The Modern Forgery Hypothesis

[eggyk]

All that being said... and since this was part of the premise of your request... we can both see that the Theorem has been fulfilled in a more direct way than the technical minimum of some small and unfounded possibility he saw that astrolabe, because all these examples of octēbre in manuscript form fulfill one of the requirements, that the source, if not in print, be in a place he is known to, or could reasonably assumed to have possibly visited. Several of your links do show this.

I admit that is is possible, albeit quite unlikely, that voynich saw the form Octēbre -either on an astrolabe or in a french book of hours- or alternatively that he came across the form octembre in one of these historical books, and then chose to shorten it the same way septēbre, nouēbre and decēbre often got used.

Now the July is still up in the air. And as I've related, I think that the very indistinct and vague form would make it so difficult to pin down what spelling was actually meant by it... so I would reserve judgment on what that spelling was. I have to say that I do intend to pore over your spreadsheet, and look at all examples carefully, and perhaps I could form an opinion on this... not really so far though, not that it matters to anyone else!

Fair enough, but I would say that everyone would agree that the word has 'oll' in the middle of it. Such a spelling -no matter what comes before or after- is unattested afaik. Previously unattested forms do trickle in as we do this work sometimes. For example, we have a lone 'jugnius' for june instead of julius in one of the latin entries. 

Or similarly, we have You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (wonderful) unique zodiacs that I only found a couple of days ago:

           

I doubt we'll see these designs in another manuscript, nor I assume in later printed works. It's a good reminder that some things were genuinely unique back then. If the VMS had copied the above designs, but the above manuscript was lost to a fire, we would be saying such designs are completely unattested. That is the nature of medieval works. Hell, it feels like every time I open a german manuscript I find a new, ridiculous unique spelling of something or other. 

Can I also place this link on my blog? No problem if not of course.

You are welcome to add the zodiac spreadsheet onto the blog, but as it is connected to my personal google account I would prefer the form to be a link to the Voynich Ninja You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (which contains the spreadsheet link), so nefarious actors (or AI scrubbers) can't freely access/provide the share-link without registering.   Sorry for being awkward! 

The month name spreadsheet is owned by Koen, so you would require his permission.

I keep coming back to this thread just to enjoy reading Mr. Ovoplasma's aliases

They are meant entirely lovingly, no yoke (but I'm not sure if the Eggster is a Mr. or not, not that it matters. Do we?)

Hahaha