01-09-2020, 07:22 AM
(31-08-2020, 06:53 PM)R. Sale wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.So, if Oresme is valid (BNF Fr. 565), if the clothing is valid, if Melusine is valid (Harley 334), if the Golden Fleece is valid, then the date is after 1430 and there are historical connections to the Duchy of Burgundy. VMs as a finished creation comes after the last dated event.
None of these can be used. BNF Fr. 565 is just one manuscript, and there is no evidence that the drawing in the Voynich MS was copied from this one. Same with Harley 334.
With respect to the individual samples, their uncertainty is wider in both directions.
Note also, that the uncertainty of each sample is a few decades, which is almost certainly longer than the time it took to create the MS. This means that individual samples cannot be used for precise dating. It is like measuring the size of a fly with a stick that only has inch markings.
Particularly:
if one sample is dated after another, this does not imply that the sample is newer. It is just 'chance'.
The more samples you take, the greater the chance that any one of them is at one of the far ends of the probability distribution.
One always has to keep in mind that the result of a C-14 dating is not a number, but a probability distribution.