these old methods may still have been corrupted. Muslim medical traditions - Unani - have become corrupted with sugar syrup, for instance. (Distillation, in the Islamic context, we ought to note, was chiefly for perfumery. Europeans put it to quite different uses.) 

To reiterate: there is a complete absence of any obvious reference to ethanol in the Voynich ms. but an abundance of evidence concerning water. On the visual evidence, this is what we find in the VM: an account of the production of aqueous extracts using mineralized or alpine waters. 

The claim in this sort of herbalism is that the salts and minerals in the mountain waters extract, concentrate and preserve the potencies of the herbs in a special way. With ethanol, the medium is neutral. It adds nothing. In the production of aqueous extracts, there are types of water that might be regarded as superior to others or are regarded as adding to and enhancing the therapuetic value of the extract; herbal extracts made with healing waters. 

Again: in the history of European herbalism this type of extraction was overshadowed by the introduction of ethanol, a long process over centuries but a process advanced especially by Paracelsus. Indeed, Paracelsus took an alpine herbalism from his background, and replaced traditional methods of extraction with ethanol, in the quest of bringing herbalism up to date (and make it commercially viable.) The Voynich ms. is before that, and aqueous extraction is still a current method. 

At its simplest, water extraction involves macerating herbs and soaking them in water. It is not very effective in itself. It is better to heat the water - and thus tisasnes, herbal teas, infusions. But there are other more involved methods, most of them attested since ancient times. 

One of them is illustrated in the Voynich ms. Percolation. Here, herbs are stacked in thick layers, and the solvent, water, slowly drips - percolates - through it, and is collected at the bottom. The process might be repeated several times. Weighs and presses can be applied.

This produces a strong extract, but since it requires an abundance of herbs for a small amount of extract, the advantages of ethanol, requiring far less of the herb, become obvious. 

Again: there does not seem to be any sign of alcohol in the Voynich. But there are signs of water: mountain waters and mineralized waters. There is a whole section described as baneological: healing waters, therapeutic waters. There are sometimes claims that the ms. does depict the use of alcohol, but this is usually based on the assumption that its use had become pervasive, or conjectures that certain glyphs might symbolize it. There is nothing explicit in the manuscript illustrations, whereas the abundant water in the work is unmistakeable. 

In the manuscript, this is the domain of the nymphs. They are mountain and water nymphs. We see them collecting rain water from the mountain tops, directing it through underground pools and caverns, and settling in mineralized lakes and ponds. They control and measure the mountain streams. Blue water is fresh water, rain water, ice thaw; green water is mineralized water. 

This is exactly the type of mountain herbal tradition Paracelsus witnessed growing up in the Alps. Anthroposophical medicine, based in Switzerland, has the same roots. In his autobiography Rudolf Steiner described the alpine herb gatherers on the trains in Austria that he met as a boy still current in the mid 19th C. 

Paracelsus replaced traditional extraction methods, but they continue - moderrnized - in Anthroposophical medicine, both in Switzerland, and through the production enterprise Waleda, situated in a similar terrain, the pristine mountains of New Zealand. Some anthroposophical methods, like running water through "flow forms" (systems of cascades) to "revitalize" it are reminiscent of what we see in the Voynich manuscript. Works on the "vitality" of water as a preferred medium, like Theodore Schwenk's Sensitive Chaos (with an introduction by Jascque Costeau) are a continuation of the same tradition. 

Most herbalism converted to ethanol extraction long ago. For a start, it is cheap, and can be scaled industrially. To understand what we see in the Voynich ms. it helps to become familiar with contemporary cases where aqueous extraction prevails. 


The method in the VM involves the strange vessels depicted in the pharmacological sections of the wortk. Evidently, the prepared herbs illustrated with these vessels are placed in layers inside the vessels. Water is added at the top and it percolates through. There may be virtue in adding hot water but it is a slow method which might takes days or longer. 

