Over the years it has been very clear, to me, that identification of the herbals is an endless road into eternity.
Those who have much more botanical knowledge than me, tried it as well, and came up with Mexican, Indian, Chinese, Austrian, etc. -plantnames and that exemplifies that there are many possibilities. When there are so much openings, you need to ask yourself if it is realistic to continue such a quest.
To me, trying to find a name for a herbal drawing in the VMS is like trying to find a formula for making gold from lead: if you really believe it, there are always followers and kings that are willing to fund your research. But with our current knowledge we should know better.
If you really are interested in the herbals, it would be better to invest in the identification of the plant details and try to match those individual parts with historical similar details. For example a root of VMS plant A can be similar to root of plant B in another ms. (The entire plant does not have to be a 100% match, which of course never is.) This way you could establish a scientific way of matching individual parts and perhaps one can write a paper on comparing those herbals in similar manuscripts and draw conclusions finally on for example the copy process as well. It is just an idea.
Those who have much more botanical knowledge than me, tried it as well, and came up with Mexican, Indian, Chinese, Austrian, etc. -plantnames and that exemplifies that there are many possibilities. When there are so much openings, you need to ask yourself if it is realistic to continue such a quest.
To me, trying to find a name for a herbal drawing in the VMS is like trying to find a formula for making gold from lead: if you really believe it, there are always followers and kings that are willing to fund your research. But with our current knowledge we should know better.
If you really are interested in the herbals, it would be better to invest in the identification of the plant details and try to match those individual parts with historical similar details. For example a root of VMS plant A can be similar to root of plant B in another ms. (The entire plant does not have to be a 100% match, which of course never is.) This way you could establish a scientific way of matching individual parts and perhaps one can write a paper on comparing those herbals in similar manuscripts and draw conclusions finally on for example the copy process as well. It is just an idea.