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+--- Thread: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online (/thread-4917.html)
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What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - anyasophira - 07-09-2025
Hi everyone ,
This is a general research or strategy question. I love it when someone posts something visual up here that is a new match to a feature of voynich. I’ve done a lot of searches on the ninja forum to see what’s been done. I’m assuming a lot of the researchers have been combing over a lot of manuscripts quite a bit, especially when looking for things like marginalia or letters or zodiac signs etc. I’m assuming that anything posted here has been pretty much looked over carefully. So as I venture into the websites of archives, I find it hard to figure out what manuscripts have been completely picked over and noticed for novelty and which ones haven’t been looked at yet. More importantly, I can’t figure out how to discover when a manuscript is freshly updated or freshly posted on one of the many different sites that are hosting it or whether it’s been there for a long time. I’m not necessarily asking you to tell me every single manuscript that’s been combed over on this forum. I’m asking “Is there a way to quickly search all the various online sources and quickly identify the range of dates they were updated or uploaded so you can just start with the Newest ones first. “ and “Are there particular websites that anyone here favors as being really great with new update updates. “ “also are there collections online that we just know haven’t been looked at yet because they just dropped?”
And also- this being entirely subjective, do all of you major researchers descend upon new updates within a few months or are there enough manuscripts being added to the web if not at a steady rate then by key large uploads at certain points?”.
Anyone have an awesome system for doing this? Personal preferences?
Also- I’m most interested in herbal texts specifically - but this applies to all types.
Ps I really hope this is not extremely obvious I have -tried- to look at many manuscripts already and with the variation of viewers still struggle to see a quick way of finding when it was uploaded.
PSs: I have watched all Voynich Talk video, and the conferences and days. I searched and attempted to learn from the Voynich as well. So I have a bit of general background knowledge of what texts have been looked at to compare.
?? Thank you for any advice or tips given
Anya
Psss- I love em dashes. Love them. I am expressive in real life and those em dashes are there to show that. So please don’t flag
This as Ai. ?
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - Stefan Wirtz_2 - 08-09-2025
I don 't get even the whole questions at all.
You are asking for a kind of level or catalogue of which medieval manuscripts were already somehow "browsed" by all partipiciants of this forum here?
Why?
This is surely not done by "the swarm" systematically. Just a few people did this maybe category-wise, most are just picking 1 or 2 similiar pictures from the internet to "proove" their own theories -- which are never shared by anyone else.
I would not even suggest to watch (and believe) all Voynich Talk videos.
Voynich Manuscript shows just very few references to other scripts (beginning from this alphabet), nearly no religious symbols, but lots of vague similarities that are quite misleading.
Personally I doubt the chance of finding any "full-explaining" other script which is just waiting in some library for it's discovery -- it is better to stick to these few real-world references recognized already, but this does not mean VMS is a crazy fairytale book: we just do not know the signs given within it.
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - Koen G - 08-09-2025
This is a good question, and it touches on two frustrating (but hard to fix) points Voynich researchers have to deal with:
- It's hard to figure out what's been written about a certain topic/MS before.
- The various online manuscript repositories and their browsers are a nightmare to navigate (how I wish they'd push for a shared standard).
Additionally, we can't always assume that "known" manuscripts have been looked at from the angle you'll be looking at them. Maybe you're interested in handwriting, but manuscript x has only been studied for its imagery.
Often, finding the right manuscripts involves a bit of luck, and maybe hours of search time. There may be shortcuts, but those are all case-dependent. It would indeed be interesting if we knew when and where new herbal manuscripts were digitized, but I have no idea how we could find out.
About the em-dashes, don't worry. A dash doth not a chatbot make
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - anyasophira - 09-09-2025
A
(08-09-2025, 03:35 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.This is a good question, and it touches on two frustrating (but hard to fix) points Voynich researchers have to deal with:I used to follow a now defunct blog that listed newly digitized illuminated manuscripts from one particular library (I don't remember the details). Going through those ended up building frustrations though, because it turns out the vast majority of manuscripts just aren't interesting to us. So I think it's better to search with purpose.
- It's hard to figure out what's been written about a certain topic/MS before.
- The various online manuscript repositories and their browsers are a nightmare to navigate (how I wish they'd push for a shared standard).
Additionally, we can't always assume that "known" manuscripts have been looked at from the angle you'll
Often, finding the right manuscripts involves a bit of luck, and maybe hours of search time. There may be shortcuts, but those are all case-dependent. It would indeed be interesting if we knew when and where new herbal manuscripts were digitized, but I have no idea how we could find out.
About the em-dashes, don't worry. A dash doth not a chatbot make
Thank you Koen that is exactly
I what I was afraid of, but it’s good to know I am not missing something obvious- this will save me time at least. I appreciate your help here.
