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Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

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• Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  ReneZ > 24-09-2025, 12:51 AM

  (23-09-2025, 07:51 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (23-09-2025, 06:00 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But, by the way, are there multiple independent "Alchemical Herbals", or just one original text that got copied and mutated many times? 

  Well, without having looked into it, I would guess that the former is the case, but I am happy to be convinced otherwise.

  
  There is a good summary of one of the main books on this topic, by Philip Neal:
  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Barbrey > 24-09-2025, 01:14 AM

  (24-09-2025, 12:51 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (23-09-2025, 07:51 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (23-09-2025, 06:00 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But, by the way, are there multiple independent "Alchemical Herbals", or just one original text that got copied and mutated many times? 

  Well, without having looked into it, I would guess that the former is the case, but I am happy to be convinced otherwise.

  
  There is a good summary of one of the main books on this topic, by Philip Neal:
  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  
  Do you know if Neal or anyone else did a comparison of the 98 ‘alchemical’ plants found in these herbals to the VMS plants?

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Jorge_Stolfi > 24-09-2025, 02:33 AM

  (23-09-2025, 11:46 PM)Barbrey Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.From that article, the VMS is not really unusual when it comes to alchemical herbals and their authors’ variations on theme. But I m not sure that the differences between plant parts were unduly emphasized as in the VMS - it would be nteresting if they were. I’m not a medieval herbalist - have you seen any other illustrated manuscripts where the entire herbal is illustrated with this pattern of emphasis? Or conforms to your hypothesis?

  
  What do you mean "this pattern of emphasis"?   What about the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. posted by Marco Ponzi?  To me, the plants there do look very similar to those of the VMS in style.  Namely, equally fake-looking...
  
  (My favorite is #33, the plant with a QR code...)
  
  All the best, --jorge

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Barbrey > 24-09-2025, 03:04 AM

  (24-09-2025, 02:33 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (23-09-2025, 11:46 PM)Barbrey Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.From that article, the VMS is not really unusual when it comes to alchemical herbals and their authors’ variations on theme. But I m not sure that the differences between plant parts were unduly emphasized as in the VMS - it would be nteresting if they were. I’m not a medieval herbalist - have you seen any other illustrated manuscripts where the entire herbal is illustrated with this pattern of emphasis? Or conforms to your hypothesis?

  
  What do you mean "this pattern of emphasis"?   What about the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. posted by Marco Ponzi?  To me, the plants there do look very similar to those of the VMS in style.  Namely, equally fake-looking...
  
  (My favorite is #33, the plant with a QR code...)
  
  All the best, --jorge

  
  Thank you - I really should try to keep up with Marco P, obviously, because he always seems to have great work. I hadn’t seen this entire before - I would definitely group this with the VMS as being in the same style!
  
  And as it was an Alchemical Herbal, all of which show similarities in style and content from Northern Italy, then at least one of my questions is partially answered. The questions I now have are not so much related to similarity but related to how the VMS differs. 
  
  Re, not looking real: none of the Alchemical Herbals look particularly real, emphasis on the fantastical,according to Beasley, so VMS would be in similar company. 
  
  But I might be getting ahead of myself. My research has concentrated on the medico-alchemical and I’ve almost completely ignored the herbal pages. I’d like to hear Marco P and Matthias’s thoughts on this so should switch threads.

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  ReneZ > 24-09-2025, 09:04 AM

  (24-09-2025, 01:14 AM)Barbrey Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Do you know if Neal or anyone else did a comparison of the 98 ‘alchemical’ plants found in these herbals to the VMS plants?

  
  I have certainly looked, and I am sure so has Marco. 
  There are some details that are similar, which may or may not be coincidental. Most typical of that are animals or faces in roots, but these also occur in other herbals (yet much more rarely).
  See for example here (towards the end): You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Jorge_Stolfi > 24-09-2025, 02:31 PM

  (24-09-2025, 09:04 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.See for example here (towards the end): You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  
  Thanks Rene, I hadn't seen those slides yet...
  
  One detail: as you noted, there are only a few "color keys" on the VMS, and the one that is most readable seems to say "rot", "red" in German.  And keys like that one are seen in other herbals from Central Europe including a clear "rot" above some red-painted flowers.
  
