No text, but a visual code

[Jorge_Stolfi]

Sorry if I got carried away.  But the issue of retracing -- and, more generally, how the images came to be, -- is crucial for the topic of this thread.  Or for any investigation about the images.  That includes also the question of how detailed and accurate was the Author's draft, how much the Scribe made up or copied from other sources, how many errors he may have made, etc.

I have seen far too many deductions miscarrying because they were based on image details, like colors and nymph headgear, that are clearly not original, or were not intended to mean what they seem to mean.  That was a terrible waste of time.  Like (as I now see) all the efforts to make sense of the text on f116v.

As I argued in my Voynich Day talk, there is no such thing as "agnostic research" about this book.  Every research effort requires making some assumptions about the events and processes that resulted in what we see today -- an "origin theory".  Thus it is prudent to at least recognize one's "origin theory", and be aware of its unproven status -- and of the implications if it turns out to be incorrect.

All the best, --stolfi