The Voynich Ninja

Just my take - I spent a fair while on this theme, and what the motifs meant in the context of each page where they appear and came to the conclusion that the 'umbrella' is a form which was more important for its significance than its appearance. As art historians say it isn't a "picture of" but a "picture about" the subject.

I spoke of the two central objects as the 'peg' and 'pole' (actually I first called the peg a stud, but my blog received an awful lot of advertising material, so I changed the term).

I won't repeat here the conclusions I reached. Anyone who cares to see the part I repeated at voynichimagery can search for the folio number. I should say that in those earlier years, I used the now-outdated Yale "Voynich gallery" foliation (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.), which is not the same as the later scans posted on the Beinecke library site, nor the foliation used on the old Voynich mailing list and still, sometimes, used by Voynich writers.

@Diane, what is the specific link to that page on your blog?

@VViews: thanks, i appreciate it.

(13-04-2016, 09:43 AM)Davidsch Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.@Diane, what is the specific link to that page on your blog?

See, this is why the links-and-references "wiki" will be very handy. In the near future, we can just go to the page for You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and get links to everything that's been written about it

You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. a bit about the "pipes". (control-f 78r if you're in a hurry)
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.'s a post about similar motifs on another folio.

Blogs are a bit hard to navigate, I havent found anything about the "scales" or "scallops". While the dotted scales were also a conventional way of drawing the Aegis, I'm not sure how they found their way into the VM. The latest examples I've seen were on red figure pottery.

(13-04-2016, 05:14 AM)Wladimir D Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.See page f75v. There are two umbrella fully disclosed and combined into one tent. There are drawn spokes of umbrella and two different tip.

You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is strange from this perspective. The two umbrellas are not two different umbrellas, but rather two exemplars of one and the same umbrella - the cloudband. And while the right one has a distinct spindle, it seems to me that the left one does not. Instead, I interpret its centre as a "sink". These two "foci" thus may represent two poles of something.

(13-04-2016, 05:14 AM)Wladimir D Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.See page f75v. There are two umbrella fully disclosed and combined into one tent. There are drawn spokes of umbrella and two different tip.

 

My personal opinion is that fol.75v represents the human lungs. The two different "umbrella tips" could symbolize inhale/exhale function
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My main research focus on the technical aspects of the text and on the balneo section.
I am confident that the drawings are related to the text. It shows a bathing ritual.
That is actual what you see and that is what you get: bathing.

The extra detailed parts, such as the stick, the sponge, the umbrella's 
(these depictions are wrong but that is not important now)
are symbolic.

That means, not the whole drawing is symbolic, but only the details.
That is the same in the entire ms: the drawings itself are real. 
F.e. it really is a herb, but it is a fantasy herbal with some symbolic parts and text.

Why i came to that conclusion is rather obvious: RRC: research, reading & comparing.
I have many pictures and descriptions of bathing woman, based on professional (often paid) research 
between 1200-1600 and they share specific elements in many countries. 
I am talking many hundreds of pages. 

These elements are related to the bathing experience during those days.
For example some general items: heating rocks, oven, drinking, eating, bikini, tools for cleaning.
Not even 1 of those elements can be found in the balneo section in the ms.
and that is the basis for my conclusion that it does not display "normal bathing" but "ritual bathing".

(14-04-2016, 11:16 AM)Davidsch Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I have many pictures and descriptions of bathing woman [...]
I am talking many hundreds of pages. 

I think I'm switching sections   

Seriously now. I agree that there must be symbolic aspects to this page - it's just impossible to see everything as literal. What I don't understand is why that leads you to conclude that the actual bathing is literal though. What makes you discard an entirely symbolic interpretation?

Quote:What makes you discard an entirely symbolic interpretation?

Good question which i ask myself often.

I read many times about the ms having symbolic meanings, those assumptions are quite often "over the top"

Like the "lungs", or "the eye-balls", or the women that are performing bleeding or some sort of group-suicide.
I think those conclusions are over the top, because when the author has such a story to tell,  he would have left us with many other obvious drawings.

You could argue that the fantasy things in the herbals are also in that direction, i think not, 
but regarding the balneo section you see no fantasy baths, or f.e. zoomorphic woman (small exception is the fish-woman).

The reasoning is not based on "what do i see"  but: "what would a common picture look like" 
Do we see that ? Are there such elements and what could it depict if we NOT see the usual thing.

All things that are not common, i put in the box "symbolic". Everything else i see as literal.

To make such observations it is absolutely necessary that you have done enough research and reading.

When i started a couple of years back i saw the VMS as one big symbolic ms.
Nowadays, i do not,  because i have more knowledge and see similarities with other ms in the same region and period.

I don't mean symbolic in some esoteric or crazy sense. What if, for example, like I think Diane suggests, they represent stars or constellations for navigation on the seas? What if they represent ships, which were ever since antiquity seen as female entities, sailing down rivers and oceans?

You don't have to stray too far from the "face value" of the drawings to suggest a slightly allegorical sense.

Rene just posted (in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. that contains an illustration of possible interest for this subject (Vatikan, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Pal. lat. 412, Wynandus de Stega, Adamas colluctancium aquilarum — XV Century). You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. are a few pages away.