But it can be enhanced by adding intervening layers of stones or sand, compacting each layer of botanical material. Essentially, it is a herb press through which water percolates, collecting as much of the juices and exudates as possible. Gradations of sand act as filters to remove coarse mterial, leaving at the end, a liquid essence.

This in principle is how the vessels depicted in the Voynich ms. work. They are not storage vessels. They are clearly shown containing water. If we cannot find contemporary examples of exactly such vessels, perhaps they were merely proposed, and the ms. is setting out a theoretical method of aqueous extraction rather than a traditional or established one. 

But there is nothing anachronistic about the principle. Pressing herbs and water extraction are standard medieval methods in themselves, especially prior to the intrusion of ethanol tinctures. In the Voynich ms. someone is proposing, or demonstrating, a device - perhaps a new invention - designed to be used for this purpose. 

This suggests there was an existing water-based herbal tradition and in this ms. someone is attempting to advance it. Unlike Paracelsus they have not chosen to introduce the exotic methods of ethanol extraction and distillation. They are refining the methods of folk herbalism: aqueous extraction. 

As far as alchemy is concerned, we should note that the use of mineralized waters in this type of operation might be understood to involve metals and minerals in dilution, in addition to herbs. Again, this is a dimension lost in Paracelesean herbal alchemy with ethanol based spagyrics. Ethanol is brutually effective. It strips ingredients from herbs, including those resins and oils which are not water soluable and which are beyond the reach of water extraction. But it is not subtle or nuanced, as a solvent. It is a very blunt tool. 

In water extraction, different waters can carry different qualities. It is not just the herbs involved but the medium imparts powers and qualities as well. This is a pharmacology of herbs and healing waters combined. The methods of folk herbalism are less effective, but also more subtle and artful.

Most obviously, different natural waters have different mineral compositions and Ph values. An alkaline water will work differently than more acidic mediums. This variable is actively discouraged in modern official herbalism where - if water is used - it tends to be double distilled, making it as 'pure' and neutral as ethanol. 


The problem our pharmacologist is confronting, though, is, as we said at the outset, how to capture or harness the celestial powers of the herbs in question. 

Needless to say, this is not modern herbalism. The powers of herbs to heal was considered to be through celestial powers, and not chemical compounds in the herbs themselves. This is a herbalism that is pre-chemistry or at best proto-chemistry. 

The question becomes: how does the author propose that his percolation vessels are able to extract the celestial, healing qualities of the herbs? 

The answer, in short, is this: The vessels depicted in the ms. work on the basis of mimesis, or as we might say mimetic magic.

Each vessel imitates a mountain. The percolation process imitates the natural process by which rainwater and ice thaw moves through and is transformed by the mountain into mineralized water. 

The mystery of it, the natural alchemy involved, is that fresh water falls on mountaintops but emerges at the base of the mountain transformed. aerated, perhaps coloured, with metallic aromas, and healing qualities. 

All alchemical operations are mimetic, in any case. The alchemy of metals imitates the processes supposedly taking place in volcanoes - the arts of Vulcan. The alchemist imitates - usually in order to speed up - some natural process. 

Here the process involves the mysteries of mountain hydrology. It can be imitated, controlled, and accelerated. The process uses mineralized mountain waters for aqueous extraction, but at the same time it imitates the natural process by which such waters are made. In itself, it is a simple and very medieval idea. 

The mountain, that is, is like an extractor. It extracts and concentrates. It is the model. The devices in the ms. are designed to imitate this process. This is the 'magic' by which the celestial qualities are captured. 

We might again underline the contrast with Paracelsus. He made much of his upbringing with the old alpine herbal traditions, but in fact he modernized it into an alchemical herbalism suited to a clientelle in German cities, and much of its rustic, mountain character was lost altogether. Paracelsean herbal alchemy is, in many respects, a bastardized folk herbalism. 

