(24-10-2017, 03:52 AM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.In the Hebrew MS b3 linked, it seems like lines of a varying number of dots are used to either mark certain words, or connect them to a short note on the side. Might our scribe be using a Hebrew convention to denote that the "a" should be an "O" in his opinion?

There's not a single "o" on that folio that is fat and wiggly like the shape under the dots. They are all round and relatively smooth.

Also, when something was corrected in the second line, it was drawn over, there's no line of dots and another shape some distance away.

I would guess that the scribe was confused by "Maria" and "Mirjam". With regard to the reading of Dr. Damschen ( see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ), he may have thought of the sister of Moses ( deliverance from slavery => "... doors out of the dungeon" ? ). This could have been a problem in "Christianization".

I took a more in depth look at what was going on with the various types of Hebrew dots, which I will separate into three categories. 1)puncta extraordinaria, 2) The dots in Koen Gh's example, 3) the dots in bi3mw's example.

1) Puncta extraordinaria:  A feature of the Masoretic tradition, these actually appear to be related to very specific words.
They appear exclusively over words and nowhere else. The obvious reason for this is so that they cannot be confused with the diacritical marks indicating vowels. They appear over only 15 words in the Hebrew Bible (listed You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. p.32). According to the authority on the subject, Paul de Lagarde (1863), all the manuscripts which feature them belong to this masoretic tradition and they are all copied from one archetype (see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view., p. 80). So, I do not believe that what we see in 116v can be related to the masoretic tradition of puncta extraordinaria directly.

2) Koen Gh's example (Geneva CL 145, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.). Let's look at this in the wider context of the whole page, which really helps elucidate what we are looking at. The page features large Hebrew letters. The feature Koen Gh noted is near a large, ornate version of the letter Chet. Underneath the Chet there are two diacritical vowel markers. These are known as tseirei, and they indicate the sound short/medium "eh", like in "egg". So this tells us to pronounce the large letter as "Che".
Next to each large letter on the page, there is a small text, and each time, above it, there is a row of four small circles, sometimes blank, sometimes filled in. The small circles in each row feature diacritical vowel markers. In the case of the small circles near the Chet, the circles are each marked by three diagonal dots underneath them. These are kubbutz, and indicate the long "oo" sound, as in "blue".
Why the small circles? According to the wikipedia entry on Hebrew diacritics, such circles are used to stand for "whatever hebrew letter is used" : in other words, they are used when it is the diacritical vowel markers themselves that are the focal point. In this sense, diacritical markers related to a small circle like this indicate a pure vowel sound. In the example above the text near the large Chet, the small circle with three diagonal dots (kubbutz) under it conveys a pure "oo" sound. They are not puncta extraordinaria. They may be related to the small text beneath them in other ways.
For this reason, now that I have viewed this symbol in the broader context of the CL 145 page, I don't believe it is related to what we see in 116v, in spite of very tempting visual similarities.

3) I have yet to read more about the type of dots in Add MS 15299  offered by bi3mw, but will update when/if I do find something.

Thanks, VViews! I think your overview is correct.
I must say that the MS linked by bi3 seems to offer the closest parallel. If you browse through it, you see that rows of dots are used on various pages in the margin. They are clearly not diacritics, and even more certainly not puncta extraordinaria. 

They look like the equivalent of an arrow, or those hands in medieval MSS that point out certain passages. Though I'm not sure. The interesting thing is that at least one of them points towards a circle.

Marginal lines and dots leading to a particular statement in a manuscript are very common, in the same category as manicules and nota symbols. One can usually recognize them by context.

The dots in the VMS are oddly positioned if they are intended to point to something and usually there is some text or at least a letter or two to indicate a comment, impression, or correction. I don't think the "rock" on this page looks like the letter "o" in this person's handwriting or any other hand that writes in Gothic cursive script.

If it's a "take note" or correction symbol, it's very unconventional.

The MS bi3 linked even has these lines that don't lead to anything.

See right margin: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
Top left a strange one: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

Again a curly one in the right margin: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

At least this should show that a line of dots can be used as a pointer, no matter what the circle is.

It's interesting that the Hebrew manuscript had dots rather than manicules because Torah pointers were sometimes dressed with a yad, so it seems like a natural transition to use this in manuscripts as well.

The dots are amazingly fine compared to the regular penwork.

It may be a silly question, but could someone used to calligraphy explain how they were made?
I should think that with a quill any attempt to "dab" the nib would have created a larger ink blot.
Are we sure we're not just looking at some sort of strange ink blot?

How fine this dots are depends on the bird the feathers were taken from and how the quill was cut, the common writing quill was made from goose wings, but other birds and feather types were used as well, especially for drawing. Not to mention the possibility that a hair from a brush could have been used to make these dots

Interesting. But could this indicate a different implement was used for the dots?
In which case, for what reason?