9 Rosette - Specific Details

[Mark Knowles]

...

So now I am trying to look at it in more flexible ways. Maybe real, maybe partly real, maybe partly cosmological or mythical. Maybe not quite so literal a map as I first (and probably wrongly) assumed.

Yes, it is true that I have quite a literal map interpretation and specific corresponding locations, some influenced by Nick Pelling's interpretation. Though I do not view the central rosette as being part of the map in the sense that I do not view it as a physical location. Similarly my own perspective as I have stated clearly before is that the page shows what could be described a circular journey strip map or return map of a journey or itinerary map of a journey to and back from a location or however is best that one could describe it. As such the central rosette does not constitute part of the interlinked strip map.

I agree with much of what is described at the top of Nick Pelling's 9 Rosette Page post, namely the two suns representing East and West I.e. the rising sun and setting sun with the far bottom left corner showing a compass pointing north. Similarly the text flowing around the page that Nick illustrates fits well I think with a circular itinerary map.

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I like the link to "regional" map as it shows a T/O map in the corner indicating the rest of the world, as I think we see in the top right corner of the 9 Rosettes page
->

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Referring to the page which is the same or similar to the text in his book:

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I find the following passage interesting and relevant->

"However, some medieval regional maps owed nothing to classical models and drew neither their inspiration nor their coastal outlines from world maps or portolan charts. In north Italy a distinctive tradition of regional maps grew up in the later middle ages, a tradition that seems to have been independent of any outside source or precedent. More than a dozen of these maps survive, and there are contemporary references to others that are now lost. The earliest dates from 1291, but most are of the 15th century. Some are of quite a small area, such as one of Lake Garda, some are of broader scope and two cover the whole of Lombardy. They are in varied styles; what was peculiar to north Italy was the idea of drawing regional maps of any sort, not a tradition of drawing them in a particular way."

Especially the sentence->

"In north Italy a distinctive tradition of regional maps grew up in the later middle ages, a tradition that seems to have been independent of any outside source or precedent."

This would be consistent with a unique style of representation of a map.

I should add that I have not seen many of the more than a dozen Northern Italian Regional maps that Prof. Harvey refers to and the references to no longer surving maps. I have been meaning to track these down, but have not yet done so. Regarding this he says:

"More than a dozen of these maps survive, and there are contemporary references to others that are now lost."

I think the following statement is consistent with the dating of the Voynich manuscript->

"The earliest dates from 1291, but most are of the 15TH CENTURY"