06-10-2026, 11:37 AM
Quote:The one issue I'm having with this is the Taccola connection. Why would it be necessary to copy some obscure bridges or sun faces from an obscure personal sketchbook, when you readily have hundreds if not thousands of manuscripts with nice illustrations available at libraries, to be inspired from?
He hadn't "thousands" of manuscripts available.
Today we truly have access to thousands of manuscripts digitalised online but that was not the case of Voynich artist. He could have easy access only to 10 or 20 illustrated manuscripts available at his library.
Somehow a book of Taccola or more probably some copy of it was among them.
For me referrences to Taccola push a possible date of VM creation a bit later than it was previously expected, maybe to 1440s. In 1440s it was over 10 years after Taccola made his autograph (the original copy) so other copies could appear.
Some later copies have stuff giving me Rosettes vibes that the original doesn't have, like for example this map: