(23-03-2024, 09:06 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think the problem comes with the use of the term "experts". There is nobody who really definitively can be called an "expert" on the Voynich manuscript. You are precisely an example of the point that it is difficult to find a consensus on any aspect of the Voynich manuscript. Take the Rosettes Folio and we have many different ideas what this page represents.

I think you are completely wrong about it being a modern hoax, but I think the chance of me or any evidence persuading you otherwise is very slim.

(03-04-2024, 05:23 PM)proto57 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.It is ironic to me, when being told that I "don't listen to the experts", that I actually listen to far more of them than virtually anyone else... well, anyone without a forgery theory. 

(23-03-2024, 09:20 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The only conclusion one could have drawn before the carbon dating was that people seemed to have had a hard time agreeing on a dating for the MS. If they had brought on board someone specialized in medieval dress, they would have certainly pointed to the first half of the 15th century. 

What was the background of the people offering date ranges for the MS, and what were those assessments based upon? A look at a few black and white scans? A specific part of the MS? All of these things matter.

Quote: As for your support for Yanick and Tucker, I am greatly confused. They claim that "the Voynich is a 16th century codex associated with indigenous Indians of Nueva España educated in schools established by the Spanish". If I recall correctly, they even had an author in mind, a 16th century painter known for his work decorating churches.

I just don't get it. Why would Wilfrid Voynich make something that looks like it is made by Mexicans and then try to sell it as the Roger Bacon cipher manuscript?

(25-03-2024, 06:30 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Well to me this seems to be about how we rely on experts. It is not because someone has any PhD, that they can be relied upon to assess a medieval artefact. 

Certain herbal traditions stray very far from botanical reality. In these cases, asking the opinion of a botanist may be counterproductive.

I also don't think Rich should cherry pick from their findings. He likes that they said the plants are American, but he doesn't like that they did so in the framework of their Mexican theory.

Again though, why would the European Voynich put so many American plants in his forgery?

Quote:"So then, anyone who believes the Voynich is genuine, and circa-1420, must reject all those 14 pre-C14 experts who said the manuscript was anything BUT 1420. But I do not reject them. I actually agree with virtually all their observations. The thing to realize here is- the reason my seemingly hypocritical belief that the Voynich is a circa 1910 forgery, while the experts did not- is simply because these opinions were not about, nor considering, whether or not the Voynich is a forgery. These experts were looking at the style and content, and then giving their expert opinions as to when and where that style and content most likely originated from. These were not forgery experts, they were art historians, linguists, scholars of the history of the herbal tradition, of iconography, cipher, codeology, palaeography, and so on."

(03-04-2024, 05:33 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.You don't listen to the people you list as experts as they don't say the manuscript is a modern fake.

(27-03-2024, 01:42 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Just to stay away from all the speculation, there is one important error in the graph, and there are two interesting omissions.



The error is with Panofsky, whose range is shown as 1510 (blue) - 1520 (orange).

However, his first assessment after seeing and handling the MS in the 1930's was: 1410-1430
Some 30 years later he gave a new assessment, 1470 or 1510 - 1520. The correct range from all this is not 1510-1520. It is 1410 (blue) - 1520 (orange).

Quote:The first interesting omission is Richard Salomon, who stated: "it was written in the 15th century, possibly as late as 1450, possibly earlier in the century"

So that would deserve a bar of 1420 (blue) - 1450 (orange).

Quote:The second omission is interesting in a very different way, but Rich may not have these details. 
Theodore Petersen had written to one of his contacts in the Vatican (A. Strittmatter), who consulted the respectable Mgr. August Pelzer about Roger Bacon in general, and Voynich's Bacon MS. Petersen had sent along some photostats. 
The answer came:

"You will be interested also to know that in the course of our first conversation Msgr. P. remarked: 
"Die Voynich HS ist sicherlich nicht von Bacon. Sie stammt aus dem späten 16. oder frühen  17. Jhdt, höchstwahrscheinlich aus der Tschecho-Slowakei oder aus Polen." As I understand it, he considers the drawings representative of interests utterly alien to Roger Bacon."

The German part means: The Voynich MS is certainly not by Bacon. It dates from the late 16th or early 17th century, most probably from Czechoslovakia or Poland.

This could rate as probably the worst of all estimates, from a respectable expert.
Of course, he did not see the MS. Only some B/W photos.

(03-04-2024, 06:46 PM)asteckley Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(03-04-2024, 05:33 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.You don't listen to the people you list as experts as they don't say the manuscript is a modern fake.

Are you seriously trying to say that if the expert  hasn't stated that they subscribe to particular theory that is supported BY their findings, then one is therefore not listening to that expert?!

(27-03-2024, 05:29 AM)merrimacga Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I had started this reply much earlier but then ran out of time to post it. The site has been really busy this month and so has my life outside this group. So please forgive if this response is a little old now that so many more responses have been posted.

There is a side of me that wants to thank Rich for his post. He does make some good points in it and he has been researching the VM for quite awhile. While that might not make him a so-called expert, it doesn't mean his opinion isn't worth listening to. Quite the contrary actually. Just as are the many other opinions, opposing or not, of the many others who have also been researching the VM for a long time.

But Rich's blog post reads like a diatribe more than it does an honest opinion or an offer of useful information for thoughtful consideration. And as others have pointed out there are also errors and omissions in it. There are several staunch factions, like the hoax versus genuine ones, in VM research that seem to me to quite often distract everyone from being able to reach any kind of conclusion. As long as VM research remains a Tower of Babel, I doubt we will ever find, or at least not widely accept, any possible solution. I understand Rich's frustration and I sympathize but I don't think the post really accomplished anything other than allowing him to vent. The blog is Rich's and so he should post what he wants in it but I wish he would have written this post better, leaving all the venting and frustration and bias out and keeping all the good points in about the so-called experts and considering what they have said at varying times with both a measure of respect and one of skepticism.

I think it is good for VM researchers to consider what has actually been proven and more importantly what has not and then keep that all in context. It is also important to consider the backgrounds of those who propose anything about the VM, dating or otherwise, so their opinion can be judged according to the level of their knowledge, if not also their expertise (which is not the same as being an expert), professional or otherwise. And so much of what has been written about the VM is just that: opinion. Knowledgeable and well-researched perhaps but still opinion. Irrefutable proof of anything about the VM, and also what it is not, is in very short supply, the radiocarbon dating, the ink analysis and the protein testing notwithstanding, and probably will remain so for the foreseeable future. And any such proof will have to invariably consider and relate to and concur with all other aspects of the VM as well. The very best proof would be to thoroughly dissect and study and scientifically test all of the physical VM, not just samples here and there, and that isn't going to happen because this would likely destroy it in the process. Whether or not irrefutable proof is even possible otherwise remains to be seen. It may well be we will only ever achieve convincing proof of what the VM is or is not, in whole or in part. If we are even able to do that.

Personally, I have my own ideas about the VM and I expect them to change many times for the duration of my interest in the VM. I do pay attention to the experts in the various disciplines related to VM research and I consider them accordingly. I also consider others who may not be experts but who offer much knowledge and expertise. None of what I have read so far has irrefutably or even convincingly proven or disproven to me anything about the VM, in whole or in part. Not yet. Except possibly the dating of the vellum, the composition of the inks, the composition of the vellum and the conclusion that it is not a palimpsest but even then only in the context of the limited samples taken and tested. There is so much written opinion to consider and I am still very new to VM research. If you were to ask me if I currently agree or disagree with Rich about the VM being a forgery or a hoax (which, I might add, as much as he wants us to believe his post is open to other possibilities, he is still promoting that it is such), then I would have to say no and that is considering all aspects of hoaxes and forgeries, modern or otherwise. I am open to the possibility but I will need convincing proof of such and so far I have not seen that. Ultimately, anyone researching the VM, myself and Rich included, must limit ourselves to what we believe to be the best possible assumptions and lines of investigation and this is simply because there are so many possibilities and we each have only so much time to invest in something that we are not getting paid to do but rather are doing it from personal interest.

(03-04-2024, 05:33 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

(03-04-2024, 05:23 PM)proto57 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.It is ironic to me, when being told that I "don't listen to the experts", that I actually listen to far more of them than virtually anyone else... well, anyone without a forgery theory. 

You don't listen to the people you list as experts as they don't say the manuscript is a modern fake. To go from saying there was uncertainty about the dating of the manuscript to saying it is a modern hoax is a big jump. Rather one might say that the dating of a manuscript like the Voynich, where one cannot read the text, is very difficult and so many people came up with different dates for it. The carbon dating has been very helpful in clearing up the dating issue.