04-01-2021, 06:27 PM
I'm not disagreeing here - I am not at all sure what Q13 is telling us.
There are, however, several important things to keep in mind related to the medieval bathing tradition, and its manuscript tradition:
- Beside the well-known illustrated manuscripts, like the "Balneis Puteolanis", there are many others that are text-only, and not nearly as well known to the Voynich world. (Nick has listed many at one of his Cipher Mysteries blog posts, but I have not delved into this).
- The water in these medicinal baths was there both for external purposes (bathing in it) and internal purposes (drinking it).
- The illustrations in the Balneis are primarily concerned with the bathing part. One can occasionally see someone drinking it too, but this is a detail, and what happens as a result of this drinking is not illustrated.
- I could easily imagine that the Q13 illustrations show both: the bathing part on some folios and the effect-on-the-inner-organs part in some other folios. It could try to illustrate what is only described by text in other manuscripts.
This is just one of many things that I can imagine, so I present it 'for what it is worth'.
Someone familiar with the texts of these bathing manuscripts could surely say more.
There are, however, several important things to keep in mind related to the medieval bathing tradition, and its manuscript tradition:
- Beside the well-known illustrated manuscripts, like the "Balneis Puteolanis", there are many others that are text-only, and not nearly as well known to the Voynich world. (Nick has listed many at one of his Cipher Mysteries blog posts, but I have not delved into this).
- The water in these medicinal baths was there both for external purposes (bathing in it) and internal purposes (drinking it).
- The illustrations in the Balneis are primarily concerned with the bathing part. One can occasionally see someone drinking it too, but this is a detail, and what happens as a result of this drinking is not illustrated.
- I could easily imagine that the Q13 illustrations show both: the bathing part on some folios and the effect-on-the-inner-organs part in some other folios. It could try to illustrate what is only described by text in other manuscripts.
This is just one of many things that I can imagine, so I present it 'for what it is worth'.
Someone familiar with the texts of these bathing manuscripts could surely say more.