The Voynich phallus

[Oocephalus]

The root in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. looks to me like two male animals (stallions?) with their penises intertwined. Maybe a coded reference to homosexuality? Or perhaps not; the hole in that page, which seems to have been intentionally created, has reminded You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. of female genitalia.

[-JKP-]

The root in You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. looks to me like two male animals (stallions?) with their penises intertwined. Maybe a coded reference to homosexuality? Or perhaps not; the hole in that page, which seems to have been intentionally created, has reminded You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. of female genitalia.

I think that interpretation is as good as any, at this point. Four legs, two tails, penises in the right location, and a hole in the page could certainly be interpreted as "the female principle", as it has sometimes been called.


Gnarly roots inherently seem to suggest familiar shapes (mandrake roots often do look like people, just as some ferns do actually look like upside-down sheep) and it was pretty common for medieval herbals and medieval imagery in general to include explicit or implicit double meanings, especially considering many people couldn't read and imagery was the primary form of communication next to speech. Even ecclesiastical imagery had some pretty amazing (explicit, gory, you-name-it) stuff that you would never find in contemporary religious imagery.

[VViews]

Ok, if we're really going to discuss phalli in plants/trees, then there should definitely be a mention of this mural from c.1265, Massa Marittima, Tuscany:
Bonus: ladies (albeit clothed) and baths included-
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[david]

Without wishing to be purile, no discussion of phallus in the VM is complete without mention of this You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view..
If you fold the folio and move the nymphs closer, you can clearly see him have his way with a nearby lass... ah hem.
Homo ludens!

[-JKP-]

Without wishing to be purile, no discussion of phallus in the VM is complete without mention of this You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view..
If you fold the folio and move the nymphs closer, you can clearly see him have his way with a nearby lass... ah hem.
Homo ludens!

Have you noticed just below him and to the right is a brown splot (like the ones inside stars) but the left arm of the damsel and the star aren't there (I'm assuming it was intended but not finished)?

[VViews]

david & JKP,
Thank you both for pointing these features out! I'd never noticed them...
To me it looks as if the person who added the yellow/brown paint tried to make the "splot" star-shaped to make up for the absent star.

Koen Gh,
sorry I hadn't noticed your question before: about the foot, I'm not too sure: Although I can see the similarities with a foot, I don't see the similarity to the way the Voynich artist depicts feet: there are many feet in various positions depicted in the VMS (nymphs in the "balneo" section in particular) but none of them seem to be shaped like that root, with the prominent ankle/heel and splayed toes look.

[Koen G]

Oocephalus: those are definitely penises. The two animals appear to be different species though. The one on the right is smaller, has a curved back and a fox-like tail. I'm not sure about the opening having been made on purpose though. Either that or the plant (and the one on the recto side) has been drawn around it. Wouldn't it be weird to damage vellum on purpose, possibly increasing the risk of further tearing? 

Vviews: that tree is awesome! About the foot not looking like the other ones... well look at the hand-root I posted earlier in this thread, it looks radically different from the other ones in the manuscript, and yet is clearly a hand, much more so than the other ones. If we get rid of the assumption that the manuscript was illustrated by one and the same person, there's no objection at all, and even one artist can use different styles.

David: haha, I think you are right. If he is supposed to sport an erection, it's more one of the slender type preferred by the ancients than one of the "fertility god" type though

[Sam G]

All this talk of phalluses in the VMS, and nobody has yet mentioned the most obvious one: the top nymph on the outer ring on f72r1 (next to <oaiin arary>), sporting male genitalia yet otherwise apparently female.

I don't think I've ever seen it mentioned anywhere.  I've wondered if people are aware of it.

[-JKP-]

All this talk of phalluses in the VMS, and nobody has yet mentioned the most obvious one: the top nymph on the outer ring on f72r1 (next to <oaiin arary>), sporting male genitalia yet otherwise apparently female.

I don't think I've ever seen it mentioned anywhere.  I've wondered if people are aware of it.

Sam, if you mean the Virgo ring, there are males in the inner circle at 2 o'clock and 11 o'clock (the one on the left looks like an older man, balding). and in the ring just above him another man with what I think is second man directly behind him (although the headdress might be suggestive of female but I'm leaning toward man).

Two more males in the outer ring at 2 and 3 o'clock and the lower one appears to be bald on top like the one in the inner circle on the left.


As far as iconography goes, since men had long hair in those days (and possibly also wore makeup) and can't be easily be distinguished by hair or even their faces in a small nude picture, the VMS illustrator tended to draw men with smaller, flatter bellies, no breasts, with the penis only sometimes shown.

eft.

[Sam G]

I'm talking about this:

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As far as the others that you point out, I guess I'd assumed for a while that the apparently male nymphs were really just badly drawn females.  People do seem to speak of them as being all female (as the term "nymph" itself suggests).  But looking at it now, it seems like that can't be correct.