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| [Just for fun] State of the Voynich 2016 |
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Posted by: Koen G - 01-01-2017, 04:10 PM - Forum: Voynich Talk
- Replies (44)
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One of the things one learns (preferably) soon after entering the online Voynich world, is that speculation is a bad guide. We only speak confidently about those things for which we believe there is evidence, and make sure to express our uncertainty when there isn't.
Speculating is fun, though, when it is clearly separated from evidence-based analyses. I thought it would be interesting to determine, by a set of questions, which beliefs are currently (i.e. at the beginning of 2017) held by the community.
Then, at the end of 2017, we answer the same questions again. Like that we can see how a new year of research has influenced our personal beliefs on the one hand, and those of the community on the other. I'd find it very interesting to be able to keep a finger at the pulse of the community. Which ideas are held, and do these evolve over time?
Rules - Everybody who was a member of the forum in 2016 is encouraged to participate.
- For Yes/No questions, answer the most likely. If you give "yes" 51% chance, then answer "yes".
- For the few open questions, again answer what you find most likely. If you really can't think of anything, "I don't know" is allowed as well.
- This thread will be closed at the end of January. At the end of the year or in January 2018, we will run the questions again and see if anything changed.
- Please answer in a numbered list!!! to avoid confusion.
- If you want to participate but don't want your answers posted publicly, you can always PM your list to me and I will post it in a thread in the mods forum (for control). Like that only the mods will ever see your answers. Sharing your answers here in this thread is encouraged of course.
- The more participants, the better: we want the entire community to be reflected. So don't hesitate to participate!
Yes/No questions::
- Does the text contain any meaning?
- Has the text been purposefully enciphered to conceal its meaning?
- Do the images match the text?
- Are the plants meant to refer to real plants?
- Is the majority of the plants exotic from a European perspective (Asian, African, American...)?
- Have the images been made ambiguous or otherwise strange to conceal their true meaning?
- Is alchemy an important part of the manuscript?
- Is astronomy and/or astrology an important part of the MS?
- Is medicine an important part of the MS?
- Is the MS the creative product of one mind, i.e. an author? (Taking into account the possibility that one or more scribes helped to fashion the physical manuscript)
- Is the MS authored by a known historical figure?
- Will we ever be able to read the MS?
- Will there be any breakthrough in Voynich studies in 2017?
- Is the MS any kind of hoax?
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Open questions:
- In a few words, what is quire 13 about? (bathing, anatomy, angels......)
- In a few words, what is quire 20 about?
- If we were able to read the script, which language(s) would we read, if any?
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| Marci's memory |
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Posted by: ReneZ - 31-12-2016, 12:03 PM - Forum: Provenance & history
- Replies (23)
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Koen wrote elsewhere:
Quote:If it is indeed true that Marci had forgotten almost everything only one and a half year after he wrote that letter, then this is important evidence, and it should concern everyone genuinely interested in the truth.
This part of history has been researched extensively and most of the evidence is freely available and well known. Other items of interest are not so well known, e.g. the reasonably extensive literature on Marci, the text of his last will, ...
That Marci's memory was defective in 1665 is clearly contradicted by evidence. Most of this can be found on my web site. (I have always made a point of avoiding reference to my web site in every second post, but here it is the most appropriate thing to do).
The letter from Kinner that has been mentioned says a bit more than just that Marci lost memory of nearly everything. From Philip Neal's translation:
Quote:Dominus Marcus has lost his memory of nearly everything but still remembers you. He very officially bids me salute you in his name and he wishes to know through me whether you have yet proved an Oedipus in solving that book which he sent via the Father Provincial last year and what mysteries you think it may contain. It will be a great solace to him if you are able to satisfy his curiosity on this point.
Maybe it doesn't look so bad after all.
What also wasn't mentioned is that one year earlier, just a few months after Marci sent the book and the letter, there was already a letter from Kinner to Kircher with basically the same question, but no reference at all to any memory problems of Marci.
Of course this problem had already been considered and analysed in the several publications of this part of history. The very brief summary You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. :
Quote:As concerns Marci, the Voynich MS was something that had deeply interested him (and his close friend as we shall see below) since many decades. All details in the Marci letter that could be verified have turned out to be correct: his inheritance of books from the previous owner of the MS, the fact that this previous owner had written to Kircher, and the fact that Dr.Raphael was a tutor to Ferdinand III You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.. We may safely trust that he correctly remembered Mnišovský's words.