-A
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - anyasophira - 09-09-2025
(08-09-2025, 03:18 PM)Stefan Wirtz_2 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I don 't get even the whole questions at all.Well my question wasn’t based on the premise that I was a few clicks away from finding a manuscript “Rosetta Stone”.
You are asking for a kind of level or catalogue of which medieval manuscripts were already somehow "browsed" by all partipiciants of this forum here?
Why?
This is surely not done by "the swarm" systematically. Just a few people did this maybe category-wise, most are just picking 1 or 2 similiar pictures from the internet to "proove" their own theories -- which are never shared by anyone else.
I would not even suggest to watch (and believe) all Voynich Talk videos.
Voynich Manuscript shows just very few references to other scripts (beginning from this alphabet), nearly no religious symbols, but lots of vague similarities that are quite misleading.
Personally I doubt the chance of finding any "full-explaining" other script which is just waiting in some library for it's discovery -- it is better to stick to these few real-world references recognized already, but this does not mean VMS is a crazy fairytale book: we just do not know the signs given within it.
To find value in my inquiry, let’s assume for a second that someone finds value while looking at other manuscripts written about the same time/ballpark region to create a baseline , as they themselves are not a 1400’s scribe,-which puts them at risk of having a mismatched modern perception. I find value in looking at manuscripts so I can have a better gauge of what the average formatting zodiac wheels used or what was included when scribes wrote herbals, or even how a Latin mind thinks about words. Because even if it isn’t plain text Latin, chances are someone was comfortable with Latin at some point in the pipeline whether creator or scribe or both.
Sure lots of manuscripts are lost to time and many are not digitalized, but the mind that made the Voynich had at least some shared knowledge of the rest of the people. Hence a T/O map, a graphic organizer that modern minds wouldn’t even recognize let alone think to draw.
To my request- As I said before, I’m assuming that that if there’s not a running list, but I’ve seen lots of manuscripts be mentioned more than once and I would be naive to think many have not been looked over closely already.
I am just asking if there is a quick and easy way (that I am missing )where you can see where new manuscripts are being uploaded.
And if any researcher has some Strategies to share for manuscript viewing and tracking. Or maybe a favorite site.
Thanks,
A
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - ReneZ - 09-09-2025
The number of manuscripts that is digitally online has been increasing spectacularly over the last 10 years or so.
Keeping an index of them is an almost impossible task. One of the most complete indices I have ever seen, known as "DMM app", seems to be undergoing a change.
It was excellent before, but I have not used it in recent years, so I cannot vouch for its reliablility now. It looks very different.
Here is the start page: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - MarcoP - 09-09-2025
For herbal manuscripts, I made extensive use of Minta Collin’s You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (2000). It can now be read in full on archive.org. She discusses about 300 illustrated manuscripts.
For copies of the Alchemical Herbal (which are not covered in full by Collins) see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (2024).
For zodiac illustrations and astrological/astronomical manuscripts, one can refer to Kristen Lippincott’s You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (it’s not exhaustive, but very informative).
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - bi3mw - 09-09-2025
It's really sad that the British Library website has practically nothing online anymore after a hacker attack.
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - Stefan Wirtz_2 - 09-09-2025
(09-09-2025, 02:46 AM)anyasophira Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Well my question wasn’t based on the premise that I was a few clicks away from finding a manuscript “Rosetta Stone”.
[..]
Funny thing: that is the best hope one can have about VMS...
The author(s) showed some very few tendencies to use inspirations (or rather flat copies) from other books.
In best case there is a just-copied manuscript page somewhere in this world, helping to explain it's counterpart in VMS.
RE: What are your approaches to finding manuscripts online - anyasophira - 10-09-2025
(09-09-2025, 09:12 PM)Stefan Wirtz_2 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.(09-09-2025, 02:46 AM)anyasophira Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Well my question wasn’t based on the premise that I was a few clicks away from finding a manuscript “Rosetta Stone”.
[..]
Funny thing: that is the best hope one can have about VMS...
The author(s) showed some very few tendencies to use inspirations (or rather flat copies) from other books.
In best case there is a just-copied manuscript page somewhere in this world, helping to explain it's counterpart in VMS.
-has that been backed up by some quantified trends? If the research has been shown I would love to see that. Like if the time period that the manuscript was a part of - has what was likely to be drawn or shown or discussed or even -how- the subjects were shown - are they more like those manuscripts of the time rather say the 1700’s or 1800’s or even modern works of zodiac signs or herbals? Or earlier? Because for sure the Voynich appears unusual, but again, imagine if that unknown script was found on some of the manuscripts we can read - how strange would those appear. We know that a book of its type has not been identified out there, but in pieces do the sum of the parts still add up to more overlap to 1400’s middle Europe that than 1700’s ?