The Voynich Ninja

One of the pictures was drawn and coloured by a doctor. He lived in Berlin from around 1750 to 18xx.
He describes it as a medicinal plant.
But whether it was described in the same way around 1400, I have no idea.

The doctor’s drawing depicts a flower with multiple leave bundles in the growing pattern, not couplets as pictured in VMS.

Rene and Jorge, I’m interested in your thoughts on why you consider this illustration as specifically more likely to represent Viola triolor rather than Viola bicolor. As you know, the argument that You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is more likely the latter has been made by well-credentialed botanical experts, but is typically rejected for extraneous reasons, which conflicts with a proper analysis of the botanical features.

But since in this thread, your are clearly attempting a more objective assessment of the drawing, I’m genuinely curious how you view the specific points raised by Tucker and Janick:

"This phytomorph (Fig. 4.142a) clearly shows linear, terminal stipular lobes, as in the North American native V. bicolor Pursh (V. rafinesquei Greene) (Fig. 4.142b)—not spatulate, as in the Eurasian V. tricolor L. Also, this phytomorph matches the blue flowers of V. bicolor, not the tricolored ones of V. tricolor; V. bicolor flowers are uniformly cream to blue, whereas those of V. tricolor usually have two purple upper petals and three cream to yellow lower petals ..."

(I have my own reasons for being dubious of the case, but am curious to see how they compare with yours.)

[attachment=12683]

Ok, now it's getting ridiculous.
Who added the VM to the Wikipedia page of Viola rafinesquei? The entire paragraph is among the biggest nonsense I have ever seen on Wikipedia.

Quote:The Voynich Codex, also known as the Voynich manuscript, contains information that has been used to identify plants.

There is no evidence the VM contains information to identify plants. We cannot read the text. If anything, plants in the VM have been claimed to be identified. Most of these identifications are more than doubtful.

Quote:This 15th-century book contains an accurate drawing of Viola rafinesquii, with blue and white flowers, distinguishing it from Viola tricolor.

The VM flowers are either completely blue or blue and yellow and the coloration much better matches an average V. tricolor than [i]V. rafinesquei.
That aside, I'd like to remind you that T. tricolor is a widespread neophyte in North America, and I'd like to see you tell the plants apart without a chromosome count. These are highly polymorphic species aggregates that come in a huge variety of sizes and shapes and as I said many Violas are generally a nightmare to identify.

Well, here you go, give it a try!

Quote:The presence of this drawing suggests that Viola rafinesquii had medicinal uses for native populations in the early 15th century.

How exactly? Native Americans wrote the VM in Precolumbian early 15th century? Seriously?

All in all, I see no reason why V. rafinesquei should be a better match, unless you are trying to propose a New World origin of the VM.

I’ve accurately and precisely identified many of the roots and flowers through Irish translation with my lexicon. See my substack and TikTok, if curious.

(27-11-2025, 05:23 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I still don't know whether Viola tricolor has ever been used as medicinal herb.

It was, though the earliest clear references with drawings are from 1485. In German it was called freysam, in Latin yacea or herba clauelata.

See this great work Marco posted that has a large section devoted to V. tricolor:
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

Quote:Das Wilde Stiefmütterchen erscheint erst im 15. Jh. in der pharmazeutischen Literatur, jedoch nicht unter dem heute gebräuchlichen Namen. 1478 beschreibt der österreichische  Arzt Michael Puff aus Schrick ein Heilwasser aus einer Pflanze namens freבsam in seinem  „Büchlein von Tugenden der ausgebrannten Wässer“, in dem er die Heilwirkung verschiedener Pflanzenextrakte abhandelt.

Quote:Die erste Abbildung eines Freisamkrautes (freyschem krut) begleitet die Beschreibung der Pflanze im Gart der Gesundheit, der ersten deutsche Kräuterbuchinkunabel, einem der einflussreichsten pharmazeutischen Werke seiner Zeit. Das Buch wurde vom Arzt Johann Wonnecke von Kaub (auch de Cuba genannt) auf Anweisung des Mainzer Domherrn Bernhard von Breidenbach zusammengestellt und 1485 von Peter Schöffer in Mainz gedruckt.

