The Voynich Ninja

I agree with Anton; the stain managed to wash away some ink. That would indicate it is a water-based substance.

But I also disagree about the colour; it is different from the red of the "samovar" type next to it, but it is the same colour as the infill of the "roots"

Dripping wax wouldn't cause burns on the page/have a different interaction? Looks like a typical aquarel stain to me...

Some other observations on this folio:

- the text in the ciylinders that has been painted over, has been spotted by you of course, I see it now for the first time
- the highlighting/rewriting with fresh ink is not the same for the characters. That 8 that is transcribed as "d" (and that's how I'd read it too) is much more frequently re-inked than the other characters. Could mean something?

I am not so sure that water would have much of an effect on iron gall ink that has already dried.
It's probably worth trying to find out.

Whatever it was, it penetrated the parchment. It's visible on 102r, 102v, 103r, 103v and 104r.
Most affected are 102v and 103r, and perhaps the damage to the ink is from attempts to scrape it off. The smaller spot seems to have been mainly on 103v and 104r, and there is a similar one just a few pages before that.  

What I'd really like to know is how (un)usual such spots are. There is something similar on the first folio of the alchemical herbal Florence MS 106, and I long suspect a connection between the two MSs, for reasons which I have probably already posted elsewhere.

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Did you think of red wine? Common drink at the time, there are poems of scholars craving for it and stains are notoriously difficult to remove and alcohol is a very good solvent. And I have not seen many such stains, people took care of their books

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PS: I know this kind of stains, with  me it is tea

Quote:Whatever it was, it penetrated the parchment. It's visible on 102r, 102v, 103r, 103v and 104r.

Most affected are 102v and 103r, and perhaps the damage to the ink is from attempts to scrape it off. The smaller spot seems to have been mainly on 103v and 104r, and there is a similar one just a few pages before that. 

Quite the thing I planned to have a look at three days ago, but had not time yet...