If we look at very early texts, words were often run together. It was up to the reader to know where the word breaks should be. This tradition still existed to some extent in the early medieval period.
In contrast, separating text into syllables was not so common in narrative manuscripts, not so common in medieval ciphers before c. 1460s, but was very common in missals and other music-related manuscripts, as well as in maps and diagrams. It also occurred in mnemonic Llullian-style imagery and, to a lesser extent, in scientific manuscripts.
If the person who created the drawings is the same person who created the VMS text, then they would have been familiar with breaking up words into syllables. If the illustrator and the Voynichese creator were different people (which they frequently were in the Middle Ages and even in the modern age), then I suspect the chance of the VMS being broken up into syllables (or some kind of chunks) is less. As Nick has often pointed out, they just didn't do it that way in the earlier years.
I've often tried to discern if the illustrator's hand matches one of the scribal hands but it's very difficult to compare them. We might never know. And even if the illustrator and one of the scribes match, it still doesn't tell us who invented Voynichese. A mastermind isn't always a scribe.
But if the illustrator created the Voynichese glyphs and how they go together... I think it's possible. The concept was there. The VMS is remarkable in many ways. Perhaps it is remarkable in this way as well.
In contrast, separating text into syllables was not so common in narrative manuscripts, not so common in medieval ciphers before c. 1460s, but was very common in missals and other music-related manuscripts, as well as in maps and diagrams. It also occurred in mnemonic Llullian-style imagery and, to a lesser extent, in scientific manuscripts.
If the person who created the drawings is the same person who created the VMS text, then they would have been familiar with breaking up words into syllables. If the illustrator and the Voynichese creator were different people (which they frequently were in the Middle Ages and even in the modern age), then I suspect the chance of the VMS being broken up into syllables (or some kind of chunks) is less. As Nick has often pointed out, they just didn't do it that way in the earlier years.
I've often tried to discern if the illustrator's hand matches one of the scribal hands but it's very difficult to compare them. We might never know. And even if the illustrator and one of the scribes match, it still doesn't tell us who invented Voynichese. A mastermind isn't always a scribe.
But if the illustrator created the Voynichese glyphs and how they go together... I think it's possible. The concept was there. The VMS is remarkable in many ways. Perhaps it is remarkable in this way as well.