08-05-2016, 07:40 PM
It becomes increasingly clear that the manuscript is most likely to have been made in Italy, as was the opinion of both Nick Pelling and Edith Sherwood before 2008.
Sherwood believed so because she thought then that the manuscript was by Leonard da Vinci; Pelling's opinion was drawn from his own research into an Italian architect nicknamed 'Filarete'.
Codicological evidence for this view has been less often addressed.
Recently, however, Alain Towaide has said that the binding itself (i.e. the style of stitching) is characteristically Italian, an important new insight. (on which point, see the publication by the Villa Mondragone, and a summary review by Rene written for Stephen Bax' website).
In this connection, I have noted again a comment published some time ago on ciphermysteries by Menno Krull Knul, who said he thought that an Italian manuscript in the library of the University of Vermont (Burlington) was 'convincingly like' the botanical section of Beinecke MS 408.
Bald assertions of this sort abound in Voynich studies, and finding the reason and evidence for an opinion is often very difficult.
So I've recently begun to write up a detailed comparison of the two manuscripts. My conclusions are (for those who don't want to wade through the comparative evidence, reasoning and all that) that the similarities are primarily those of similar practices and materials in use in northern Italy during the fifteenth century. As example, one page of the Vermont herbal, folded across the middle, differs not at all from the VMS vellum in one dimension and only 2.5mm to either side on the other.
The palette is comparable, though the Vms' is broader. More telling is that both have had the pictures made before the text was added, and in *some* cases, the text of the Vermont 'Tuscany Herbal' also weaves the text through and around a central image.
However, the length in time between them - as much as four or five generations - suggests that it is the use of paper and membrane supplied by a constant source over that period which explains the dimensions, as well as the possibility that the 'Tuscany' herbal drew upon the earlier Beinecke manuscript, or upon exemplars in common. I conclude that the Vms is most likely to have been made c.1427-8 in the Veneto.
I think that, given the earlier ideas about where the manuscript was made (which is not the same thing as where the contained matter was first enunciated), Towaide's comment and Menno Krull's Knul's observation become important. We may need to switch attention from 'central Europe' to northern Italy in our hunt for the text.
I should appreciate comments on the posts from members here.
Sherwood believed so because she thought then that the manuscript was by Leonard da Vinci; Pelling's opinion was drawn from his own research into an Italian architect nicknamed 'Filarete'.
Codicological evidence for this view has been less often addressed.
Recently, however, Alain Towaide has said that the binding itself (i.e. the style of stitching) is characteristically Italian, an important new insight. (on which point, see the publication by the Villa Mondragone, and a summary review by Rene written for Stephen Bax' website).
In this connection, I have noted again a comment published some time ago on ciphermysteries by Menno Krull Knul, who said he thought that an Italian manuscript in the library of the University of Vermont (Burlington) was 'convincingly like' the botanical section of Beinecke MS 408.
Bald assertions of this sort abound in Voynich studies, and finding the reason and evidence for an opinion is often very difficult.
So I've recently begun to write up a detailed comparison of the two manuscripts. My conclusions are (for those who don't want to wade through the comparative evidence, reasoning and all that) that the similarities are primarily those of similar practices and materials in use in northern Italy during the fifteenth century. As example, one page of the Vermont herbal, folded across the middle, differs not at all from the VMS vellum in one dimension and only 2.5mm to either side on the other.
The palette is comparable, though the Vms' is broader. More telling is that both have had the pictures made before the text was added, and in *some* cases, the text of the Vermont 'Tuscany Herbal' also weaves the text through and around a central image.
However, the length in time between them - as much as four or five generations - suggests that it is the use of paper and membrane supplied by a constant source over that period which explains the dimensions, as well as the possibility that the 'Tuscany' herbal drew upon the earlier Beinecke manuscript, or upon exemplars in common. I conclude that the Vms is most likely to have been made c.1427-8 in the Veneto.
I think that, given the earlier ideas about where the manuscript was made (which is not the same thing as where the contained matter was first enunciated), Towaide's comment and Menno Krull's Knul's observation become important. We may need to switch attention from 'central Europe' to northern Italy in our hunt for the text.
I should appreciate comments on the posts from members here.