Many of the things that Marci writes in his letter to Kircher are corroborated by independent references. His memory is perfectly in order.
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f57v idea Cracking it |
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Posted by: stellar - 31-12-2016, 05:20 AM - Forum: Analysis of the text
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Some folios are missing which may have been wheels like You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. or abstract tables.
Setup using the 57v cipher Wheel:
Condition:
1) Invented language for the VMS.
Condition:
2) The cipher wheel in folio 57v in which four dials are set to different lengths along with four different concentric circles.
a) Yes, you have the regular cipher wheel of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. with all the VMS glyph s as in its current form in 2d, but the trick is you have to make it 3d.
Down Side How to build the missing wheel? So when you turn the dials and concentric circles words are formed mapped to the VMS You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.!
Hypothetical:
The missing wheel may have had numbers assigned to it with a alphabet, but how do you make a wheel with the most used affix's and suffix's and normal letters so when you turn the dials to desired positions VMS glyph s are appropriately mapped to the VMS words or glyph s? At the same time, how do you make it not so obvious as part of the Cipher but to the Author very easy to instantly reconstruct his own cipher wheels?
Furthermore, extra missing wheels would not be placed in order in the VMS, but clues would point the way to how numbers and words were equal. The missing wheels would use abstract information to disguise itself; as Julian would say maybe a puzzle within a puzzle! These missing wheels are formed like abstract Pi Charts with numbers and glyphs at various locations. Maybe even 90° cutaways and charts with various numbers and perhaps VMS art work as in pipes to point a trail of how to use the dials of the missing wheels that you build in 3d.
What I'm getting at is someone took the missing wheels out of the VMS which look like or connect to to folio You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. either abstract or complex. Or this idea next.
[IDEA]
[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]The outer ring of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. contains about 51 VMS vords combined in total with a small set of VMS glyph's. [/font]
[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]Next Ring in from outer contains 46 VMS glyphs that are normal! [/font][font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]Do you notice the one abstract glyph that has a Right Angle with a degree sign and open triangle at 45[/font][font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif][font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]°pointed down. This maybe suggesting a dial to point at 45[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]° and the other to 90[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]° and when you close the dials the glyph's make sense; then as you close them together at one degree or degrees to each glyph. Just a thought but how to apply a trigonometric function? The dials are used to form words along with Geometry? By the way 45 and 90 = You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[/font][/font][/font][/font]
Next Ring closing in on the 4 people are 30 vms words and some glyph s combined
Next Ring to the 4 people equals 31 glyph s combined with vords.
The total of sole glyphs and vords in the rings is 158 which equals You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. not counting the vords next insided circle with the 4 people. or the very outer single vord and if you count the total number of these words its a 9. SEE SOLOMON'S Key below.
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This read may contain what we need!
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Make a 3d map of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. then place four dials on it and make the four circles which turn too. Next use Euclidean Geometry or Trigonometry for the 4 similar wavy P glyph s as degree markers that are set to 90[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]°; then use the four different dial lengths and turn them. You see the three empty 360[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]° spaces, fill that with numbers and Latin letters A=1 through Z=26 which follow ordinal Gematria. Next add some common Latin affix's and suffix's as-well as English in another circle, but you have to place them in there at what degrees? We could have 3 different languages so the count would be 72 letters of the Latin alphabet + what number of compound words, added next to VMS vords, in the empty circles placed at certain glyph or degree markers. Now spin the wheel and the dials and play the lotto then look at where the dials and wheels end up. Do they make words correlated to VMS words my guess is no that is like a You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. test. So now make a word if you can then look it up in this calculator. Deliberately point the dials through the VMS glyphs to Latin letters and the dials that go through a VMS glyph or word which equals a common English affix, suffix or Latin letter. [/font][/font][/font]
[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif][font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif][font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]Or just go to my Cipher and place the Latin letters and or compound words in the empty circles of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. next to Glyph s and vords which the dial reads the same as my cipher with associated Gematria Number as in A=1 through Z=26.[/font][/font][/font]
[font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif][font=Roboto, arial, sans-serif]You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[/font][/font]
Quote:Chart and Sigils from a Greek Key of Solomon ~15th century Sacred Geometry Spiritual Symbolism, Key Of Solomon, Solomon Seals Symbols, Solomon Magick, Keys
![[Image: 2a2ab25e9407f888367de842330b19c1.jpg]](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/2a/2a/b2/2a2ab25e9407f888367de842330b19c1.jpg)
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| f57v: A new positional confirmation |
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Posted by: R. Sale - 30-12-2016, 09:22 PM - Forum: Imagery
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In a recent posting, an image of the Zodiac man contained certain commentary with words such as 'cholera' and 'melancholia', in which the final letter 'a' had a significant tail underneath that much resembled the shape of the number '9'. This is also a shape that has a similarity to one of the VMs symbols, sometimes transcribed as '9', but is also found in the 4 x 17 Symbol Sequence of VMs f 57v, as Symbol #15, transcribed as EVA letter 'y'.
