The Voynich Ninja

What comments does anyone have about the four figures sitting at the top of VMs Pisces? If someone could post an image, that would be great. Feel free to wander in the rest of this illustration. I have my opinions, but don't want to sway the initial response.

I don't know about the four figures, but two of them (those closest to 12 o'clock) are remarkable in that they both sit in tubs with the same ornament. A quick glance suggests to me that it is not common, is it? So why the two tubs are the same? I can suggest the following explanation: The artist began the circle with the right figure, and then proceeded clockwise (alternatively, he could begin with the keft figure and then proceed counter-clockwise). Then when he came to the last figure, he had to use the same ornament as the one he began with, because some pre-defined sequence or pattern of ornaments was in place, and it suggested this very ornament for this last figure.

So what is that pattern, if any?

Coincidentally I wrote a post about these patterns some days ago, comparing them to patterns used in Ptolemaic Egyptian art. This is relevant to me, since I believe much of the MS's imagery to be the result of a series of copies going all the way back to Greco-Roman Egypt.

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The gist of it is that these patterns were found in statuettes of the goddess Bastet. Her statuettes were exceptional because often her dress was more carefully ornamented than the goddess herself. We are not sure why this is the case, but the pattern seems to suggest that the dress is very ornate - a certain degree of luxury, perhaps.


I am currently writing about astronomy, so this was just a short aside which I did not explore in depth. 

IF there is a link with Bastet (who, again, was known by the Greeks and Romans in the first centuries CE, so not some obscure Egyptian deity), then the associated aspects are:
- protection
- fertility

Which might explain why it is placed upon these figures, marking, perhaps, the point where the girl becomes a woman or something like that.

I do not think there is any link with medieval heraldry.

Anton,

Thanks for your reply. Indeed, you are correct, in part. The two top figures sit in tubs with very similar patterns of vertical stripes -  the same pattern for all intents and purposes IMO. But what you suggest, going all the way around in search of fulfilling some complex, undefined methodology of arrangement is complicated and unrewarding at best. Why not start by looking for simple patterns that are clearly attested by the illustration? The simplest pattern that I can suggest is pairing. And at the top of Pisces, we have, as you suggest, a pair of very similar patterns.

Now, reexamine the illustration in more detail. To either side of the pair of striped patterns, there is a tub with a stippled pattern.  Now there are an inner pair and and an outer pair, based of tub patterns - a pair of pairs. Look at the figures in these four tubs. From what I can tell of basic anatomy, there are a pair of women to the right and a pair of men to the left. Arranged by gender and tub pattern, we now have a pair of couples, male and female.

This is a subtle, almost {[always successfully]} subliminal introduction of the concept of pairs. If by chance the idea of pairing was missed or considered to be irrelevant, it has also been introduced a second time in the central medallions of the first five houses of the VMs Zodiac -  a series of images in which not only are the individual houses all paired, but there are corresponding pairs between the houses. Thus a pair of aquatic animals (fish) in Pisces and (crayfish) in Cancer combine to make a pair of pairs, a pair of land animals in Aries and also in Taurus, and so on.

So the first idea introduced by the four figures is pairing. [Basic pattern recognition based upon the simplest of patterns plainly exhibited.] [[ And... apparently slipping by under our proverbial noses.]]

The second idea to be introduced by these figures and their tub patterns, though more weakly in these first four examples, is that of heraldry. A pattern of alternating vertical stripes corresponds to the heraldic example of a paly. And moving a bit further clockwise, if the pattern of chevrons fails to suggest the possibility of heraldry, perhaps that is a shortcoming on the part of the investigator, not a flaw in the illustration. Other heraldic identifications exist in the outer circle of Pisces. Further examples of pairing exist between heraldic examples on Pisces and others on the Aries pages.

Now to further combine these two ideas, pairing and heraldry, and to propose an investigation into the possibility of historical correspondence in VMs White Aries.
.

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Koen,

I really like the first one. It's a ringer.
The second is indeterminate. There are a limited number of ways to show a pattern of alternating colored stripes in situations where colored pigments are not in use.
The third one doesn't work. The VMs shows a pattern of chevrons, the Egyptian example shows a pattern where little 'chevrons' are used, but the overall pattern itself is stripes, not chevrons.

The potential interpretation of correspondence with medieval heraldry is shown by the use of alternating vertical, horizontal and diagonal stripes, alternating stripes in the chevron pattern, the use of concentric circles, and the use of the scale pattern, all of which have closely corresponding, standard examples and specific terminology in medieval heraldry. Plus the semy of roundels, the use of engrailed lines and so on. All from a single source and demonstrated on a single page of the VMs.