The Voynich ms. concerns a kindred alpine herbal tradition and is proto-Paracelsean in that sense: but it is not a radical departure such as Paracelsus was to make. The pharmacological process being described or proposed is a natural development of that tradition, making the most of the mountain waters that nurture the mountain herbs and invoking the processes of the mountain itself.

This is the short answer to what we see in this pharmacological text. The work proposes some improvement on the herb press and on aqueous extraction by percolation. The vessels are mountain shaped, and arranged in layers, like the strata of the mountain, with the prepared herbal matter compacted between layers of stones and sand. The appropriate water is added, and it is left to work by osmosis, percolating down through the layers, collecting the extracted juices on the way. The device imitates the mountain. 

Here we might surmise that a crucial factor in this will be: time. Percolation is an inherently slow process. So too is the seeping of water through mountains. This is what is celestial in the process. The cycles of the mountain reflect cosmic cycles. These powers can be harnessed through the imitation of these cycles. Very likely, it is proposed that the powers of different stars and heavenly cycles can be imparted through percolation times of different duration. 


To now be more specific about the traditions involved rather than speaking in general terms:

It is evident that the manuscript concerns a region not only rich in medical herbs but also rich in medicinal waters. If we place the work in northern Italy, alpine Italy, such as the Sud Tyrol, we have these two things. It is rich in hot springs, valued since Roman times, but the mountain people - remnants of Roman settlers speaking a vulgar Latin - maintained an accomanying rich tradition of alpine herbalism. Indeed, very rich. Ethnobotanical studies suggest it may extend back to the end of the Ice Age. In its folk form, of course, it did not use ethanol. It is a water-based herbalism combining mountain herbs with mountain waters.

Paracelsus grew up with the folk herbalism of the western Alps. There is much in the Voynich ms. to suggest a similar landscape, but in the eastern Alps - the depiction of bathing springs and Ghiberline fortifications in the Voynich map, for instance, place us more in the eastern Alps than the west. It is the same tradition that Paracelsus knew, but an eastern iteration of it.

Assuredly, banelogical therapies became an important part of German natural medicine more generally, and are still well-patronized, but they accompanied the herbalism of the eastern Alps more than the western Alps in which Paracelsus grew up. His herbalism was not married to water therapies. The banelogical section of the VM directs us to the eastern Alps of northern Italy. 

The identification is surely confirmed when we find that the people of this region also had a rich nymph lore. 

In mythology they are said to impart rosey cheeks to those they heal. This is how they are depicted in the Voynich manuscript. 

Again: Paracelsus knew the same, or a kindred tradition, from the westrern Italian alps where a variant of the same vulgar Latin was spoken. He would boast of his rustic origins and his knowledge of alpine folk herbalism, which, as we have explained, he set out to modernize with alchemy and bring to the cities of Germany and Europe. 

Even though Paracelsus is a century later, this is necessary background to the Voynich manuscript. The VM preserves another version of this, or a kindred, herbal tradition, but from the eastern Alps, the Dolomites, a region replete not just with herbs but with springs and remarkable water features due in its unusual geology. We should understand the Voynich ms. to be proto-Paracelsean, but also appreciate the ways in which it differs from the herbalism Paracelsus developed. 

The nymphs, though, are what allow us to be specific. In the relevant folk mythology, they are the nymphs of the Rosengarten mountains, in the Sud Tyrol, here reimagined as Hellenic nymphs. Their golden hair and rosy cheeks are from the alpenglow - the magical phenomenon of dawn light that illuminates mountaintops of the region like candle-flames or, in the Rosengarten mountains, like a rose garden. 

This allows the pharmacologist the device of presenting his methods as the 'secrets of the mountain nymphs'. We can frame the actual claim being made in this work as follows: 

The mountain nymphs communicate with and learn the secrets of their celestial counterparts, and the author has learnt these secrets from the mountain nymphs. His methods capture this secret knowledge. His extracts are endorsed and authentic. They carry the imprimatur of the nymphs. 