In prior investigations of the 4 x 17 sequence, [Triple Convergence], I had suggest that there are three ways to interpret the fifth symbol of the sequence. They are 1) as the Greek letter lambda, 2) as the medieval form of the number '7', and 3) as the Roman numeral V = 5, inverted.
In addition, each of these interpretations is confirmed by a form of objective placement. In the example of the fifth symbol as lambda, the first symbol of the sequence, EVA letter 'o', interpreted as the Greek letter omicron, is placed in the proper sequential relationship as it would be in the Greek alphabet, with three symbols in between, if reading Greek from right to left.
Now, if one takes Symbol #15, with its various interpretations, and substitutes a potential interpretation as the letter 'a' and then takes the Greek alphabet as set down by the letters omicron and lambda, and then continues to move onward to the right through the Greek alphabet toward alpha, well, guess what? [Bingo, bango, bongo!] The count lands on Symbol #15. A new objective, position-based confirmation of the Greek alphabet interpretation.
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| Documents and historical enquiry. |
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Posted by: Diane - 30-12-2016, 07:41 PM - Forum: Provenance & history
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If it is about the manuscript, it's fair comment.
I recently pointed out, in another place, that among the numerous reasons for doubting that Rudolf ever saw or owned the manuscript is that when Marcus Marci mentioned Mnishovsky's rumour, Marci was already suffering from a condition which affected his memory.
This is known because a mutual friend (Kinner) wrote to Kircher just 18 months later, saying then that Marci " has forgotten almost everything".
I wasn't entirely surprised by the blog-holder's lack of interest in this question of how much weight should be placed on a particular seventeenth century source, or even in the philosophical issue of how much weight should be placed on any particular source.
The response was one all-too-common these days, and which we've seen employed ad.nauseum since the first mailing list closed: it sees the actual information or issue ignored, and all responses aimed only at demeaning the researcher - as a means to ensure that the disturbing evidence, information or comment will be ignored and some pet theory continue to be believed.
In this case, the ad hominem attack on me began with an entirely ludicrous argument that by referring to Marci's condition (as documented by Kinner's letter) I was "attacking" Marcus Marci - who has been dead for several centuries. The fantasy was elaborated: this supposed 'attack' was motivated by some 'ideological agenda' - a product partly of the blog-holder's fertile imagination, but mostly the result of a pretty determined effort by earlier parties to spread the idea that my involvement in this study has some devious motive. (The fact is that I was asked to comment on it, because I'm a specialist in comparative iconography and -analysis).
Of course it is funny - until you recall that just this sort of combined mindlessness and dedication to maintaining the old ideas is what history tells us leads to the worst excesses of anti-intellectualism.
We don't burn books so much, but we do (outside this forum) see propagandist methods used to have dissenters portrayed as "bad people" and then constantly flamed. The myth of the dissenter as morally evil is an appropriately superstitious and medieval idea, but we ourselves are supposed to live in more rational times.
I'd hate to see the "Ignore and flame" disease infect this forum too, so as preventative measure, I propose we adopt the following as a personal yardstick:
If it is about the manuscript, or about the history of its study, it's fair comment.
and conversely:
If it aims only to degrade another member - if the message is not about the manuscript it's off-topic.
Agree?
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| Relation between text study and imagery study |
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Posted by: Koen G - 29-12-2016, 09:37 PM - Forum: Voynich Talk
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This is a bit of a philosophical question: what comes first, the imagery or the text? Should we try to understand the images better first, or try to crack the text first? Which one will offer the easiest entrance? Which one will help us understand the other better?
