Hi Diane,
Unfortunately some of the links on Knox's site are down. I would really have liked to be able to read Stolfi's paper about what he call "big two" as well as Klaus Schröer's PDF. If any of the veterans around here have these it would be great if they could post them!
I understand what you're saying about etymology and aries not making sense as a paragraph marker, but to me it would be best if we could first gather the largest possible number of comparisons that are visually as similar as possible, and then think about what makes sense and how things connect once we have a large corpus, rather than dismiss things a priori.
I think it's useful to know that an aries or aries-looking symbol has been proposed as a possible comparison, and it is visually very similar, whatever the connection, so why not list it? Especially in an MS like the Voynich where aries seems to be a "doubly" special element.
Nahuatl... well, I personally don't think the Voynich has much to do with that culture, but again, it is very visually similar and it has been proposed, so why not list it? To me this is step 1, just casting as wide a net as possible.
Of course if you have specific images that you would like to contribute to such a list that would be great too: don't hesitate to add them to the thread!
About nota bene: Spanish keeps the Latin form, as well as the abbreviation N.B., but I have no idea what may have been the specific Spanish symbols for it in the past.
Unfortunately some of the links on Knox's site are down. I would really have liked to be able to read Stolfi's paper about what he call "big two" as well as Klaus Schröer's PDF. If any of the veterans around here have these it would be great if they could post them!
I understand what you're saying about etymology and aries not making sense as a paragraph marker, but to me it would be best if we could first gather the largest possible number of comparisons that are visually as similar as possible, and then think about what makes sense and how things connect once we have a large corpus, rather than dismiss things a priori.
I think it's useful to know that an aries or aries-looking symbol has been proposed as a possible comparison, and it is visually very similar, whatever the connection, so why not list it? Especially in an MS like the Voynich where aries seems to be a "doubly" special element.
Nahuatl... well, I personally don't think the Voynich has much to do with that culture, but again, it is very visually similar and it has been proposed, so why not list it? To me this is step 1, just casting as wide a net as possible.
Of course if you have specific images that you would like to contribute to such a list that would be great too: don't hesitate to add them to the thread!
About nota bene: Spanish keeps the Latin form, as well as the abbreviation N.B., but I have no idea what may have been the specific Spanish symbols for it in the past.