(07-01-2020, 05:13 PM)Anton Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I think it's useful to sum up what we have of the last line so far.

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a) gas mich - "quickly" ("gas" as "gahes") + "mich", the whole phrase making it "so take quickly me".



pros: "gas" has examples, "mich" is a common word
cons: no space in between, the word order is not perfert ("take quickly me" instead of "take me quickly")



in this variant, "mich" should impersonate the spell, otherwise makes no sense (unless the author himself wants to be taken by someone whom he addresses)

Taking this reading, then we see the orb (personification of the scribe?) being born up to Maria, with the inserted cross afterwards.

The scribe came to the end of the prayer, and in a fit of passion drew the circle of himself being born up to the Virgin Maria and added in the cross above the name.

But, again, that's not the end of the prayer, the prayer ends with the word "maria" and what follows appears to be a recipe.

As I argue above, he may have blindly copied the spell from elsewhere without understanding of what it means (or once meant), and abia maria would be no more to him than a usual "ave maria" component of such charms. He would not perceive it as his personal prayer.

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The dotted line may be more complicated than it looks at a glance, I've shown to the right what I mean.

   

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Or, I think, in fact it's been thus:

   

Anton, does that scan also show the stuff that is scuffed and scraped under the Voynichese on the left?

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(09-01-2020, 01:33 PM)davidjackson Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....
Taking this reading, then we see the orb (personification of the scribe?) being born up to Maria, with the inserted cross afterwards.

...

Yes, it's quite possible it's upward rather than downward (ascension, resurrection, or returning to the beginning). In charms, some of which I have examples that I'll post, the alpha and omega are not always at the beginning and end of the charm. Frequently they are mentioned within a charm. Alpha and omega tends to especially show up in divinations, spells cast by people who want something (or want to know something).

It's not a scan, but a specific tone curve that I'm applying to the regular Beinecke scan. Helps to see the traces where ink faded out. However, not much helpful where ink has been erased. For those cases, nothing can be more helpful than naked eye and a magnifying glass. Because when you look with your eye, you do that at an angle and can immediately see the relief on the paper. Same thing with those treaty scans which I posted about in another thread - it's impossible to distinguish embossed stamp from a mere image thereof on the scan, but just one direct look is enough.

I think I understand what you mean, but I can reveal nothing definite.

On the contrary, the "p v" (or maybe "p y") under the capital symbol is perfectly visible (as some other symbol halfways from M to "p v"):

   

To all appearance, something has been written, and partly in Voynichese, in two lines under aror.sheey palden ubren, and in up to four lines under so nim gas mich, but this has been very thoroughly scraped off.

I can only add that this is the portion of the book where some information of the date and author is usually expected to appear, so it's really a pity these erased scribbles did not attract attention of those having the opportunity to work with the MS.

Anton,
Could you clarify which bit you are looking at, please? I've spent some time and still can't see what you're referring to.
Are you sure you're not seeing bleedthrough from the reverse side? The parchment is pretty thin there.

As I said, it's pretty difficult to tell. Yes, the parchment is thin and applying the tone curve reveals the lines from the opposite side. That's probably what shows up below "so nim gas mich"

The two zones to the left are uncertain, I marked them with red ellipses. On the "normal" scan you'll see how the surface in these places is scuffed.

   

Unfortunately, there's a lot of bleedthrough from the other side of the folio (especially on the left and the lower portion), but when I look very carefully at the Beinecke scans, I see scraped parts under the Voynichese and suggestions of what might have been a line or two of text and possibly also a drawing lower down near the left (a vertical drawing). But it's just not clear enough to be sure.

Hey Anton

Weren't people a little angry when you smeared the blue ink on it?