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| Voynichese Phonotactics |
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Posted by: Emma May Smith - 22-09-2016, 02:29 PM - Forum: Analysis of the text
- Replies (39)
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In another thread a discussion was started about the phonotactics of Voynichese. Basically, where do characters occur within words and syllables and how might this reflect an underlying language. There was particular reference to that fact that [k, t] seldom occur at the end of words (the same can be said for [ch, sh]) and whether that might be a realistic linguistic feature. I've reposted my response below, and am keen to discus the matter broadly and fully.
Ok, let's get a little technical.
You can think of a syllable as having three parts:
1) onset: this is everything which comes before a vowel;
2) nucleus: this is the vowel or any sound which acts as a vowel;
3) coda: this is everything which comes after a vowel.
Now, in terms of consonants, these will typically appear in the onset or coda (though they can form the nucleus). Most languages have both a) restrictions on how many consonants can be in an onset or coda, and b) the order in which they appear. Some languages completely forbid clusters—that is, more than one consonant in either onset or coda position—but if they allow more than one they have a tendency to order them in the same way. Basically, certain sounds must be nearer the vowel than others. It's based on a quality known as sonority, but we shan't bother with explaining that except to acknowledge it exists.
There is a tendency to allow onsets to be more complex than codas. Typically all or most consonants can appear there and some clusters are allowed. Codas are more often either empty or have one of a restricted set of consonants, with clusters forbidden. Of course, many languages which flout these rules do exist, for example English, which allows clusters of three consonants in the onset and four in the coda, but it is not typical. (Indeed, Indo-European languages as a whole are typically more complex in their syllable structure than the average language.)
So, when we look at the structure of Voynich words and see that [r, l] are very commonly found at the end but [k, t] are not, what we are observing (ASSUMING the surface patterns are linguistic) is a fact about what the underlying language permits in syllable codas. We can explain this by saying that [r, l] must have some phonological difference to [k, t]. Were you to suggest that [r, l] were nasals and [k, t] plosives, then you would have a similar situation to a number of languages which forbid obstruents but permit sonorants in codas.
Likewise, the observation that [k, t] often appear at or near the beginning of words can be explained in a similar way. If you believe that [k, t] are plosives, then they have low sonority and typically always appear at the beginning of an onset before sounds with a higher sonority (sibilants are sometimes exceptional, so /s/ can appear in places like in English 'skip' and 'stone'). Those strings which appear before [k, t] in Voynich words: [o, qo, cho, che, cheo, etc] can be explained as separate syllables. The task of researchers is then not one of explaining how [k, t] work, but why the syllables within a word are structured as they are.
Sorry if this answer is a bit long-winded, but hopefully it is helpful to thinking about the possible linguistic features of Voynich words. It is my belief that a linguistic analysis, ignoring the origins of the script, the illustrations, and even the potential meaning of the text, could well solve the Voynich manuscript. At the very least it provides us with a framework for assessing both the text and potential solutions.
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| Voynichese: a forgotten turkic-aramaic-persian language? |
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Posted by: escape - 21-09-2016, 07:19 PM - Forum: Analysis of the text
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Hello all! I'd started my research in Voynichese 2 years ago and have got some results!
I've chosen the different way to crack this cipher, although it wasn't a cipher...
I've found the five basic elements on the upper of f77r page - there was 5 images of them, blowing out of their fittings and inscription of each. Then I've started to finding and comparing words with the same meaning and sounding in the languages of all over the world.
And what came into result - just see below:
![[Image: X_J5QvzSVZ8.jpg]](https://pp.vk.me/c636122/v636122792/2e0da/X_J5QvzSVZ8.jpg)
Then, a very hard work with a letter-sound combinations and a pile of dictionaries allow me to obtain an approximate sounding of the almost all voynichese symbols:
![[Image: VuvQbZg196Q.jpg]](https://pp.vk.me/c636122/v636122792/2e0c7/VuvQbZg196Q.jpg)
The next thing i've found - the moon-calendar on a page f67r2:
1. 4o*H*oca2 - [ FOTOI[font=sans-serif]ӘR / ФОТОИӘР ] - foto + year. Täz[font=sans-serif]äyil in Turkmenian means 'pure year'' - new year;[/font][/font]
2. 8rco8a2 - [ [font=sans-serif]ĞIO[font=sans-serif]Ƣ[font=sans-serif]ӘR / [/font][/font]ҖӨҒӘР ] - ??;[/font]
3. 9Sax8ax - [ AB[font=sans-serif]ӘŞ[font=sans-serif]Ƣ[font=sans-serif]Ә[font=sans-serif]Ş / [/font][/font][/font][/font]АБӘШҒӘШ ] - the word derived from Turkmen/Uzbek 'beshgesh' that means 'a gift'. There are a variants in another Turkic: peshgesh, peshkesh (Chagatai);
4. 9*H*o8ax - [ ATO[font=sans-serif][font=sans-serif]Ƣ[/font][font=sans-serif][font=sans-serif]Ә[/font][/font]Ş / АТОҒӘШ ] - ??;[/font]
5. *H*ox8aiiU - [ TO[font=sans-serif]Ş[font=sans-serif]Ƣ[font=sans-serif]ӘÑD /[/font][/font][/font] ТОШҒӘҢД ] - Probably, from a city named Tashkent (Uzbek's capital). This word in Uzbek means 'a stone city' and sounds like Toshkänt.
