Deconstruction of Voynich Manuscript words

[don of tallahassee]

Dear VViews,

Sorry, I don't have folio 1r done.

I have no training in this either. Before I retired, I was a carpenter/handyman. I just love puzzles - always have.

I don't much care for what the manuscript seems to be saying or understand fully why there only seem to be ingredients, maybe grouped into apothecary-type formulas. All I can do is try to piece things together from the hints in the Voynich Manuscript (and probably putting some pieces together wrongly). But I am trying to uncover enough of the rules about how the words are put together to enable the next person who comes along with ideas to proceed from that point, rather than having to do all this grunt work before getting started.

Where are the animal and mineral ingredients so prevalent in other formularies of the time? Where are the prayers? Where are the astrological implications? Where are all the other things that would seem necessary in an herbal? Why would such a book be made (and use such an innovative group of ways to try to keep its secrets secure)? Who? Where? Can it answer the questions of others about its idiosyncrasies and secrets?

I've got as many questions for myself and the manuscript as any of you others. And I probably have just about as many answers to those questions as any of you others (because I didn't write the book).

One of the other people I have been corresponding with about my ideas has posited that the system of codes and tables and sequence of deconstruction might be used for something else and is leading a group to investigate the possibility. I've offered to assist in any way they need me to do. Maybe they'll come up with something that makes more sense - or at least something that helps make more sense of this proposed solution.

I don't claim to have all the answers, only a way to deconstruct the words into component parts that seems to work for most of the words in the manuscript, way over 90%. I don't know why there are exceptions. As a general rule, I don't even understand the exceptions. As with everything about the VMS, there's a lot I don't understand.

I just try to take each problem one little step at a time. If I can't come up with an answer or if there is a barrier to my understanding, I put it aside for the time being and get on with the other problems.

I've built a really shaky house-of-cards proposed solution from very iffy base points. I admit it.

But, basically, it seems to hold together under closer examination. There is still a lot of the manuscript that I have not examined closely (as I have the attempted decoding pages). So it may have surprises yet in store for me.

The manuscript continues to vex me at every turn. That's one of the best parts - it is a mystery that keeps on mystifying, like a good Sherlock Holmes story, right to the end, I guess.

One thing you need to remember about my fumblydiddles.com site is that much of the info on it is in need of being updated (look at the dates on some of the items). Table I has had many changes made since its last update. There is a new sound for Table VII - the EVA = ll glyphs, now a long o sound, as at the end of mallow, willow and sallow. I am as unsure as ever about the proposed IDs for the numbers in Table V, especially the EVA = d identification of 2. It may be 1 or 10 or some other number entirely - no way to check yet. The same goes for EVA = e, not presently found in Table V. If I added it, it would take care of the two words out of the 505 that presently don't fit the proposed way to deconstruct words - but I won't add it yet, just to make things neat - unless, and until, I'm more sure. The rest of the Tables are mostly up to date, except for a few seldom-used codes. I know it will take a week and a half to do it right, a month and a half or two months (or more) if I redo all the decoding attempts. And I'm lazy.

There shouldn't be many changes that need to be made to my site that will change anything except code attributions, such as a new herb code or a new name for a code earlier attributed to another herb.

All code IDs are tentative - let me know if you think of a better one or one that fits the pages better.

This week, today, right now, I would say the Voynich Manuscript was written in about 1421 by a native English speaker/writer (maybe having been to York at one time) with training in apothecary/medicine who had read Roger Bacon's ideas on keeping secrets. If the same person was also the artist, the person probably traveled at some time to the Continent (at least to northern France) and had the opportunity to visit the King of France's library and maybe a few other highly placed individuals' or other prominent libraries or medical books, also.

That opinion may change by noon (still an hour away), if new evidence pops up. If I had to hazard a guess, I would think the person was the King of England's doctor or master apothecary or one of the main doctors or apothecaries in England who needed/wanted to keep his master book of fomulae and potions secret. I know there were strict laws in France at the time about who prescribed and who prepared medicine (only doctors and master apothecaries could change a prescription's ingredients for any reason) - not sure about England.

All I was trying to do with Voynich Lite is show that most of the 505 most common words in the VMS can be deconstructed using a single, rather simple, method and sequence. I did the Voynich Lite stuff because I thought it was easy to understand and gave surprisingly consistent results for a large group of words that couldn't reasonably be considered 'cherry-picked'. And I knew that Voynich researchers would ask for proof - 503 (or even just the original 467 before adjustments) out of 505 is pretty good proof in my world.

I hope I haven't rambled too long.

Thank you.

Don of Tallahassee