Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.... Those few "words" that could be "Germanish" or Latin words do not make sense together.
So why does the last line almost seem to refer back to the first? "poxleber" (buck's liver), "gaſmich" (goat's milk), suggesting to the reader so first take the liver of a goat, then the milk of a goat? The last three words are especially clear as "ſo nim gaſmich.", translating to "then take goat's milk.", along with all the other elements of a medieval charm that suggest it is in fact, a medieval charm?
Quote:Again, the Restorer who tried to recover the lost (Voynichese) text apparently thought that the parag was a charm, and tried to "restore" the smudges accordingly.
So why wouldn't the restorer have seen the two Voynichese words that just so happen to be perfectly untouched, along with the rest of the manuscript being in Voynichese, and figure out that the text was in fact, not in Latin or German, but in this mysterious language no one could read?
Quote:By the way, two of the crosses (after "multod" and after "cere") are closed at the northwest quadrant by a diagonal line, so that they look more like a "4". But crosses are normally drawn with a vertical down stroke and a left to right horizontal stroke. If the quill is not completely lifted off the vellum between the two traces, the result would be a diagonal line closing off the southwest or northeast quadrant, depending on which stroke is drawn first. The diagonal line at the northwest suggests that what the Restorer saw there was a "4", not just a cross. Like a partially erased q...
You do know that when writing '+' shapes fast, diagonal connecting lines can happen when writing normally, right?
I can say this because whenever I have to write a '+' as part of a math equation, or something similar, typically I write it fast, and in one stroke without lifting my pen off the paper, which usually results in a diagonal lines in either the northwest, or northeast quadrants, depending on the direction I wrote the symbol in. A shape just just like a 4, or indeed,
q is just a consequence of writing a '+' symbol in one stroke.
ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The hat looks a little more detailed, and it has legs. The difference is that she looks a little better. Judging by the illustrations in the VMS, the artist could not have drawn such a hat, and he would hardly have drawn legs. I believe that someone has redrawn the nymph. But who knows...
I understand how you may think that, someone may have drawn over it, it's possible, but the styles in my opinion feel a bit too similar to be done by different artists, however, I understand that this is a bit more subjective, and that other people may have different opinions on whether the nymphs are in the same style.
Quote:Is there an N there?
There could be many reasons why there are pluses there. The fact that it's a spell is undeniable, but the fact that it makes sense is incredible.
Yes, there is.
[
attachment=16719]
I can see how this could be mistaken for 'M', but the reason I believe it's 'N' is that capital 'N' was common in medieval charms, a short form of the Latin word 'Nomen', meaning name, which is why is stood for the specific person's name.
(22-07-2026, 12:29 PM)J_Voy Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.So why does the last line almost seem to refer back to the first? "poxleber" (buck's liver), "gaſmich" (goat's milk), suggesting to the reader so first take the liver of a goat, then the milk of a goat?
poxleber is more of a swear word. In any case, the author of this text
wanted this spell to be meaningful. He may have triedYou are not allowed to view links.
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Login to view. or restore the text, but he ended up making a mistake.
(22-07-2026, 12:29 PM)J_Voy Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.A shape just just like a 4, or indeed, q is just a consequence of writing a '+' symbol in one stroke.
By the way, this is interesting...
(22-07-2026, 12:41 PM)J_Voy Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I can see how this could be mistaken for 'M', but the reason I believe it's 'N' is that capital 'N' was common in medieval charms, a short form of the Latin word 'Nomen', meaning name, which is why is stood for the specific person's name.
It is very similar to the minuscule m. Although you're probably right that it's some kind of abbreviation or special notation, because the author writes m and n differently.
ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.poxleber is more of a swear word. In any case, the author of this text wanted this spell to be meaningful. He may have triedYou are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. or restore the text, but he ended up making a mistake.
I personally don't believe it is a swear, as the final three words of the marginalia, 'ſo nim gaſmich' translate to 'then take goat's milk', i find it much more likely that a charm would first say to take a goat's liver, then goat's milk. I personally also don't believe it could be a decipherment attempt as handwriting analysis puts the marginalia between 1400-1425, so personally, I believe that it was most likely one of the original scribes.
Quote:By the way, this is interesting...
I don't entirely understand what you mean by this, how exactly is me pointing out when when writing '+' in one stroke, it ends up looking like 4, interesting? Could you please clarify on this?
Quote:It is very similar to the minuscule m. Although you're probably right that it's some kind of abbreviation or special notation, because the author writes m and n differently.
Perfect that we agree on this, uppercase N was most commonly used in medieval charms as a name, which is why it is accepted by every source I can find that it stands for Latin 'nomen'.
Has there ever been a written reference to “gasmilch” = “goat's milk”?
I know
gaißmilch
geyßmilch
gaizmilch
gaißmülch
gaißmilich
but not “gasmich”....
(22-07-2026, 04:13 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Well, it is not a meaningful German spell because it has no meaning in any German dialect, known or imagined.