  It is tempting to conclude that the VMS Scribe and/or Author were German.  But that "rot" key was not followed by the Painter, and the letters look rather awkward.
  
  So here is another theory: when the VMS Scribe was copying plant parts from another herbal, which happened to have been created in a German-speaking area, he saw the "rot" color key on the stem of that plant, and --- not speaking German -- thought that it was a Voynichese label that had to be copied too.  So he did, striving to interpret the German letters as Voynichese letters...
  
  All the best, --jorge

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Koen G > 25-09-2025, 08:38 AM

  (24-09-2025, 02:31 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.So here is another theory: when the VMS Scribe was copying plant parts from another herbal, which happened to have been created in a German-speaking area, he saw the "rot" color key on the stem of that plant, and --- not speaking German -- thought that it was a Voynichese label that had to be copied too.  So he did, striving to interpret the German letters as Voynichese letters...

  
  It's an interesting idea, though I'm not clear on the details. If the Voynich scribe was copying from another herbal, why would he think the color annotation is a Voynichese label? This is a bit awkward, since it assumes a document in Voynichese with German color annotations to begin with.
  
  For the color annotations, I see basically two options:
  
  1) Someone wrote them and intended them as color annotations, either for a later painter or as a "note to self" for later painting. For some reason unknown to us, these instructions were not followed very well. We have some evidence to suggest that not all colors were available in all stages of the painting process (see for example the lack of red in Herbal B pages, the limited color palette of the rosettes foldout...) and that the painter was, overall, not very good at painting.
  
  2) Or, as you suggest, a color annotation was copied from a source that had it. This would suggest a rather unquestioning following of an exemplar, which we presumably don't have anymore (or hasn't been digitized / linked to the Voynich yet).

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Jorge_Stolfi > 25-09-2025, 02:47 PM

  (25-09-2025, 08:38 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If the Voynich scribe was copying from another herbal, why would he think the color annotation is a Voynichese label? This is a bit awkward, since it assumes a document in Voynichese with German color annotations to begin with.

  
  The theory is based on the previous theory that the plant drawings in the Herbal section are mostly fake, because Author had only the Voynichese text for each plant (at best). So he instructed the Scribe to make up the drawings, based on sketches and assorted herbals that the Author provided for inspiration.  Probably including one or more "alchemical" herbals, since the drawings had to look exotic.  These cribs would be in plain or encrypted European languages, not in Voynichese, but their text was to be ignored by the Scribe.
  
  The new sub-theory is that one of those cribs was a German herbal, but the scribe did not understand German.  And he thought that the color key on the stem was Voynichese that had be copied too.
  
  

  (25-09-2025, 08:38 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.We have some evidence to suggest that not all colors were available in all stages of the painting process (see for example the lack of red in Herbal B pages.

  
  Indeed, the Dark Painter's palette apparently had only green, blue, ocher, and rusty reddish brown.  Only 2-3 pages in the whole book show significant painting in a more vivid red; most red details (like the dots on the calyxes of f2r "Centaurea" and the cheeks of Zodiac nymphs) were applied with a quill pen.  Perhaps the red ink was expensive, or had to be borrowed from another Scribe...
  
  I am not yet sure, but I see evidence that the transparent yellow color was applied by another Yellow Painter, well before the Dark Painter did his thing.
  
  All the best, --jorge

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Koen G > 25-09-2025, 03:30 PM

  Going further off-topic here, but I need to point this out: within the Herbal section, the abundance vs near-absence of red is a standalone feature of A vs B, which appears unrelated to the use of other pigments and techniques.

• RE: Alchemical Symbolism in the VMS

  Barbrey > 25-09-2025, 04:35 PM

  (25-09-2025, 03:30 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Going further off-topic here, but I need to point this out: within the Herbal section, the abundance vs near-absence of red is a standalone feature of A vs B, which appears unrelated to the use of other pigments and techniques.

  
  Correct me if I’m wrong, doesn’t that suggest that there is a connection between Scribe B and the painter who ran out of red?
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