6. o*H*a289 - [ OT[font=sans-serif]ӘRƢA / ОТӘРҒА ] - ??;[/font]
7. rco8axcj - [ JIO[font=sans-serif]Ƣ[font=sans-serif][font=sans-serif][font=sans-serif]Ә[/font][/font][/font][/font]Ş* / ХӨҒӘШ* ] - ??;
8. 9*H*rco8x9 - [ ATHIO[font=sans-serif]ƢŞA / АЦӨҒША ] - ??;[/font]
9. or*H*c9S - [ OJTIAB / ОХТИАБ ] - Clear here. But none the calendar have a 9th month - october in the world. Russian "oktiabr' ";
10. 9*H*oH*a2 - [ ATOK[font=sans-serif]ӘR / АТОКӘР ] - ??;[/font]
11. o*H*oxo2 - [ OTO[font=sans-serif]ŞOR / ОТОШОР ] - derived from word o*H*ox - [ OTOŞ / ОТОШ ] - Fire, warm, hot. Atash, otash, atish, atesh, etc in other Turkic;[/font]
12. oH*o8a2 - [ OKO[font=sans-serif]Ƣ[font=sans-serif]ӘR / [/font]ОКОҒӘР ] - probably - ukuger. Google gave me a phrase "yal takibasu ukuger-un siinesiin tiilebesii" with no translation;[/font]
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| f17v |
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Posted by: Koen G - 21-09-2016, 03:50 PM - Forum: Imagery
- Replies (26)
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I have mentioned this some time ago in another thread, but that was not dedicated to f17v, so I decided to make a new thread about it.
After letting it rest for a while, I revisited the curiously shaped tendril on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and decided to write a blog post about it (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.).
First of all, it is clear that this plant is a vine (any kind of creeping or climbing plant, probably not grape vines). This seems to be what most, if not all researchers agree on, with for example Dana Scott having identified it as wild buckwheat. I'm not sure which kind of vine it represents, but I have made this composite image to show some examples I think closely resemble its parts:
![[Image: comp.jpg?w=616]](https://herculeaf.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/comp.jpg?w=616)
What strikes me as strange, though, is that the tendril does not spiral, but rather kind of waves its way down. Tendrils generally do not behave this way. They will curl like the cable of an old telephone, or spiral up on themselves like a snail shell.
![[Image: 3732145438_a15b9a1d5c_z.jpg]](https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3533/3732145438_a15b9a1d5c_z.jpg)
Additionally, they are often rather regular in their curls or undulations, while the tendril in the Voynich plant behaves very erratically but, as far as we can see, does not curl.
As usual, this strange aspect does not appear to represent a botanical property, but at least as I believe, contains a symbolic image. In this case, a face in profile. It is rendered with such detail that we can even say which kind of face: an older man with a bald head, moustache, pointy beard, snub nose. A wreath of vegetation in his hair.
![[Image: f17v4.jpg?w=400&h=749]](https://herculeaf.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/f17v4.jpg?w=400&h=749)
At first I took this face to refer to Seilenos, the drunkard foster father of Dionysos (Roman Bacchus), the god of wine. However, since I have found images of "Old Bacchus", which are virtually identical to Seilenos imagery and are recognized much more widely. Indeed, Bacchus has been known throughout history and even those who believe the manuscript was made by a 15th century auteur should not be too surprised to find his image here. Bacchus was known as the god of not only the cultivated grape vine, but also its wild cousins: ivy, bindweed and similar creepers and climbers. He and his companions are always shown with a wreath of vines in their hair, and an ivy crown was also worn by those who worshiped him.
![[Image: f17v5.jpg?w=616]](https://herculeaf.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/f17v5.jpg?w=616)
The image above sets just one example of "old Bacchus" in f17v. The features evoked in the profile and those often found in Bacchus' face are too many to be a coincidence: high forehead, thick brow, deep set eyes, stubby nose, thick moustache, pronounced lower lip, wild, medium length beard. The shape of the leaves in his crown varies, depending on which vines the artist knew or preferred. Also note that there are very often berries near the brow, both in this statue and others, and in the VM drawing.