[..] But the words that he got just don't make sense, in any language...
Yes, there is nothing German within these f 116 words; no native German-speaker finds anything understandable in it.
If it is "clearly German": why can nobody read something senseful in it...?
The german-said "sequence" is just 'so nim gas mich', which is not validating any German:
"so" and "nim" could be parts of nearly all other languages,
and it is very extending to take "gas" for "Geiß/Geiss" (goat) at all; there must be very few dialects that skip the L in "Milch" (milk), to produce something like "mich" and still mean "milk" instead of "me".
(22-07-2026, 12:54 PM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.poxleber is more of a swear word.[..]
Nope. You are overestimating the range of German swearwords. Never heard of something coming even nearly to that.
There
are several "animal parts" working in our language, as 'Hasenfuss', 'Hasenherz' (rabbits foot and heart, both meaning 'coward') or 'Rattenschwanz' (rat's tails, meaning a long line of unpleasant consequences), but I never heared of animal livers being involved in such expressions.
By the way, 'pox' is also very stretched for 'Bock', such mis-take did not happen very often in early written Germen.
Here again: why should that be German at all? the 'p'-type letter is very similar to era-like writing of English 'the' or 'ye', looking the same.
At all, this has not much to do with "Chinese theory", should maybe added to f 116 discussions.
I find a lot of it easy to understand, and I’m German. I’m sure there’s a lot of German/Bavarian on page 116v.
"So nim" xxx "mich" (evtl "o") is clear German—and no, that’s not the case in every language.
In the Middle Ages, offal was considered “unclean” and was, of course, very often used as swear words. (Saublase, Kuttelfleck, Sauwanst, Hundgedärm, etc.).
The spelling “Poxleber” as “Bocksleber” is attested
It's hard to disentangle the You are not allowed to view links.
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Login to view. discussion from this thread. As long as stolfi doesn't mind, we can discuss it here, since it also involves his retracing theory.
Some clarifications:
- poxleber as a curse is not the best reading. As I explained elsewhere, this word is only attested in much later carnival plays, by ONE specific author, uttered only by despicable characters. Also, the curse would have been of the most vulgar kind imaginable, the kind of language that would get you banned from online discussions. Poxleber has been attested earlier as an ingredient, a piece of meat. This has to be the preferential reading.
- gasmich has NOT been attested as goat milk, so this remains shaky. However, it has not been attested as any of the other suggested readings either. With gaismilch, the issue is the unattested spelling. The other options are also unattested in that form, but on top of that they are syntactically questionable, to say the least.
(22-07-2026, 02:18 PM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I find a lot of it easy to understand, and I’m German. [..]
The spelling “Poxleber” as “Bocksleber” is attested
Fine, let‘s begin:
- what does „vinen/vmen“ mean? (directly after „poxleber“. Unreadable? Try the following.)
- what does „anchiton/michiton“ mean? Which language is that?
- what does „oladaba?“ mean?
- what does „mnlie?“ mean?
- what does „re/te/ce“ mean?
- what does „teve/tere/ceve/cere“ mean?
…
- what is „six/fix“, „mamx“ and „vix/rix“?
- what does „abia“ mean?
You understand that all? As what?
From when exactly is the (printed) notation of „poxleber“, where is the original?
(22-07-2026, 02:18 PM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view."So nim" xxx "mich" (evtl "o") is clear German—and no, that’s not the case in every language.
You don‘t have to xxx the ˋgas´, this is one of the few clearly visible and recognizable spellings at this page.
And this word clearly makes not the slightest sense at that position, only after bending it somehow to Gais or whatever. And even then, you have to bend the following word also to give any weird meaning to it all.
You really mean „so“ and „nim“ cannot occur in many other languages?
Enlighten us.
(22-07-2026, 01:13 PM)J_Voy Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I personally also don't believe it could be a decipherment attempt as handwriting analysis puts the marginalia between 1400-1425, so personally, I believe that it was most likely one of the original scribes.
Perhaps someone decided to see if they could decipher the recipe
I can imagine a scene like this (I'm not making any claims, just having fun): Perhaps the peculiarities of Currier B and its differences from Currier A were due to the author's incorrect encryption of the text. The author of the manuscript decided to approach their subject, read what they had encrypted, and encourage them to attempt to decipher it. Realizing their failure, they became despondent...
(22-07-2026, 01:13 PM)J_Voy Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I don't entirely understand what you mean by this, how exactly is me pointing out when when writing '+' in one stroke, it ends up looking like 4, interesting? Could you please clarify on this?
Perhaps this explains a little of the essence of the
q. I like the interpretation of it as a cross better than the identification with the four.
(22-07-2026, 01:51 PM)Stefan Wirtz_2 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Nope. You are overestimating the range of German swearwords. Never heard of something coming even nearly to that.
You know better
They used to swear in different ways. In fact, it was defined as a swear word in the corresponding discussion