No text, but a visual code

[Antonio García Jiménez]

Trying to understand every detail of the Rosettes foldout can lead to a dead end, because some elements may simply reflect the author's whimsical choice—such as the section of crenellated wall connecting two of the lower spheres.

  What matters is the forest, not the trees. And what the overall image conveys is the author's desire to show his conception of the universe and how astral influence is transmitted. The circles we see are the celestial spheres, as indicated by the fact that two of them are tent roofs and another features a baldachin, serving to represent celestial domes metaphorically as well. And the central sphere can be nothing other than the outermost sphere, where the fixed stars are located. And all those tubes we see represent the way astral influence is channeled—originating here and radiating throughout the universe all the way to Earth.

   If I am asked which planet corresponds to each sphere, I say I do not know, because the author does not seem to have been much concerned with that. It does seem certain, however, that the upper-left sphere corresponds to the Moon, as we can see crescent shapes on it.

   Throughout the codex, we see the sun, the moon, and stars—many stars. That is why I believe that, in the authors' conception, the planets do not play a significant role. Naturally, at that time, planetary conjunctions—such as that of Saturn and Jupiter—were highly significant for astrological predictions. However, as I mentioned, the astrology found in the Voynich manuscript is of a different nature; it appears to focus on the influence of the fixed stars and, perhaps, the Moon.