I consider the astrological part of the book the most important, because beside the plants (which are hardly identifiable) our stars and constellations do not change, and therefore it is the only part of VMS that can be connected to our real world.
Few months back I got myself to study a bit, and found that Chinese have a You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view. system. These Mansions reflect the movement of the moon in a lunar month (28 days) where each day corresponds with a constellation.
The Chinese lunar calendar is separated into quadrants - Dragon(East), Turtle/Snake(North), Tiger(West) and Bird(East). The south is usually on top.
Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Indians and Arabs utilise similar concept.
The 28-Mansions System lunar appears to be present on page f68r3. I saw there is an agreement that f68r3 features the moon in the middle.
[
attachment=9459]
What's more interesting is this rendition of the Mansion System from time of Yuan dynasty 1271-1368.
Marco Polo served Yuan dynasty around 1280.
[
attachment=9460]
What's important, all lunar mansion systems - be it Arabic, Chinese or Indian - do include Pleiades as one of the mansions. The symbol in Chinese is "昴" is 16th lunar mansion, under Tiger(west).
In this image, I located 昴 on the right and adjusted it to align with the European north-up perspective. Conveniently, the Pleiades constellation in the VMS corresponds to the chart.
[
attachment=9461]
edit: changed title from "Chinese Astrology present in VMS" to "Eastern Astrology present in VMS"
This looks interesting. As far as I remember, divisions of astronomical month or year into 28 segments are known in various cultures, e.g., Arabic lunar mansions (which also include the Pleiades) have been discussed here: You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
Are there any particular reasons to link f68r3 with the Chinese version, other than the placement of the Pleiades mansion?
(28-11-2024, 04:39 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.divisions of astronomical month or year into 28 segments are known in various cultures, e.g., Arabic lunar mansions (which also include the Pleiades).
Yes, I wrote it in the post above. It was used by Arabs, Indians, Chinese, Japanese and some other cultures.
(28-11-2024, 04:39 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Are there any particular reasons to link f68r3 with the Chinese version, other than the placement of the Pleiades mansion?
Not really, only the chart from 13th century which strikes me as very similar given the inscriptions. Also, from the lunar mansion charts that I've found, the Chinese one is the most similar.
It's most likely not the Indian one, because that one
usually has 27 mansions.
It however might be Arabic one, as it's considerably closer to Europe, but I did not find any chart for manzilas from 12-15th century. Those that I did find from 1600s look different.
I've looked at various examples of these "二十八宿" (as far as I understand, that's what 28 mansions are called?), mostly they are just a bunch of Chinese characters, but there are some exceptions, e.g.:
[
attachment=9471]
"Traced copy of the star chart on the ceiling of Liao Dynasty tomb M2 in Xuanhua (Image from reference #6)" (automated translation)
I've also found a high resolution image of a Chinese star chart:
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
And I put the hires of the original f68r3 next to the chart you found, just for the convenience:
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
I wonder if it's possible to find a good source of digitized Chinese manuscripts on the internet.
(28-11-2024, 06:46 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view."二十八宿" (as far as I understand, that's what 28 mansions are called?)
Yes "二十八宿" literally translates as "Twenty and eight homes"
(28-11-2024, 06:46 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.they are just a bunch of Chinese characters
Each character in the outer ring corresponds with one constellation or a star. 昴 are Pleiades, 角 is the brightest star in Virgo, etc.
(28-11-2024, 06:46 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I wonder if it's possible to find a good source of digitized Chinese manuscripts on the internet.
I don't think it is, due to political reasons and the
Great Firewall. I've managed to find some, but they are not based in China.
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
(29-11-2024, 01:41 PM)argo2001 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (28-11-2024, 06:46 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I wonder if it's possible to find a good source of digitized Chinese manuscripts on the internet.
I don't think it is, due to political reasons and the Great Firewall. I've managed to find some, but they are not based in China.
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
I think Taiwan could be a good source of digitized historical documents in Chinese. E.g., You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
(28-11-2024, 04:39 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.This looks interesting. As far as I remember, divisions of astronomical month or year into 28 segments are known in various cultures, e.g., Arabic lunar mansions (which also include the Pleiades) have been discussed here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. Are there any particular reasons to link f68r3 with the Chinese version, other than the placement of the Pleiades mansion?
Just for general entertainment and edification, here are the names of the Pleiades in some non-European languages, as well as I could figure them out:
Tibetan:
ཀ་རྟི་ཀ smin-drug "six stars"
Mandarin: 昴 mǎo
Cantonese: 昴 maau5
Vietnamese: Tua Rua "Tassel"?
Burmese: ဖျောက်ဆိ hpyawwatsi
Khmer: ផ្កាយ កូន មាន់ phkay kaun man "Chick star"
Thai: ดาวลูกไก่ Dāwlūkkị̀ "Chicken star"
Arabic: الثُّرَيَّا aṯ-ṯurayyā
Hebrew: כִּימָה kimā
Voynichese:
doary (from f68r3)
My browser (Chromium) cannot display the Tibetan properly (it should be three characters and two dots).
All the best, --jorge
(24-09-2025, 02:22 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Voynichese: doary (from f68r3)
By the way, this is one of relatively few cases where the retracing could affect the analysis of the text. The original label of the Pleiades was
doary, but the tail of the
y was so faint that the Retracer missed it and "restored" the word as
doaro -- which is how it was transcribed by Takahashi.
(Rene's present transcription has it correctly as
doary).
All the best, --jorge
Just for the record, I suspect that word-final o and word-final y are equivalent.
(24-09-2025, 08:10 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Just for the record, I suspect that word-final o and word-final y are equivalent.
If there was no retracing, so that all the ink we see was put down by the original Scribe, this may be an unavoidable conclusion.
But if there was substantial retracing of the text, as I now believe is the case, that apparent equivalence may be just the result of many
y having lost the tail and having been incorrectly "restored" as
o. As in the "Pleiades" label.
All the best, --jorge