Those umbrella/pinecone things

[MarcoP]

Apparently, Voynich illustrations represent something similar to classical "canopies", but they don't follow the same visual tradition.

Putting together Koen's observations (italics) and mine, these are the main differences when comparing You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. with classical canopies:

• Voynich is the only one that has alternating colors for the pieces that radiate out from the centre. 
  
• The older examples show a clear dome in side view. The other examples give a top view. Voynich, however, gives a side view with little to no dome effect. Kind of like a squashed umbrella.
  
• The central pole that appears in the Voynich ms is absent in all other cases;
  
• The curves on the border are convex in the VMS, while they are concave in all other cases.
  

I think You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (Bern Cod. 246, 900 ca) overcomes three of the four problems (the alternating colors are still missing). 
I found the image here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.



In the Bern manuscript:

• There is a central pole (shaped like a cross).
  
• The curves on the border are clearly convex (even if much less so than in the VMS).
  
• The "squashed umbrella" shape is there (but steeper in the Bern ms).
  

We are back to the proposals made in the first posts: tents and pavilions can also provide examples with alternating colors. I think that also better matches for the other details could be found (pole shape, convex borders, steepness of the "cone").
In my opinion, Wladimir's observation is a nice addition to the subject: there appear to be tents also in the Rosettes page. On this specific idea, there is a very interesting blog post by Ellie about You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view..