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The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
- The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
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RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Battler > 31-07-2026, 06:15 AM
(12-07-2026, 09:46 AM)Noctula Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Not exactly my turf and not exactly Chinese either, but resting in the same geographic area, anyone considered Hangul as a possibility?
I have, I proposed the Korean hypothesis once, also because it makes chronologically sense - the Voynich Manuscript has been dated to the early 15th century and that's exactly when King Sejong was devising a new writing system for Korean, so this could have been an earlier attempt at it.
The Hangul writing system assembles letters into syllable blocks with an initial slot, a medial vowel slot, an optional final slot, so text is a linear sequence of internally slotted blocks, which structurally is, in my modest understanding, what Voynichese slot grammar does, at least in principle.
Excluding many dissimilarities: Hangul and Voynichese use the same type of mechanical blueprint to build their tokens. Hangul uses that blueprint to map the infinite variations of human speech, while the Voynich system uses it to heavily lock down and restrict its underlying code.
Mechanically opposite objective functions while the blueprint is same and thus purpose-neutra
But as said initially, not really my gaming area.
-Noctula -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
rikforto > 31-07-2026, 04:57 PM
(31-07-2026, 06:15 AM)Battler Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The Hangul writing system assembles letters into syllable blocks with an initial slot, a medial vowel slot, an optional final slot, so text is a linear sequence of internally slotted blocks, which structurally is, in my modest understanding, what Voynichese slot grammar does, at least in principle.
If you treat the jamo as letters, which they essentially are, I would not expect that you get the remarkable structure of Voynichese letter ordering because the finals significantly overlap with the initials. I'm not sure I've seen anyone run the entropy statistics on Romanized Korean text---and if someone is interested in tackling that challenge I have some thoughts about how to do it---but it has a very different quality from Pinyin or Chữ Quốc Ngữ. -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Damiro > 02-08-2026, 05:28 AM
If you take a look at the ancient Chinese compasses they used for sailing (ancient drawings as well just google for "Ancient Chinese sailing compass 1400s and 1500s), you will see that there is a similarity between the Voynich drawings and whatever they used back then to sail the seas... It is quite possible that it were an inspiration for some of those drawings. Now, I do not think that language is actual Chinese or any other language, my theory is that it is a set of indexes except for the parts that look like old German (will make a post about it should mods accept me to this forum).
Cheers! -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
ololololo > 02-08-2026, 03:43 PM
Does the Chinese theory allow for the possibility that the author knew and could read the characters, but simply created a different system for writing them?
In general, this may be possible. In any case, the book was clearly intended for sale or some other exchange, as there is no longer any point in bringing an unreadable book to Europe. -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Jorge_Stolfi > 03-08-2026, 12:06 AM
(02-08-2026, 03:43 PM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Does the Chinese theory allow for the possibility that the author knew and could read the characters, but simply created a different system for writing them?
If the author lived for a few years in the place, he probably picked up a few dozen basic Chinese characters. But, AFAIK, to read a modern Chinese newspaper one needs to know between 2000 and 5000 characters. Chinese students reach that level at the end of high school, learning a couple hundred characters per year. Medical books like the Shennong Bencao use many specialized and old characters that not even a normal Chinese speaker can't read.
Therefore, it is highly unlikely (to put it mildly) that the Author could read those medical books himself.
Quote:In any case, the book was clearly intended for sale or some other exchange, as there is no longer any point in bringing an unreadable book to Europe.
The Author possibly expected to get some benefit from bringing that book to Europe. Maybe he was a doctor himself, and hoped to learn some new remedies. Or maybe he just imagined that doctors back home would be very interested.
Anyway, I believe that hist goal at first was just to get the book in a form that he could understand, to the extent that his knowledge of the spoken language would allow. The VMS we see today is not the result of that Dictation exercise. It is a cleaned and edited version of his notes, that he prepared in Europe. Perhaps in the hope of selling it to an interested doctor or scholar. Perhaps as a legacy for a disciple or heir.
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Battler > 08-08-2026, 07:41 AM
(31-07-2026, 04:57 PM)rikforto Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
That would depend on the romanization. McCune-Reischauer, predominantly used in North Korea, yields neater structure than the southern romanization, and then there's also the second, unofficial southern romanization which is based on English sound equivalently (it's how they end up with eg. Eun-suh instead of Eun-seo, or, in McCune-Reischauer, Ŭn-sŏ).(31-07-2026, 06:15 AM)Battler Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The Hangul writing system assembles letters into syllable blocks with an initial slot, a medial vowel slot, an optional final slot, so text is a linear sequence of internally slotted blocks, which structurally is, in my modest understanding, what Voynichese slot grammar does, at least in principle.
