I decided that my paper was getting too big, so I will start publishing it in blog form. It's just activated today, so right now I have one reader, who was me when I accidentally logged out... I hope you'll forgive me this shameless promotion to get my first readers. I'm posting this here because it touches on imagery, test and provenance alike.
My first two posts are up, discussing a plant I identify as mango, and one I identify as saffron. Many more will be posted tomorrow and the days to come.
Make sure to first read the pages about mnemonics, which can be accessed through the stickied post or the top menu.
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If you're not convinced yet by these examples, don'y wory... There are more to come
Either way I hope you enjoy the read!
Just for Marco Ponzi, I bumped my post on millet a couple of days forward. Link to the post: You are not allowed to view links.
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Today's post is up: You are not allowed to view links.
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Hello Koen Gh,
I read what you wrote about ms “Sloane 4016”.
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I am not sure that you are aware of the fact that this manuscript is a “visual dictionary” in which vegetal, animal and mineral medical ingredients (“simplices”) are listed in alphabetical order. “Bos” is next to “Borago” because they are alphabetically close. This and similar works do no use “bos as a mnemonic for borago”, nor the other way round: they simply order their illustrations alphabetically.
Similarly, “lacerte” (“lizard”) is next to “lectuca” (“lettuce”) and “mumia” (mummy) is next to “mus” (mouse).
Sloane 4016 can still be considered a parallel for the Voynich “pharmaceutical” section, if one considers those pages of the VMS to also be a list of medical ingredients. An important difference is that the Voynich list does not appear to be alphabetically sorted.
I am aware of that difference.
You can't just call them "parallel alphabetical lists" though. Whether that's in alphabetical order or not, doesn't really matter: the lists keep the same pace, so there's always a nice match.
A clear effort is made to place an animal next to a plant that starts with the same sounds. Why is this, then? Just alphabetical coincidence? Or a mnemonic function? (= makes it easier to learn or remember)?
If not for a learning or memorizing purpose, what is the reason for these parallel lists?
I don't consider the root-and-leaf section pharmaceutical at all, by the way. The parallel I note is that both manuscripts couple the plants with similarly sounding images.
(09-03-2016, 12:57 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.A clear effort is made to place an animal next to a plant that starts with the same sounds. Why is this, then? Just alphabetical coincidence?
It's not alphabetical
coincidence. It's alphabetical
order.
Is You are not allowed to view links.
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You are right that I should at least reword that page a bit though.
Is this what you mean? Listing these animals together with plants that start with the same letter was a custom, and the mnemonic effect was secondary - or perhaps even forgotten. The way I see Voynich mnemonics is as a way more conscious effort.
Of course it's alphabetical order - I know how a word list works. That doesn't answer the question why the list of animals and the parallel list of plants keep a perfectly matching pace - they clearly selected animals and plants that started with the same letter(s) to go together. What is the purpose of this, if not mnemonic?
I think that You are not allowed to view links.
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In some manuscripts, such illustrative albums do not contain any text, but only the names of the plants in the language of the several groups present in medieval society. These albums with multilingual lists of plant names were visual aids which allowed for easy identification of the plants to be used in the practice of remedial therapy. Their representations of materia medica were much more efficient than words to make transcultural exchanges possible.
As stated You are not allowed to view links.
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This particular manuscript is too rich and elegant to have been created for a physician: it was more like a luxury picture book.
Anyway, if you needed to know how to say donkey in Arabic, you could search for You are not allowed to view links.
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Login to view. and find the Latin for wild donkey (onagrum) and the Arabic term (omaraules). If you had a recipe written in Latin and prescribing some strange ingredient, you could find it in the book and check the image to be sure to get the right herb.
I understand, but let me rephrase my question then:
Do you think that the fact that on about 80% (wild guess) of the pages, one or more plant drawings end up with "something else"? This has no purpose at all apart from the order dictated by an alphabetic list? Or has an effort been made to put plants and "other things" (mostly animals) on the same page?
If that it the case, then I would argue for a
secondary mnemonic function.
If that is not the case, I am badly mistaken and should probably remove that page from my blog
Marco's point is fully correct.
This herbal is one part of a herbal tradition that was copied over several centuries, and included a variable mixture of medicine from herbs, animals and minerals. Sloane 4016 and a few other MSs from this tradition that have been preserved are 'unusual' in that there is no text but only illustrations.
They have all been organised alphabetically. The two manuscripts that are most similar to Sloane 4016 are Masson 116 in Paris and CLM 28531 in Munich (which is largely overlooked even by experts). The alphabetical arrangement, and the differences between them, are clearly visible in an online Thesis (in German) here:
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(see p.209 and ff.)
These other two MSs are not visible online as far as I know, but another similar one is: Morgan MS M 873,
see here:
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EDIT: CLM 28531 has text....