The Voynich Ninja

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(01-01-2026, 04:04 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(01-01-2026, 03:21 PM)PeteClifford Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I see something like <oteeeol aim> However, <oteeeol> is not attested in the manuscript
A Ch can easily become ee, because the ligature is usually the faintest part, and those words have been heavily effaced by wear and/or spill.   I find an otCheeol on <f104v.41>.

Oops, I mean, it could be otCheol (just one e).  This is found e.g. on <f87r.12>

All the best, --stolfi
Could it be that the text begins with "Mutter aller Leute"? The "leuz" actually being a south German word "Leutz", which means "Leute". 

So, in essence, "mother of all peoples".
(18-07-2025, 03:34 AM)magnesium Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I found "allor" (the second word of the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. marginalia) as the second word of line 20 of the 7th page of this 15th-century German-Latin manuscript: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

See also the third line of the 8th page: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

I don't know enough Latin or German to translate fully, but I think this may be relevant.


Excellent find. Now it seems much more plausible that this marginalia in the VM is in German.
"Aller" is extremely common in German, "allor" is not. But looking at the multispectral images, I think the reading of the marginal word as "aller" is perfectly valid.
(18-07-2025, 03:34 AM)magnesium Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I found "allor" (the second word of the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. marginalia) as the second word of line 20 of the 7th page of this 15th-century German-Latin manuscript: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

It does look like "aller" to me, as Koen says (second word of third line in the detail).
[attachment=13362]
Just 2 cents: Look at the next word. I see "der". It's the same 'two-part' "e" again. Also look for "o" in the lines below. The difference seems fairly clear.
@ Aga

Perhaps what follows (possibly) "volkomn" =  is just an "ist" = is (and not an iA) = vollkommen ist (be
I should have added a picture to proof, here it is: 

[attachment=13377]

So if we assume a German reading, which now actually seems more plausible to me than a Latin one: 

The ‘volkomn’ from Aga remains conceivable, and then it would say ‘volkomn is’. Although I find the two ‘o’s in the word difficult.

Other readings would then be something like:
"pallmmist/ pullmmist/ pollmmist / vollmmist / vallmmist / vullmmist"  - but based on the spelling at the time, pu(o)llmmist / vu(o)llmmist ) "voll Mist"  could mean "full of dung".

In Middle and Early New High German manuscripts, assimilation occurs at morpheme boundaries: if, for example, an n or L at the end of a word is followed by an m, it is written as ‘mm’ (e.g. Lm -> mm ), but usually as a replacement; in this case, one less L would have had to be written, i.e. volmmist. Another example is ‘umbe’ becoming “umme”. That is why the word ‘voll Mist’ is also ambiguous. Unless it is a kind of spelling mistake – he simply forgot to write one less L and wrote the two M's after it out of habit.

But what is a sentence with ‘voll Mist’ doing in a possibly medical context? Here is some evidence:

›Excrement, faeces of humans and some animals‹ (discussed in the evidence in terms of its natural properties and their evaluation, its usefulness for everyday purposes, including therapeutic purposes, etc.).
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As for Aga's: ‘aller kurz her’, that is also one possible interpretation. 
It could imply ‘Hört mal alle kurz her’ = “Listen up, everyone”, but of course that is also just one interpretation.

And then there is "mallier" or "mullier"

As Aga correctly said:
woman/wife
But it could also be a dialectical form of ‘Müller’ (miller).
and even ‘Maler’ (painter), although ‘Malier’ is more commonly attested later -> in the 19th century.

I like something like:

"Maler hört alle her, vollkommen ist: " = "Painter, listen up, everyone, perfectly is:" and then the name of a plant written in Voynichese. But I think ‘painter’ is rather unlikely.

But: "Wifes, listen up, everyone, perfektly is: ....." ???  Big Grin

However, I think that ‘ist’ = ‘is’ should be included in the discussion as a possibility.

Have fun puzzle solving!
While I don't really agree with Nick Pelling's Occitan reading of
Quote:meilhor aller lucent ben balsamina [….]
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...I admit I have no idea about Occitan.

Again I'd like to point out that we are not dealing with a few ambiguous words in an otherwise ordinary text, but that all marginalia are profoundly odd to the point of being unreadable. Looking at the odd German in f116v, we must consider the author used some vernacular dialect that deviates significantly from common spelling forms, omitting or switching letters. Combine this with the equally unorthodox and ambiguous glyphs we find in the marginalia. It's hard not to end up in some guessing game. Or seeing what you want to see which is symptomatic for the entire VM.

I still think the best way forward is trying to find similar glyph shapes and phrases in other manuscripts.
I fully agree. For example, if the "poxleber" line had said something like "poxleber n lnng", then a strong case could be made for exclamation usage ("leber und lung" being a common phrase). So comparing to other manuscripts and other phrases, i.e. actual attestations, is our only hope for having a chance at success.

The step "let's see if people actually used this word/phrase" is unfortunately often skipped as soon as some dictionary mentions the form.
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