In the end, this is little different than a modern herbalist claiming inside knowledge from the faery folk. 

To be clear, of nymphs, there are two types: terrestrial and celestial, as they are shown. It is through the nymphs that celestial powers are imparted to the herbs and waters of the mountain. 

If one knows the knowledge of the nymphs, therefore, one understands the correspondences between the terrestrial and the celestial. A pharmacologist might claim such knowledge. That in plain terms is what we have before us.

In the legends of the Rosengarten mountains there are stories of 'wizards' who 'marry' the mountain nymphs in order to learn their secrets. The Voynich ms. is not far from such allegories. 


The essential idea here - a pharmacological method based on the model of the mountain - is obscured, though, because the Voynich vessels, like the mountains on the Voynich map, are depicted in a stylized manner - like church spires. How are the vessels modelled on mountains? They look more like church spires, the same bulbous church spires depicted on the Voynich map. 

Mountains have spires, and some mountains have pronounced pointed spires, like churches. The analogy is so obvious that these days such mountains are often adorned with crucifixes in the same manner as church spires. 

This is what we find in the Voynich ms. and it creates many layers of confusion if it is not understood. It is the symbolism of the alpenglow. Mountains are depicted as church spires because mountain peaks light up like church spires - both of them alluding to a lit candle. 

In context, the centre of the map will depict such a stylization of the Rosengarten mountains - the centrepiece of the Dolomites. 

To explain further: in nature, water and snow are left on the mountaintops. These mountaintops are then illumined by the alpenglow - a sacred light believed to impart healing - literally rosy cheeks. This is part of the natural alchemy. The waters then filter - over long ages - through the stratifications of the mountain and emerge as healing waters, lakes, streams and springs, in the low valleys. The alpenglow is the sacred light, the supernatural element. The nymphs are agents of the alpenglow. 

In any case, the pharmacological vessels are of the same shape as the spires depicted on the Voynich map, and those spires are stylizations of sun-lit mountains. The Voynich vessels are small versions of mountains. Their purpose and conception is mimetic. The pharmacological process is mimetic: it imitates the natural alchemy of the alpenglow mountains. 

The accompanying alpine herbs, let us add here, are unique and potent. Plants from harsh environments are a rich source of strange chemistry. They have short seasons, tend to be deep rooted for hybernation, with short displays of foliage and flowers - many are rare and peculiar (carnivorous plants, for example) and only found in remote valleys. 

This cannot explain all of the peculiarities of the herbs depicted in the Voynich, but just as there are no medical depictions - it is pharmacological, not medical - we should note there is no evidence of garden cultivation in the VM: these are wild herbs, the herbs of herb gatherers rather than herb growers. The Benedictines and others had cultivated medical gardens, but folk herbalism relied on plants gathered in the wild. 

We might also note the emphasis on roots, especially in the pharmacological sections where herbs are being prepared. This is entirely typical of alpine herbalism. It still is; in the same region of the Italian Alps today, herb gatherers collect wild gentian root and other herbal roots that are prized for the making of liquers and bitters, a relatively modern (i.e. post medieval) Italian industry that depended upon the introduction of distillation. 


There is a final complication to this, though. It is essential for placing the Voynich ms. in its proper context. There are several layers of symbolism. 

Accounts that see, not a location in Italy, but Jerusalem, the holy city, in the centre of the Voynich map are no doubt correct, in the first instance.

This is also true. Because the sacred candelight of the alpenglow is analogized to the lighting of the candle in the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, symbolic of the Risen Christ as Light of the World. 

It is not just any church spires that are being analogized in this iconography. The Rosengarten mountains are being compared to the spires of the Holy Sepulchre. Moreover, the subterranean pools of the nymphs are compared to the Pools of Solomon. Thus we see both at the same time in a composite, but quite simple, medieval symbolism. 

