Cribs in the Voynich MS

[MichelleL11]

Responding to Mark Knowles, you have an excellent illustration of the 28 mansions of the moon in the Catalan Altas, which is more or less from the Voynich era.

Do you have any links? And when does it date from?

Hi, All:

So I spent some time down this rabbit hole this weekend.  As with everything related to medieval studies and therefore, the Voynich manuscript there is no simple answer to any of this.

The medieval European understanding of the mansions of the moon names derive from the likely first translation into Spanish and Latin of the Arabic Ghāyat al-Ḥakīm as well as an insertion into Alfonso X's translation of the Ghayat of a discussion of talismans that include a name listing attributed to "Plinio."  These two listings are present in what is known as the Picatrix (an amagamation of a range of disclosures about similar subject matter, collected by Alfonso's translators but a big part is the Ghayat).

Because there are both Spanish and Latin versions of each of these two lists, that single translation results in five total lists of 28 names (actual Arabic, Spanish transliteration of Ghayat name, Latin transliteration of Ghayat name, Spanish transliteration of Plinio name, and Latin transliteration of Plinio name).  Other than the actual Arabic, which is relatively unlikely, it is possible that if the Voynich 69v 28 words are those names it could be from any four of these (depending on how likely you see a Spanish transliteration version used). 

You can get/derive these lists from this reference, where Pingree actually lists them out (sort of):
Pingree, D., Between the Ghāya and Picatrix I: The Spanish Version, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol., 44 (1981), pp. 27-56.  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

I've done this (now I'm going to sound like JKP) and there are definite, sometimes drastic differences because of the use of variants from the Arabic.  Also, sometimes the name is spelled more than one way for a single list -- as I'm sure surprises no one who has spent any time with medieval manuscripts and their "spelling is optional" approach.  But I simply do not have time to wrestle posting my chart onto the forum this morning.

The approximate date of these Spanish lists is 1256 or 1258 (it is controversial) and the Latin lists are thought to be shortly after because Alfonso's translaters were known to be quick with other Spanish to Latin manuscripts, but the exact date was not recorded.  So this is pretty early but likely by far the best "known" list(s) existent at the carbon dating of the Voynich period. 

There is also a list from Urb. lat. 1384 (a separate translation from the Arabic into Latin from the Picatrix) but that dates from 1480 or 1481 so likely just a bit too late for the Voynich.  See, Lippincott and Pingree; Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vo. 50, 1987; You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. [the differences here are relatively small as the translater likely had the Picatrix available to him when translating(?) but there are differences].

Just for comparison, the other list given by D'Imperio (Agrippa) dates from 1531.  So very late.  But again, likely derived through who knows how many iterations, from the Picatrix.

I'm sure there are other Voynich contemporary mansion of the moon lists but this is all the time I have to spend on this for now.

I'm also pretty sure Marco has spent some time on this, so I apologize if this is duplicative.

Hope this helps.

Michelle