If you treat the jamo as letters, which they essentially are, I would not expect that you get the remarkable structure of Voynichese letter ordering because the finals significantly overlap with the initials. I'm not sure I've seen anyone run the entropy statistics on Romanized Korean text---and if someone is interested in tackling that challenge I have some thoughts about how to do it---but it has a very different quality from Pinyin or Chữ Quốc Ngữ.
But statistics should really be run on Korean jamo written in sequence instead of in blocks, rather than on romanized Korean, and if possible, it should be 14th century Korean. Or even better, a Chinese text with Korean pronunciation, for which they back then even invented special jamo for sounds only found in Chinese.
Perhaps the Voynich Manuscript is a retranscription by a European of such a Koreanized version of the Shennon Bencaojing, written by preliminary new Korean writing system devised by King Sejong under European influence before he decided to scrap it and instead come up with Hangul based on Phags-pa (it is theorized that the *guo* script one contemporary Korean source names as the basis may have been a veiled shorthand for *mengguo*, ie. Mongol, as the Mongols used Phags-pa that was originally devised for Tibetan, but it became taboo by that time in the Sinosphere to openly name the Mongols)? The time period fits, and Koreanized Chinese would fit what Mr. Stolfi is saying as well. -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Jorge_Stolfi > 08-08-2026, 11:18 AM
(08-08-2026, 07:41 AM)Battler Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Perhaps the Voynich Manuscript is a retranscription by a European of such a Koreanized version of the Shennon Bencaojing
At this point I cannot rule out that possibility.
Korea has some points in favor as the place where the Starred Parags section (SPS) was redacted. It would be not affected the xenophobic policies prevalent in China at the time. I gather that the Shennong Bencaojing (SBJ) was highly regarded in Korean medical literature. A local doctor reading the SBJ would have read it from a Chinese edition, character by character, with some local pronunciation -- which is consistent with what is seen in the Voynichese text.
On the other hand, any influence to or from Hangul seems unlikely, since Hangul was designed around 1440. Afaik there is no evidence that European alphabetic scripts influenced or inspired the development of Hangul. It is a completely original design, based on the mechanics of articulation of each sound -- an idea that does not seem to have occurred anywhere else in the world, not even in modern "phonetic" alphabets like Shavian and Inukitut.
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Battler > 09-08-2026, 12:07 AM
(08-08-2026, 11:18 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.On the other hand, any influence to or from Hangul seems unlikely, since Hangul was designed around 1440. Afaik there is no evidence that European alphabetic scripts influenced or inspired the development of Hangul.
I'm actually positing it may be a pre-Hangul attempt by King Sejong. I'd imagine he'd have tried several different things before settling on Hangul.
Quote:It is a completely original design, based on the mechanics of articulation of each sound -- an idea that does not seem to have occurred anywhere else in the world, not even in modern "phonetic" alphabets like Shavian and Inukitut.
That's King Sejong's official explanation, but there's the alternate explanation, with some evidence to it, that the consonants were actually based on phags-pa letters used by the Mongols. Given that it is known that naming the Mongols at the time was taboo to the point it would have angered the chinese, it's not surprising that he hid the true origins and that even contemporary sources simply speak of it having been inspired by a "guo" script.
This is a chart demonstrating the similarities between hangul and phags-pa:
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Video on interesting Medieval trivia, and reverse Marco Polo
Jorge_Stolfi > 11-08-2026, 07:49 AM
This video has several interesting Medieval trivia
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
The You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is relevant to this thread, as it describes a "reverse Marco Polo" and his failed attempts to convince European royalty to join a Persian Khan in a war against the Mamluks of Egypt.
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against
Linda > 23-08-2026, 05:34 PM
(It turns out that the correct name for that section is "Remedies", that is, medicinal substances -- what pharmacists of the time called "simples". But who cares about the truth?)
This above (from Antonio's thread) just reminded me to ask for clarification. You had said that you found a term in a recipe re red rooster, that matched a vms word which appears to occur at the same frequency, and that sounded very promising.
However it did not do so in the copy I had found at the time. Can you show this correspondence visually with whatever copy you are using and the starred paragraph you have linked with it, just in case i didn't compare with the correct one? It seems to me that if this is true, that other correspondences would be able to be made.