The wider perspective is this: at the end of the Middle Ages the pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem became increasingly difficult. Instead, local pilgrimages were established as substitutes. In this, the topography of the Holy Land was superimposed upon the local landscapes of Europe, (often, we should note here, on the basis of corresponding vegetation.)

Mountains were often the focus of these new pilgrimages. The ardour of trekking up a mountain to a chapel at the top was a substitute for the long journey to Jerusalem. In northern Italy there was a tradition of nine mountains - a novena of mountains - constituting the full journey to Jerusalem that became an official observance in the 1490s. 

We see an example of this in the Voynich map from fifty or so years earlier: a novena of mountains, with the Rosengarten mountains (symbolic Jerusalem) in the centre. It is, in form, a pilgrimage map with local sites in northern Italy presented as analogous to the pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre.

All of this speaks of a transfer of knowledge from east to west. The Voynich ms. assuredly participates in this great general tide of ideas at the end of the Middle Ages - and made acute by the seige of Byzantium in our period - by which eastern knowledge moved westwards.

More exactly, the Voynich follows the well-established model of transfering things east to west according to the patterns of the pilgrimage. Moving the pilgrimage from east to west - its symbolic relocation - is the paradigm for any transfer of knowledge east to west. This is how the Voynich ms. is framed. 

Again: the wider context of the work is the transfer (assimiliation) of a body of Oriental knowledge to an existing body of local knowledge - this, after the pattern of the relocating of pilgrimage symbolism from Jerusalem to the local (Italian) landscape at the end of the Crusades. 

In effect, the celestial nymphs possess the Oriental knowledge; the terrestrial nymphs possess the local knowledge.

That is to say, and to be clear: what is being presented as a communication of knowledge from the celestial realm to the terrestrial realm is, in fact, a transfer of knowledge from east to west.

To generalize what we find in the manuscript: the herbalism and the accompanying aqueous pharmacology are largely local traditions, whereas the astrology that fills many sections of the manuscript is largely a body of imported Oriental knowledge, apparently Graeco-Arabic in character. The legitimacy of its assimilation is guaranteed by following the patterns of how the sanctity of the pilgrimage was moved and superimposed upon a new landscape. 

This may shed light upon the nature of the Voynich language. There are, in fact, two dialects or languages intermixed, Voynich A and Voynich B. We may suspect these to be the tongues of the terrestrial and celestial nymphs respectively. One language is formal, and the other is its vernacular cognate. The text is presented as the inter-lingual discourse of the nymphs. 

In summary: 

Our author, we can see, was involved in a similar enterprise to Paracelsus: bolstering local, indigenous traditions with new (exotic) knowledge. The difference, though, once again, is that the Voynich pharmacologist is not replacing water extraction with distillation and ethanol. 

He is importing exotica, and bringing new knowledge to local traditions (dressed up as knowledge acquired from the nymphs) but the traditional aqueous extraction method remains. This is because healing waters - baneological therapeutics - were an integral part of the tradition he is drawing upon and were not easily replaced by the new medium of distilled alcohol. 

R.B. Dec 23

This article setting out a general reading of the text can now be found updated and somewhat revised at:

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A few thoughts on Paracelsus' alchemy: I once tried to link this "herbalist branch" to people before Paracelus, but I was unsuccessful. Paracelsus' thinking certainly did not arise out of nothing, but the approach as such can be described as revolutionary in a certain way. Palacelsus' education was already atypical for his time. Instead of just attending the "first available" university, he embarked on an eight-year journey through Europe and slowly developed his own medical view. He fundamentally rejected the Galenic teachings. However, magic and astronomy also played a major role. Throughout his life, Paracelsus was an outsider in the medical profession. He was despised by many of his colleagues but revered by his patients because of his successes. Experience in professional practice and not theoretical medicine was always the benchmark for him. He developed his recipes, tinctures and treatment methods on this basis. This is also where alchemy comes into play. In his countless writings, Paracelsus built up a cryptic and complex world of ideas in which he defined illnesses as a disorder of the alchemical-chemical processes in the body. According to Paracelsus, these are based on the three basic principles of which humans are also made: Mercurius (mercury), sulphur (sulphur) and sal (salt). And if the basic principles were to become disordered, then diseases would arise. This alchemical principle can in fact be attributed exclusively to Paracelsus and, as far as I know, has no known predecessors. Therefore, one can only speak of proto-Parcelsism to a limited extent.