Interesting that you should see influences of the Classical past so well, and yet not see what for the VMs author would have been the medieval present, which would in many situations under European influence, for an educated person of that time, certainly include the knowledge of medieval armorial heraldry.

Of course, the way I see things the medieval scribe was not much more than a human copy machine, perhaps just for the sake of preservation. They often copied for a patron, so it is likely that they had no idea what it was they were copying. In that case, what the copyists knew and did not know is only relevant for example when looking at possible misinterpretations.

R. Sale:

Yes I know that you've been developing this concept of pairing, although I confess I haven't followed it in detail - partly because I don't delve deep into the VMS imagery due to the lack of knowledge in respective areas.

I'd like to note though that there are two kinds of stippled patterns in Pisces (or so it seems):
- the one with dots shaped into vertical parallel lines
- the one with dots shaped into horizontal parallel lines

The tub clockwise next to the right striped tub is an example of the former (dots-vertical), and the yet next tub is an example of the latter (dots-horizontal).

Now, the tub counterclockwise to the left striped tub looks like dots-horizontal. So there is no pairing - one tub in the alleged "outer" pair is dots-horizontal, the other is dots-vertical.

Koen,

As I said, I particularly like the first comparison you made. So how do you propose that the pattern made its way from Pharaonic Egypt to 1400s+ at a place somewhere - possibly in Europe? Obviously the Romans looted Egypt, and left much of it in Rome. And clearly there was a parade of literate individuals through Rome, having to do with the church and and other events. But if it cannot be asserted that an educated person of the time was knowledgeable about something as chronologically current to the VMs creation and widely known across various nations and languages as the medieval science of heraldry, how can it be the original creator of this document is so wise in the ways of ancient Egyptian patterns? How can the VMs author be so wise in the obscure, and so stupid in the obvious? It doesn't make sense. You have suggest that such difficulties may arise from problems in the transmission system - shall we say. The problem of the sloppy copy.

Let me suggest an alternative. The author has intentionally obfuscated certain material in the illustrations. Not eliminated; not contradicted, but intentionally disguised images that can be historically validated to make them more difficult to recognize. The modern investigator does not know the heraldry-based references being made. And therefore recognition does not occur.

&&&

Anton,

Follow your interests - is my recommendation. But if I may reply. Dots is dots, I always say. Is your interpretation of orientation a total full-stop to further investigation? Perhaps it we borrow Koen's suggestion of the sloppy copy, it might be assumed that the unthinking copyist didn't give a sniff which way the dots were aligned.

If you think that something like this is sufficient to completely derail an investigation, well, I hate to be the one to tell you..., but, you known the VMs illustration of a violet? One of my favorites. Well the flowers are all upside down, like inverted. So that invalid orientation totally discredits any identification same as with the dots. After that the whole botany thing gets much worse real fast IMO.

Heraldry has a set of rules well in place before the creation of the VMs and little changed over centuries - with one relevant, modern exception which is the institution of the counting of parts in the paly, bendy, barry patterns. What set of rules did botany have in the era of the VMs creation?

The part of Egypt's history I think is relevant is the one when Greeks and Romans sat on the Egyptian throne. Starting around 300 BCE. When I show older examples, that is because they remained more or less the same throughout the Greco-Roman period as well. Still in the first centuries CE, the Egyptian capital of Alexandria with its Library was considered a center for learning, and many scholars from Europe spent time there.


As far as the transmission of the imagery goes, I largely follow Diane's opinion. The Voynich images do not look especially Greek, nor Roman, nor Egyptian, nor European. They can only be explained as hybrid forms, which is to be expected if material is maintained and copied during 1500 years. Diane thinks this material was maintained with a great amount of care because it remained useful in intercontinental trade and navigation. The manuscript looks totally weird because it shows images that were originally Hellenistic, but copied by later cultures with their own sensitivities and taboos and so on. 

Everybody's first instinct is to think of MS Beinecke 408 as a strange medieval work. Mine was as well, and Diane's was as well if I'm not mistaken. And that's only normal: it is an item made in 15thC Europe, after all. But a large part of the manuscript industry was copying copying copying. And if you payed some professionals to copy every line of a weird book, they would - though some things would probably have to be filtered out to not cause offense.

So when I show a correspondence between an Egyptian pattern and a Voynich one, it has to be seen like that: I think the images originated, for example, in Alexandria, got altered by in-between cultural sensitivities, and were copied line-by-line onto MS Beinecke 408's vellum. (this is only about the imagery - I'm leaving out the text because that would make it way too complicated)