There are some arguments that can shoot this thread down, so I would like to get them out of the way already. Let's hypothesize that: - the text does contain some meaning (not necessarily plain text)
- the text and the images do belong together
- the document is genuine
This is not necessarily true, but in my opinion very likely. So let's assume for a moment that the text is meaningful and arranged in a way that it complements the imagery.
---
When I started studying the manuscript - after having read some introductory material - I first focused on the text. With some naive enthusiasm, which you probably recognize. I soon realized that there were just too many unknowns to have a go at it without any foothold, so I gradually shifted my attention to the imagery. I am now growing more convinced that a profound understanding of the imagery is required before we can figure out the text. Studying the images can teach us:- Which cultural background(s) are present, and hence which languages we may expect
- When the imagery originated and when it was altered, and hence, again, which languages we may expect
- Which subject matter we might look for in the text - specifically in the case of labels.
I notice though, that quite a number of people study mostly or even exclusively the text. So I wonder what your philosophy is about this issue. Can we understand one without the other? Do you focus on one because you think it offers the best chance of a breakthrough? Or rather because you feel more at home with one or the other?
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| patterns counting letters in vords |
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Posted by: Davidsch - 28-12-2016, 09:21 PM - Forum: Analysis of the text
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A while back I counted the letters in vords and also tried to identify the "rhytm" in the words (specific letterpatterns)
needless to say that I failed in finding anything worthwhile.
But, as a mindgame I regularly go over my past theories and think about improvements.
Today I was asking myself this question: Is it possible if you count the letters in every vord, to find a pattern?
This is useful, because when the text contains a cipher, it is very probable that it has a fixed (block) length.
I am talking about the text, not specifically about the labels.
For example:
* every vord has an even amount of letters. like 64246228
* every vord has an odd amount of letters
* every significant vord -length is repeated once like 66 44 22 32648 66 44 21684 22 44
* ...
In order to do this you will have to make decisions on how to count several letters. For example you could count a gallow as 1 or 2 or count Sh as 3 or 1 or 2 etc.
A quick exercise showed me this is not so simple as it looks and should not be waved immediately.
Perhaps there are other possible patterns.
If so, we can try to find a way to rule everything out by writing a method that check every possible method.
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| HOW VOYNICH WAS WRITTEN |
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Posted by: Wolfgang99 - 28-12-2016, 08:58 AM - Forum: Theories & Solutions
- Replies (112)
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NEW VIDEO!!! VOYNICH LETTERS CONTAINER SYSTEM & STENCILS WORKING
here it is!
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Maybe now you also have understood how Voynich was written...
Now all my video have ENGLISH SUBTITLES, SOTTOTITOLI IN ITALIANO, SUBTÍTULOS EN ESPAÑOL!:
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I did my bit, now you have to do your's
there should be someone who can access Voynich and can take and share a close photo!
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| [Copy] Discussion: Earliest copies of the MS |
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Posted by: ReneZ - 27-12-2016, 09:32 AM - Forum: Voynich Talk
- Replies (9)
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(Copied from You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.by KG)
Ernest Lillie wrote:
Quote:Anything you can provide will be much appreciated. I've long hoped that someone, at some time, had either photographed or hand copied the now obscured bits of "9 Rosette" --- like the above mentioned label and the worn out gutter between the S and SE disks.
I just scanned the relevant pages of the Th.Petersen hand transcription, and realised that it includes only 8 of the 9 circles. The upper right one is missing. I will need to go through the original at home to see if it is there. After that, I will post a link. Note, however, that unfortunately the quality is particularly bad for this part of the MS.
A few words about early sources: Voynich made photostats of the entire MS, in B/W. Many of these are still preserved in the Beinecke, and are probably the earliest copies. A few of them are on glass plates, still preserved, a technique that people interested in old photography can probably explain.
The Th.Petersen hand transcription is also very early, but later than these.
Another early record is the "Friedman copy", which may derive from photostats before the Th.Petersen transcription. It is also preserved in the Marshall library, and photocopies of it have been circulated. Friedman provided copies of these to his contacts, and one of these has been digitised. I have not looked at it for ages. I may still have it. It was not better than the copyflo, as far as I remember.
That last item is a printout of a very early microfilm made by the Beinecke, I don't know exactly when, but certainly before 1976.
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![[Image: Beatus-of-Osma-map.jpg]](http://www.medievalists.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Beatus-of-Osma-map.jpg)