My research into the history of Slovenians led me to the ancient Slovenian speaking territory of not only medieval Carniola, but Southern Tyrol, Austrian Carinthia and northern Italy, particularly Veneto and Friuli regions, including Raetia. I am also familiar with their folk lore. Like you, I believe that the knowledge was being transferred from East to West, since Herman of Carinthia was one of the greatest conduits of Arabic astronomy, medicine, magic, mathematic, etc. to Europe in 13th century. The religious interpretation of the Bible and the gnostic and apocryphal books were also brought to Europe in Northern Italy, Rhineland and France by the religious sect of Paulicians who spread the symbolic interpretation of the Bible to Europe. In the 10th century, the Slavic 'heresy' bogomilism has spread in Northern Italy. Adherents, known as Patareni had spread further to Switzerland and France, where they were known as the Cathars.
In the 15th century, the Patriarchate of Aquileia, a religious state, was divided between the Republic of Venice and Austria. The adherents of these movement used their national languages  and a common symbolic language to perpetuate their ideas that found their ways even among the philosophers and theologians and are regarded as precursors of Protestantism, such as the Valdensians in Switzerland. Among other things, they used floral symbolism. 
This is how flowers became to be used in alchemical manuscripts for more than just the folklore from the distant past. Of course, the symbolism and the allegorical use of the flowers depended on the knowledge of the healing and harmful properties of the plants, as well as on the colour, shape, mythological uses, etc.
This means that the people who used such symbolism were well aquainted with the medieval herbs. The Republic of Venice was one of the greatest producers and exporters of popular medieval herbal remedies theriac, for which up to 60 different plants and resins were used. The Venetic Republic at the time included also parts of Istria and Adriatic coast.
The proof that Sciavones (the Italian name for Slovenians  and coastal Croatians) were important in the Venetian herb gathering tradition is in the use of Slovenian/Illyrian names of plants in the codex Liber de Simplicibus Benedicti Rini. Out of 458 names of the plants written in Arabic, Latin, and Greek, there are also 370 Slovenian names and only 65 German. There is also quite a similarity of some plants with other North Italian herbals.
The production of Theriac was not alcohol based; it's process was based on fermentation and took more than a year to extract the potency of plants. It was considered a cure-all remedy.
According to Bosnian/Illyrian tradition, such medication was buried in the ground for at least a year in order to age and be able to use as the medicine. 
There was also a method of extraction based on oil. From 40 to 70 different plants were used for the production of Armenian holy oil (Holy Muron). The Orthodox churches used about 40 different ingredients, and besides oil also the vine.
This could explain the use of the plants for medicine and for religious purpose.

(03-01-2024, 02:31 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.A few thoughts on Paracelsus' alchemy: I once tried to link this "herbalist branch" to people before Paracelus, but I was unsuccessful. Paracelsus' thinking certainly did not arise out of nothing, but the approach as such can be described as revolutionary in a certain way. Palacelsus' education was already atypical for his time. Instead of just attending the "first available" university, he embarked on an eight-year journey through Europe and slowly developed his own medical view. He fundamentally rejected the Galenic teachings. However, magic and astronomy also played a major role. Throughout his life, Paracelsus was an outsider in the medical profession. He was despised by many of his colleagues but revered by his patients because of his successes. Experience in professional practice and not theoretical medicine was always the benchmark for him. He developed his recipes, tinctures and treatment methods on this basis. This is also where alchemy comes into play. In his countless writings, Paracelsus built up a cryptic and complex world of ideas in which he defined illnesses as a disorder of the alchemical-chemical processes in the body. According to Paracelsus, these are based on the three basic principles of which humans are also made: Mercurius (mercury), sulphur (sulphur) and sal (salt). And if the basic principles were to become disordered, then diseases would arise. This alchemical principle can in fact be attributed exclusively to Paracelsus and, as far as I know, has no known predecessors. Therefore, one can only speak of proto-Parcelsism to a limited extent.

