The Voynich Ninja

(27-12-2025, 09:39 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Whatever the deliberate use of colors means (not forgetting yellow and red), it is not simply decoration but, as I said, a pictorial narrative.

(27-12-2025, 10:54 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But we should not expect that the colors will help us solve the riddle.  I believe they are only noise, that adds to the confusion..

Okay, Jorge, I think we've clearly outlined the different points of view.

[attachment=14037]

@Lisa
I found something interesting here.
Writing on unpolished parchment. I think the left (black) is written in lead, the right in red. I don't think the red is ink either.
It looks the same as the flower border on f55r.
Do you have any idea what kind of writing material this is?

I just want to refresh (from my post in the thread "Colors"): 
Comparison of the pages of the same bifolio shows that the author did the basic coloring most likely before bifolios were sewn into quires, since most of the plants pairs have the same colors and shades. Apparently (not surprisingly), the author prepared paints for a particular volume of work, depending on circumstances.
Examples of plant pairs from the same side of the same bifolio:
Currier A
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Currier B
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3. Imprints on the next pages in the current order - is most often blue paint, rarely – red, also rarely - green. In one case (f55r) – the imprint of green dye presents in the form of darkened areas on the opposite page ( f54v ), it is not green, it is likely appeared with the passage of time because of dampness, some particles gradually leaked into parchment. The other example is the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (the Sagittarius diagram). There are spots which look like imprints of the green dye, but where they are - from the offcut folio with diagrams of Capricorn or Aquarius, from the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. with the green pools, or from quite another bifolio, it is unclear for now.

Perhaps also good to know.
For about 5 years now, it has also been possible to determine when a colour was applied.
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(15-02-2026, 09:24 AM)Aga Tentakulus Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.For about 5 years now, it has also been possible to determine when a colour was applied.

Indeed, good to know.  Basically they do C14 dating on the binder used to hold the (inorganic) pigment particles to the substrate, using less than a milligram of paint.

But they are working with oil paintings, where the paint layer is rather thick.   I wonder if they could do anything with the VMS paints, that seem to be much thinner and probably have less binder in their formulas.  They would have to scrape quite  a bit of paint to get the needed amount of binder (10 micrograms) after chemical separation.

Being thinner, the paint layer is also probably more prone to contamination from dirt, mold, and the vellum.

But maybe one day...

All the best, --stolfi

I also think that the thickness of the paint is the biggest hurdle between the painting and the book.

(11-02-2026, 09:13 AM)Aga Tentakulus Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Writing on unpolished parchment. I think the left (black) is written in lead, the right in red. I don't think the red is ink either.

Both are in ink written with a pen.  Note that the width of the strokes varies with direction, and the thick strokes are all in "safe" directions and end with "square" ends at an angle -- as produced by a quill held in the right hand.

If the colors are accurate, the ink of the right hand text is probably a suspension of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) in a binder, like a diluted watercolor.  

The left-hand ink could be iron-gall ink.  However, its color does not look right.  Moreover, since the right-hand ink is not waterproof, there would be no point in using a waterproof ink on the left side. Thus I would guess that the left-hand ink too is a "watercolor", but with some iron-based pigment instead.

The parchment looks rough, but that apparent roughness does not seem to affect the writing. So I guess that the parchment was coated with some light paste and then sanded smooth. The dark spots may be dimples of the skin that were sanded down to be flush with the lighter surface.

All the best, --stolfi

I think that this observation was posted before, but cannot find it. So here it is again.

The big right-hand flower on page You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. extends for a few mm into the other half of the bifolio, f40r; proving that the drawings were done while the bifolios were still unbound.

That flower has been proposed as evidence that the color paints too were applied before the bifolios were bound, since the bits of the flower on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. are painted blue like the rest petals on f33v.

However, looking closely, on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. the blue paint stops 1-2 pixels short of the binding fold (purple arrow); and the hue and shape of the painted areas on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (red arrow) do not quite match those on f33v:

[attachment=16733]

So it seems that the book was already bound when that blue paint was applied.  The Painter must have noticed that the flower of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. extended into f40r, and tried to paint that part too. 

The blue paint is distinguished from other paints for frequently producing dark gray "offset" (contact) prints on facing pages.  The prints presumably were due to some component of the blue paint, not the blue pigment itself, that did not dry properly.  Here it is no exception: we see offsets of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. onto f34r, and of the bits on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. onto f39v.

Those offset prints were obviously produced when the bifolios were already nested in the current order.  Moreover, their vertical positions precisely match those of the original painted aeras; so it is highly likely that the bifolios were already bound, not simply nested but loose, when the offsetting happened. 

It is possible that the paint was applied when the bifolios were loose, but the offsetting started only centuries after that, after the book was bound.  Maybe because the book was kept for a while in a damp environment and the humidity softened that dark gray component of that particular paint.   

But it seems more likely that the offset prints formed right after the paint was applied, because the paint included an improper ingredient that did not dry properly -- like tar, perhaps added to get a darker shade of blue.  Indeed, the mottled appearance of the dark blue paint could be explained as due to some oily component that did not mix well with the water-based binder.  Or maybe all the dark blue areas were painted in a single pass, and the Painter did not wait for the paint to dry before putting the two sheets in contact and moving on to the next drawing.  In that case, the offset prints on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and f39v would be evidence that the paint was applied after the binding -- that is, long after the outlines were drawn.

All the best, --stolfi