02-01-2026, 12:19 PM
I agree that these manuscripts have very Voynich-like figures, especially the first one. It's been discussed before on a couple of occasions, though this was long ago. It's nice to be reminded of it.
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (looking back at it, I think that Diogenes parallel was really strong, split beard and all).
For some reason, my heuristics just rarely lead me to the Vatican archives, even though there's a wealth of manuscripts there.
Now for your question about stylistics. This comes up sometimes, but answering it is harder than you'd think. We can find human figures that are somewhat similar in a wide range of places and times. (I remember David once tried to argue for Spain, and Panofsky thought they were Spanish or "southern" because he saw a Flemish influence). Blushed cheeks are the worst indicator: name a country and you'll find that they depicted people with red dots on the cheeks at one point.
So the first task would be to define what exactly we're looking for, and then check where that's found. I tried it a couple of times, but the task proved too astronomical and I always gave up quickly.
What remains is to give some subjective assessment, and then I'd say the most similar figures are found anywhere people spoke German, including bordering regions.
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (looking back at it, I think that Diogenes parallel was really strong, split beard and all).
For some reason, my heuristics just rarely lead me to the Vatican archives, even though there's a wealth of manuscripts there.
Now for your question about stylistics. This comes up sometimes, but answering it is harder than you'd think. We can find human figures that are somewhat similar in a wide range of places and times. (I remember David once tried to argue for Spain, and Panofsky thought they were Spanish or "southern" because he saw a Flemish influence). Blushed cheeks are the worst indicator: name a country and you'll find that they depicted people with red dots on the cheeks at one point.
So the first task would be to define what exactly we're looking for, and then check where that's found. I tried it a couple of times, but the task proved too astronomical and I always gave up quickly.
What remains is to give some subjective assessment, and then I'd say the most similar figures are found anywhere people spoke German, including bordering regions.