No text, but a visual code

[Linda]

About the dots and their possible meaning in the VM, I remember seeing an explanation in a family of manuscripts but unfortunately I didn't take note.
Basically, when the "scales" are mountainous terrain, one manuscript had a little "tree" or plant on each bump. In a later copy, these plants on mountains were reduced to dots or tiny dashes on scales.
So I think that dotted scales might in some cases be shorthand for mountains with vegetation, or fertile hills or whatever. But this is just extrapolated from a pair of manuscripts I can't remember, so take it with a dot of salt.

I agree with that idea, the other one i hold to the side is that the dots indicate minerals.

Was it the Beatus maps? I find these most analogous to the depictions of mountains in the vms. To me the pinecones, with the additions of finials, indicate mountains with volcanic origin, versus uplifted sedimentary rock which is the more general  bumpy layered looking items. They all seem to be painted blue to indicate runoff of precipitation or glacial melt, and erosion seems to be indicated in some cases as well, ie plants would not grow if it was just rock and water, it is the mixture of the two, which allows for life to exist.