When I first saw this months ago, I did not know what to make of it, but having understood the connection between Dionysos/Bacchus and vines in general, I can only conclude that the interpretations of this plant as a vine (as made by many others before) and of the tendril as representing Dionysos reinforce each other in a logical and relatively straightforward way.
Some more images can be seen in the blog post I linked, but these should give a general impression. Ideas and comments are welcome. I'd also like to know which other ID's for this plant have been proposed.
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| It's music... |
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Posted by: pbhd0815 - 20-09-2016, 06:59 PM - Forum: News
- Replies (4)
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Check out my paper at You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
Sorry that it's written in german.
It describes how to transform the voynich-Manuskript into music.
If you want to listen to it, you can either download pages 29-28 as mp3
from You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
or the whole transformed document as midi-file
from You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
For listening to the midi, you need some midi-player. I used timidity:
timidity -K -20 voynich-music.mid
Enjoy.
Cheers, Peter
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| Character Classes |
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Posted by: Emma May Smith - 19-09-2016, 12:14 AM - Forum: Analysis of the text
- Replies (51)
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Some characters in the Voynich script behave like one another. For example, an instance of [ch] can usually be replaced with [sh]. We could consider them to be members of the same 'class' of characters. We might think of numerous tests by which such similarity could be measured. What are the character classes that have been proposed, or we could agree on?
The characters [ch, sh] look alike and act alike. Stolfi placed [ee] with them, but I'm not certain that is valid because they cannot always replace one another.
The 'gallows' characters, which themselves can be subdivided into smaller classes dependent on the presence of a bench and/or two legs. This is the most commonly referred to group, but is it really valid?
Stolfi suggested the 'dealers', [d, l, r, s], which often occur in similar contexts. Within that class I would suggest that [d, s] and [l, r] are natural subgroups.
Stolfi also suggested the 'circles', [a, o, y], which in his theory were highly mobile. I think that if we consider [a] to be a variant of [y], then [y/a, o] make a fairly coherent class of character.
I think that being able to see characters as members of classes helps in analyzing the text because it gives us another level of insight. If we take some or all of the classes mentioned above as valid, we can see that words such as [oteal] and [ykeeor] have some structural similarity.
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| Triple convergence |
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Posted by: R. Sale - 17-09-2016, 11:29 PM - Forum: Analysis of the text
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So how can we interpret the validity of things that are found in the VMs? The validation is found in the text.
For example the triple convergence of interpretation applied to the fifth symbol in the 4 x 17 symbol sequence of VMs f 57v. In EVA transcription, they are o, l, d, r and v. And so the fifth symbol is 'v'. Not that the fifth symbol really is a 'v', if you actually look at it.
A person familiar with Greek letters might identify it as an upper case version of lambda. A person working with medieval mathematics might see the number seven. And supplementary both of those, there is an inverted version of the letter 'V'.
Is this coincidence? Three different interpretations for one simple symbol. Is there a way to establish validity of interpretation?
I believe there is something that goes a long way in that direction. And that is the use of positional confirmation.
Here are the examples:
1. 'Lambda' interpretation: Within the Greek alphabet, if symbol 5 might be lambda, symbol 1 might be omicron. The reading is right to left, which was permitted in Greek. And the spacing, with three symbols in between, is the same placement as in the Greek alphabet.
Note that position is a measurement not a subjective assessment of perceived similarity. It is a mathematical equality and therefore an objective fact. This is a positional confirmation.
So perhaps the lambda interpretation is correct. But look again.
2. 'Seven' interpretation: Within the realm of medieval mathematics, as evidenced on the skirts of Typus Arithmetica are the first few powers of '2' and '3'. Not only does the form of the number seven match with the form of symbol 5 of the VMs sequence, the number four is a match with symbol 2 of the sequence. There are two intervening spaces between symbol 2 and symbol 5. Just as there are two intervening spaces between numbers '4' and '7'. This is the same sort or positional confirmation as the first example.
3. 'Roman' interpretation: The Roman numeral five is "V". And VMs symbol 5 is a 'V' inverted. If this were a random sequence of symbols, the symbol could have been placed anywhere. Given that the interpretation and the placement are same, this is also a positional confirmation of interpretation.
In my book, this sort of triple convergence thing cannot pass as a coincidence or random concatenation of circumstance. And in an artifact of human manufacture, the only alternative is intentional creation.
This triple convergence shows how the choice of symbol position can be used to confirm subjective visual interpretations by means of measurable distance and relative location. The method of using positional confirmations has been used again on VMs You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (White Aries) as part of the Genoese Gambit and the tradition of the red galero.
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