Quote:Bock (1539) nennt das Freyssam dreifaltigkeyt, so die Kapitelüberschrift, violen, also Veilchen. In dieser Zeit wurde das Wilde Stiefmütterchen also bei den Veilchen eingereiht, zu denen es auch heute taxonomisch gestellt wird. So notiert auch Leonhart Fuchs 1543 „freyschamkraut oder trinitatis herba ist ein Geschlecht der Violen“. Der französische Humanist Jean Ruell (Ruellius), der keine Mühe scheute, Pflanzen selbst zu suchen und zu beschreiben, hält 1536 fest: „Ich halte es für die geruchlose Violenart, die das französische Volk penseen nennt, und die Blätter wie das Bingelkraut hat“, was eine zutreffende Beobachtung ist.

So around 1540 botanists recognized that pansies belonged to Viola. But before ~1475 pansies were apparently absent from literature.
As you said, it appears they were not used in antiquity and Southern Europe. Their use was probably an invention of Central European Herbalism in the late 15th century. Which makes the appearance in the VM even more interesting. I think we should look into this. Right now - if we accept You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. as V. tricolor and we accept a date around 1420 for the creation of the VM, then this would predate other depictions of V. tricolor by around 50 years!

(27-11-2025, 10:29 PM)Doireannjane Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I’ve accurately and precisely identified many of the roots and flowers through Irish translation with my lexicon. See my substack and TikTok, if curious.

Doireann, please keep your theory out of other threads. If your contribution is based on your linguistic theory, then it will only confuse people. There are plenty of people here who would like to add their own translations, but we learned that this does not work. Out of respect for several people here who make an effort to discuss their theory in its own thread (shout-out to Antonio), I ask you to stop. You are welcome to make a new thread about your theory (we'll adjust the rule to one open thread per theory for you). But expect criticism. Again, this is nothing personal. But we can't have everyone behaving like this, so the rule is that no one gets to.

(27-11-2025, 10:43 PM)Bernd Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.As you said, it appears they were not used in antiquity and Southern Europe. Their use was probably an invention of Central European Herbalism in the late 15th century. Which makes the appearance in the VM even more interesting. I think we should look into this. Right now - if we accept You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. as V. tricolor and we accept a date around 1420 for the creation of the VM, then this would predate other depictions of V. tricolor by around 50 years!

I agree, this is fascinating, it should tell us something about the VM's plant inventory. Because Viola tricolor does occur widely - I've encountered it myself in the wild. So knowledge of it is not unusual. But it would be our earliest image of it.

Re. your other post, I physically cringe when I see Voynich theories spill over into the real world. Whoever does such things, please stop

It is kind of strange as V. tricolor and arvensis are prolific agricultural weeds that are easier to cultivate than V. odorata, providing you have a sufficiently dry and sunny spot. And they flower for a much longer period than odorata, all summer. I think the reason is that it took until the late 15th century and the Northward spread of the Renaissance for scholars to create novel works instead of just copying and recompiling classical literature. Therefore, while V. tricolor use was probably known and even cultivated in early medieval Middle Europe, it may simply not have been recorded in herbals because the major authorities of antiquity did not recommend it. At least not in the high quality famous works that survived until today. Quality-wise, the VM certainly is an oddball that only survived because of its weirdness.

(27-11-2025, 10:54 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(27-11-2025, 10:29 PM)Doireannjane Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I’ve accurately and precisely identified many of the roots and flowers through Irish translation with my lexicon. See my substack and TikTok, if curious.

Doireann, please keep your theory out of other threads. If your contribution is based on your linguistic theory, then it will only confuse people. There are plenty of people here who would like to add their own translations, but we learned that this does not work. Out of respect for several people here who make an effort to discuss their theory in its own thread (shout-out to Antonio), I ask you to stop. You are welcome to make a new thread about your theory (we'll adjust the rule to one open thread per theory for you). But expect criticism. Again, this is nothing personal. But we can't have everyone behaving like this, so the rule is that no one gets to.

Sorry I didn’t realize that was against the rules, I was just pointing to my plant identifications. Won’t happen again