Voynichese is a numeric cipher?

[Jorge_Stolfi]

Oh, I’ll add one more thing — couldn’t this be just a coincidence due to the fact that the VMS cipher is based on numerical logic? If you managed to create the proper number system, then it’s possible that someone else managed it too.

Indeed, the number system I proposed in that first webpage was NOT meant to be THE coding used in the VMS.  Besides the "slot with empty alternatives" structure (which resulted in the compact lexeme length distribution), it tried to vaguely imitate only the occurrence pattern of VMS gallows letters:  one per word, with similar glyphs on both sides.  But I did not even try to see whether that number system would match the VMS statistics and structure in any other way. 

If the VMS indeed used a codebook cipher, I expected that its encoding of the numbers would be quite different from that scheme.

But for some reason, I’m very skeptical about the idea of a “number system”. I think the author has no need to invent one.

I abandoned that idea at that time because a codebook cipher would be extremely hard to write and read.  It would be good for diplomatic or military letters or other short documents where secrecy was vital and justified the work; but it seemed unnecessary for a medical book, even if it was a hoax or contained "heretic" or precious secrets.  

IIRC correctly, someone did find a book (a Masonic "missal"?) that was entirely in codebook cipher.  But I don't recall how long it was, and I wonder how many other examples there have been.

All the best, --stolfi