Automated Topic Analysis of the Voynich Manuscript

[Jorge_Stolfi]

Now I’ve run into a different issue. I’m drilling down by section, starting with Herbal, by filtering to those paragraphs only. Inside Herbal I expected at least a couple of thematic clusters (think Culpeper-style: when to harvest, flowering stages, preparations, etc.). Instead, the splits I’m getting are almost entirely language A vs B, with little evidence of cross-language themes. That’s surprising. Herbal is big enough that, ideally, we should see some topic diversity across languages, but we don't; the fact that I’m mostly seeing language separation makes me wonder why...

Well, VMS Herbal parags are fairly short, so some of those "items" (like "where it grows" and "when to harvest") may be just a word or two.  Possibly most of the text is repeated items like 

• "For condition X1, take N1 ounces in wine for D1 days. For condition X2, apply poultice R2 times for D2 hours.  If symptoms persist, call your doctor. For condition X3, make a tea from leaves and drink a gallon every day for a week."
  

The differences between "languages" could be due to the text being the join of two sources with different wordings of the formulas, like

• "This herb is good for X1 if taken in wine for D1 days. A poultice applied R2 times will cure condition X2, but some cases may need something else. The tea from leaves, twenty glasses per day, will cure condition X3."
  

All the best, --jorge