Thanks for those comments. Indeed, Paracelesus was engaged in his own enterprise. The description "proto-Paracelsean" was given to the Voynich at an early point - Panofsky, I think. His first question was: Where are the gemstones and metals?" He was struck by the fact it is exclusively herbal and noted this was characteristric of the (later) Paracelsean school. I think that is an astute observation and a correct surmise. 

The three principles in Paracelsus, Sal, Mercur and Sulphur, as a set, has always seemed to me a simple extension of tripartite accounts of the human being well-established in Neoplatonism, and Platonic texts, long before Paracelsus. It is standard Platonism: there is nous, and thumos, and the appetitive nature, threefold. I think there is a geneaology of Paracelesus' system. 

But you are right: the Voynich is only proto-Paracelsean in a limited sense. It is a strictly botanical materia medica. But importantly, there are no signs of distillation. The herbal pharmacology in the Voynich is evidently water based. So it is very different to Paracelus who embraced ethanol based tinctures (spagyrics). 

My view, in any case, is that the Voynich stands somewhere in the tradition that gave rise to aspects of German natural medicine, specifically alpine-based, water therapies and herbalism combined. We can situate the Voynich in this way. It is not, for instance, conspicuously related to the more French developments of natural medicine where perfumery (from the East) and aromatherapy have been more pronounced. It is far closer to things we find in Anthroposophical medicine (via Goethe.) today.

(03-01-2024, 09:07 PM)cvetkakocj@rogers.com Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.My research into the history of Slovenians led me to the ancient Slovenian speaking territory of not only medieval Carniola, but Southern Tyrol, Austrian Carinthia and northern Italy, particularly Veneto and Friuli regions, including Raetia. I am also familiar with their folk lore. Like you, I believe that the knowledge was being transferred from East to West, since Herman of Carinthia was one of the greatest conduits of Arabic astronomy, medicine, magic, mathematic, etc. to Europe in 13th century. The religious interpretation of the Bible and the gnostic and apocryphal books were also brought to Europe in Northern Italy, Rhineland and France by the religious sect of Paulicians who spread the symbolic interpretation of the Bible to Europe. In the 10th century, the Slavic 'heresy' bogomilism has spread in Northern Italy. Adherents, known as Patareni had spread further to Switzerland and France, where they were known as the Cathars.
In the 15th century, the Patriarchate of Aquileia, a religious state, was divided between the Republic of Venice and Austria. The adherents of these movement used their national languages  and a common symbolic language to perpetuate their ideas that found their ways even among the philosophers and theologians and are regarded as precursors of Protestantism, such as the Valdensians in Switzerland. Among other things, they used floral symbolism. 
This is how flowers became to be used in alchemical manuscripts for more than just the folklore from the distant past. Of course, the symbolism and the allegorical use of the flowers depended on the knowledge of the healing and harmful properties of the plants, as well as on the colour, shape, mythological uses, etc.
This means that the people who used such symbolism were well aquainted with the medieval herbs. The Republic of Venice was one of the greatest producers and exporters of popular medieval herbal remedies theriac, for which up to 60 different plants and resins were used. The Venetic Republic at the time included also parts of Istria and Adriatic coast.
The proof that Sciavones (the Italian name for Slovenians  and coastal Croatians) were important in the Venetian herb gathering tradition is in the use of Slovenian/Illyrian names of plants in the codex Liber de Simplicibus Benedicti Rini. Out of 458 names of the plants written in Arabic, Latin, and Greek, there are also 370 Slovenian names and only 65 German. There is also quite a similarity of some plants with other North Italian herbals.
The production of Theriac was not alcohol based; it's process was based on fermentation and took more than a year to extract the potency of plants. It was considered a cure-all remedy.
According to Bosnian/Illyrian tradition, such medication was buried in the ground for at least a year in order to age and be able to use as the medicine. 
There was also a method of extraction based on oil. From 40 to 70 different plants were used for the production of Armenian holy oil (Holy Muron). The Orthodox churches used about 40 different ingredients, and besides oil also the vine.
This could explain the use of the plants for medicine and for religious purpose.

