(08-11-2025, 02:46 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.It is Mongolian to me... Are those detached letters on the left margin just the first letter of the first word? As in another MS that was posted recently?
If so, what would be the justification for that layout? Just a fashion of the times? Helpful for reading? A side effect of how the scribe worked?
The letters are the first ones of the first word:
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2. I actually wanted to find out why this was done before I posted it. But it just happened to fit here. I only have a very vague guess:
Attention, unproven personal theory:
As you can see in the image below from the structural lines drawn, the initial letters are given “more space.” This could be because capital letters were often at the beginning of a line. Since they were often drawn more artistically, they were given a little more space so that these beautiful glyphs could be seen and read better. And so a kind of “fad” arose.
What is unusual, however, is that in f49v.1 and f49v.16, there are at the beginnig of a line two gallow glyphs directly after each other, and the one in line 16 has also slipped.
In 66r, they are also partially misaligned, or the circle that looks like a small "o" belongs to the corresponding glyph (which would support my thesis that the original text had more information than the current one and that this information has disappeared for various reasons).
And here there are also whole words in front of it, too. This, in turn, is all very mysterious.
(08-11-2025, 02:46 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (07-11-2025, 10:50 PM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I have also found such a text, so it does not seem to be anything unusual. Its an english text of the 13th century
It is Mongolian to me... Are those detached letters on the left margin just the first letter of the first word? As in another MS that was posted recently?
If so, what would be the justification for that layout? Just a fashion of the times? Helpful for reading? A side effect of how the scribe worked?
All the best, --stolfi
Mine are transcripts of the same book, so they maybe just copied? Maybe its indicating what we discussing here. Every line start is a new sentence or better a new row in a hym.
(07-11-2025, 10:50 PM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I have also found such a text, so it does not seem to be anything unusual. Its an english text of the 13th century
I am still trying to figure out the reason for these separate initial letters.
It's older, a style that basically means: "this is poetry".
11th century: You are not allowed to view links.
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Note: this page (linked) has a 2nd column of capitals on the right, that ends on the next page with "INVOCATIO ADD[ENDU]M". They are actually the same capitals in reverse order ending with ...RITACIRTM matching the beginning of the 1st column MTRICATIR... A hidden acrostic in there? A few letter sequences might make sense but most don't: NORIT... AMOR...
I had completely forgotten that this writing style is called “acrostic.”
(08-11-2025, 12:41 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I had completely forgotten that this writing style is called “acrostic.”
Any composition including a (meaningful) text that can be read in the initial letters.
Quote:Acrostics are common in medieval literature, where they usually serve to highlight the name of the poet or his patron, or to make a prayer to a saint. They are most frequent in verse works but can also appear in prose.
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This doesn't explain the separate column of capitals. It's a tradition, like capitalizing the first letter in poetry, that had no function other than aesthetic I suppose.
I found this in a medical context and it's not poetry...
It looks somewhat similar to the pages of the Voynich manuscript.
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attachment=12115]
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The blue-bordered character even bears similarities to the Voynich P or f in a c Ligatur... And other characters also show similarities.
Could that be the basis for these pages? I looked through them, but couldn't find any page that matches the initial letters on 49v— what a pity.
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attachment=12116]
(09-11-2025, 07:16 AM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.it's not poetry.
It is, written in hexameters:
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(09-11-2025, 11:07 AM)nablator Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (09-11-2025, 07:16 AM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.it's not poetry.
It is, written in hexameters:
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So could be the voynich also written in hexameters? Could it be a medical, herbal "poetry"? Is it possible to analyse it for "hexameters"?
Thanks for pointing that out, and sorry— I should have checked that, my bad...
But it's interesting that this symbol means
pro, that fits very well...
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attachment=12118]
I was already aware of the other symbol, but I didn't connect it with this ligature.
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attachment=12119]
I search e.g. I(tem) a. others...
Quote:Aegidius Corboliensis (Gilles de Corbeil, born around 1140, died around 1224). He wrote a Latin poem in hexameter entitled Carmen de urinis (“Song of Urine”).
In an edition from 1418, the initial letters are not separated by a space but by a vertical line.
Universität Kassel, 4° Ms. med. 8, Aegidius Corbeiensis, Carmen de Urinis, around 1418, fol. 32v
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This is new to me; I would not have thought that medical texts were also written in hexameter.
(09-11-2025, 01:21 PM)Kaybo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.So could be the voynich also written in hexameters? Could it be a medical, herbal "poetry"? Is it possible to analyse it for "hexameters"?
To check that, you would need to be familiar with verse forms (rhythm). I don't know much about that. A metric representation of the ancient hexameter doesn't really help either.
Edit: I'm currently reading this tutorial:
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