(23-10-2025, 05:45 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.My theory is that the Author had the text for the herbal but at most only a sketch of some parts of some of the plants. Thus he asked the Scribe to make up all the missing plants and parts, and gave him a bunch of those "alchemical" herbals to use as crib. (By the way it is unfortunate that the name "alchemical" has stuck. I don't see much connection to alchemy. "Fantastic herbals" may have been a better name...)
Do you think that the text describes the plant and the scriba drawn it according to the text? Or that the description was given apart (in another text or oraly)?
I think also that the plants were drawn from a text and that's why they look so weird
(23-10-2025, 02:53 PM)Stefan Wirtz_2 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.His [Toresella] text about VMS is (without something About Rudolph etc.):
"Il codice è di difficile datazione ma la più parte degli studiosi pensano che risalga agli anni 1460-1480. Queste piante fantastice non Hanno relazione alcuna con quelle die soliti erbari degli alchimisti; alcuni botanici però vi Hanno riconosciuto il Peperone e persino il girasole.; altri vi Hanno scoperto meraviglie anche più sorprendenti.[etc. ect.]
I'm just curious, where does that text come from? Any link? I ask because there are a lot of orthography errors in the italian text and I wonder why.
(23-10-2025, 02:53 PM)Stefan Wirtz_2 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think you are trying to say that "experts" are better in recognizing things like that little blue guy as an elephant, as experts have quite more experience in identifying items that are out of size, colours, shape, even behaviour and expected surroundings, than us laymen and amateurs.
No, that is not what I meant. I clearly said that everyone immediately recognisesa mouse and an elephant, despite the fact that many important aspects of the drawing are completely wrong. The brain recognises it in an instant, not going through a checklist of items.
Anyway...
If I may summarise the long argument of your post:
You argued that there are only 3 Italian aspects in the MS, namely the ghibbeline merlons on some buildings, and they are only recognised by amateurs.
I argued that many experts recognise Itialian influences in several aspects of the MS. One of these is Toresella.
You say that Toresella is completely wrong.
That does not invalidate my argument. And he is not an amateur.
(23-10-2025, 06:24 PM)Mauro Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (23-10-2025, 02:53 PM)Stefan Wirtz_2 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.His [Toresella] text about VMS is (without something About Rudolph etc.):
"Il codice è di difficile datazione ma la più parte degli studiosi pensano che risalga agli anni 1460-1480. Queste piante fantastice non Hanno relazione alcuna con quelle die soliti erbari degli alchimisti; alcuni botanici però vi Hanno riconosciuto il Peperone e persino il girasole.; altri vi Hanno scoperto meraviglie anche più sorprendenti.[etc. ect.]
I'm just curious, where does that text come from? Any link? I ask because there are a lot of orthography errors in the italian text and I wonder why.
This is from the academic paper I had quoted before.
There seem to be some typos in the transcription.
(24-10-2025, 01:00 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.There seem to be some typos in the transcription
For some mysterious reason "hanno" ("they have") and "peperone" ("bell pepper") have been capitalized.
fantastice -> fantastiche
die -> dei
(23-10-2025, 06:03 PM)quimqu Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Do you think that the text describes the plant and the scriba drawn it according to the text? Or that the description was given apart (in another text or oraly)? I think also that the plants were drawn from a text and that's why they look so weird
AFAIK the text in herbals generally does
not describe the plants. Thus, if the Author had only the text and the sketches in Pharma, he would have had no idea of what the rest of the plant looked like.
And, with maybe a few exceptions (such as the pansy on You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view. and the nymphaea on f2v), the Author almost certainly did not draw the plants from nature.
By the way, I suppose that Western herbals show the whole plant because doctors or patients were supposed to collect it themselves from the wild. But I suppose that in China herbal remedies are mostly bought from Apothecaries who get them cut and dried or pickled from distant placed through traders. Thus I would expect that an illustrated herbal medicine handbook would show what the store-bought material looks like, not the whole plant. Makes sense?
All the best, --stolfi
@Jorge
That may be true in rural areas, but not in cities. There is even a decree that the city of Vienna may not have more than 10 pharmacies.
The year 1241 can be considered the birth year of the pharmacy profession in Europe. The Staufer Emperor Frederick II (1194–1250) issued a medical ordinance that prescribed a separation between the professions of doctor and pharmacist. Among other things, this ordinance stipulated that pharmacists were obliged to work in accordance with medical or recognised regulations and that they had to recognise the prices of medicines and the restriction on the establishment of pharmacies to certain locations subject to state approval. Pharmacists were sworn in before the authorities to comply with the provisions. The ‘Constitutiones’ of Frederick II.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
(23-10-2025, 06:24 PM)Mauro Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I'm just curious, where does that text come from? Any link? I ask because there are a lot of orthography errors in the italian text and I wonder why.
I had to type the text by hand, and as I am German, my editor made some autocorrections into "German" after typing, i.e. several changes to capital letters,
dei -> die etc.
I did not get all of them out.
It is Toresella's text from the article, I can't get those typos out of this anymore.
(24-10-2025, 12:51 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[..]
If I may summarise the long argument of your post:
You argued that there are only 3 Italian aspects in the MS, namely the ghibbeline merlons on some buildings, and they are only recognised by amateurs.
I argued that many experts recognise Itialian influences in several aspects of the MS. One of these is Toresella.
You say that Toresella is completely wrong.
That does not invalidate my argument. And he is not an amateur.
I said and cited that Toresella is saying nothing but a romantic fantasy about the Voynich Manuscript - the stuff about sunflowers and Andromeda galaxy didn‘t age well during the last years, but these were not his ideas.
He just draws no context between his „alchemistic plants and herbals“, so this at least one expert (you named 2 here) didn’t give a valid proof for VMS‘s „italian“ (or close to it) origin.
By the way: the mentioned article of Toresella does not show much more expertise about his core stuff than this short textblock about VMS; calling the article rather non-scientific would be the most polite to say about it.
Again: were are these masses of experts who exclaim the Alpine Story?