My own research has moved much closer to yours. I've been following your posts. 

I have been focused on the Sud Tyrol, because that is the heartland of the relevant herbal tradition and also the folk mythology (centred on the Rosengarten mountains and tales of King Laurin and his nymphs.) I have concentrated on the Ladin people and language (noting that Nicholas of Cusa was their bishop for a period of time.)

But increasingly I suspect the Voynich itself, though about that region, comes from further east, and that the language in the background might be Friulean - aka eastern Ladin. This then has a strong acquaintance with Slovenean. And I also becoime aware that the influence of Slovenean extended to parts of the sud Tyrol. 

I am especially interested now in the tensions between vernacular and 'official' languages in that context. I suspect the Voynich language might arise out of some combination of a "high" and a "low" language, a formal language and a cognate vernacular. Examples would be: Hebrew and Yiddish. Latin and Italian. Latin and Vulgar Latin (Ladin, Friulean etc.), Greek and Koine. 

The problem Christendom faced was that they wanted to acquire Arab science, and reaquire the Hellenic heritage, but it came attached to and infected by heresies, via Muhammadism, the heresy of heresies. How to separate the good stuff from the bad? It was a long and sometimes tumultuous process.

Also, thank you, yes, I should add some account of oil extraction which is, as you say, another traditional technique. It is especially used in traditional (pre-industrial) perfumery - enfleurage. But also, of course, the production of oils for liturgy, chrism etc. 

Still, I don't detect any sign of it in the Voynich pharmacology which seems devoted to aqueous extraction (on my reading of it.)

Also, I find it is the roots that are conspicuous in the Voynich botanica, especially in the pharmacology sections. There is no sign someone is collecting large quantities of flowers (or seeds). Instead, roots. Generally, you extract oils from flowers and seeds, and bitter principles (and starches) from roots.

I don't doubt there may be floral symbolism, but I'm impressed by the emphasis on roots.

(03-01-2024, 09:09 PM)Hermes777 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Thanks for those comments. Indeed, Paracelesus was engaged in his own enterprise. The description "proto-Paracelsean" was given to the Voynich at an early point - Panofsky, I think. His first question was: Where are the gemstones and metals?" He was struck by the fact it is exclusively herbal and noted this was characteristric of the (later) Paracelsean school.

I am not so sure that that is correct. At least, I am not aware of any source where Panofsky mentioned Paracelsus. He did mention the following things:
- that there are probably parts missing which would have included beasts and stones
- that it is a combination of cosmological, medical and perhaps alchemical material

Paracelsus was mentioned in connection with the MS by Charles Singer (see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ).
Singer probably did not have a correct estimate of the age of the MS (my guess).

The MS predates Paracelsus' work by at least 70 years, probably closer to 100.
The term proto- implies that this would be an early form of Paracelsean ideas.
That is of course a hypothesis that one can maintain or explore, and then it would be good to have the correct source or supporting arguments for it.

(03-01-2024, 12:04 PM)Ruby Novacna Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Hi Hermes ! 
You haven't registered your blog on Blogosphere reader?

For some reason I am not able to access the Blogosphere reader, Ruby. (Browser problem? Don't know.)