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Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

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Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread
RE: [split] Cvetka's theory thread

ReneZ > 04-02-2025, 01:31 PM

The problem is that such well-defined numerical analyses (with clear results) are either not understood or not appreciated by a lot of people who have a proposed solution.

Cvetka, BessAgratianin and others exemplify this. I write this without any intention of malice or ill will, but it is clear from their posts.
This makes discussions 'less successful'.
RE: [split] Cvetka's theory threadp

VoyBear > 24-03-2025, 04:51 PM

(27-08-2021, 02:06 AM)cvetkakocj@rogers.com Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Koen, thank you for this favour.
I would like to assure everybody that my theory about VM language is not based on my nationalistic feelings, or on my wishful thinking. It also does not mean that I regard myself smarter than other VM researchers, who had enough faith in the manuscript to study it and promoted it, hoping that somebody would recognize the language. I was just lucky that EVA script appeared on my computer four years ago. Although EVA was not perfect, I was able to recognize enough words to convince me that the language of the VM was medieval Slovenian, which was much different than Slovenian language today.
Slovenian language is one of the most archaic language (which is why so many theories are proposing ancient languages). It defies the Google translation and because of many prefixes and suffixes, the number of words that would be spelled exactly the same as in the VM would not be found in the medieval dictionaries.

For the past four years, I have been working on the VM from various perspectives, organizing my notes. Alenka Čuš, a professional Slovenian linguist, is helping me introducing my theory on my web page.

It is not my intention to translate the VM, because even if I could, such work would require more people to collaborate. And there is also a question how to present it to the members of the Voynich Community who are not familiar with Slavic language. On my blog, I introduced comparison with Slovenian and VM grammar which could be helpful to those who are researching Voynich prefixes, suffixes and line position. I also compared the VM with various 15th century documents from Slovenia in Latin, German and Slovenian. A lot more material has been digitalized, which enables me better comparison with the script and vocabulary.

I had explored other Slavic languages, particularly Czeck and Croatian, because the dialect used in the VM contains the elements of both, but the Vocabulary and visual images are reflecting the religious and mystical images of the Alsace culture from where the foreign author came from.

cant you atleast translate the first page or two ?
RE: How quickly did the VMS leave the possession of those who understood it?

cvetkakocj@rogers.com > 03-12-2025, 04:20 AM

According to my research, the author could have been a well-known 15th century mystical poet, writer, theologian, educator Nicholas Kempf, Carthusian prior from Strasbourg. He spent 30 years as a prior in two different Carthusian monasteries in Slovenia at the time when Basil Council was promising Church reform that would allow the use of vernacular languages in liturgy. After his studies in Vienna, he taught there for a few years before he chose to enter the Carthusian monastery at Gaming, one of the most prestigious in the German speaking world at the time. Several of his faculty members and students entered that monastery and later became leaders in Slavic charterhouses. This means that he had to learn Slavic language, most likely Slovenian and Czech. Throughout his life, he also kept in touch with many humanistic academics at Vienna University. It is well documented that he was a poet, yet none of his poems were found. Since large floral part of the Voynich manuscript looks like poems, this could be his poems. It is also documented that he was a mystic. His most famous work is Mystical Theology, theoretical book on mystical religious experience. The weird pictures in biological part, and in Cosmographia, could be a reflection of mystical experience.

Lisa F. Davis conclusion that the Voynich Manuscript was originally unbound makes perfect sense. From my own experience.
As a poet, I had a habit of writing my poems on loose sheets, never in the notebook. The reason for this is that the artistic inspiration does not come at once and not as controlled as writing a novel. The author did not write hundred poems at one sitting.

As a leader of Carthusian monasteries, his responsibility was also to teach monks and lay brothers the language, the herbal healing, prepare sermons. This would likely be done on loose shits of parchment.
As he was moved from one monastery to the other, he would have carried with him unbound folios, including at the time of his last transfer back to Gamming Charterhouse where he died in 1497, at the age of 97.

The Voynich manuscript could have been written by him alone over a long period of time, or some loose folios could be written by his Slovenian humanistic friends, his students.
It would also be more reasonable to expect the monastery to have loose parchment on stock, rather than bound books, although many 15th century and earlier manuscripts were written after the parchment was made into a book. With the monks fleeing monasteries because of Turkish incursions, there was probably a lot of old parchment on stock.

My dating of the Voynich Manuscript is assumed by certain events that are reflected in the VM.
Kempf started writing poetry as a student at the university, that is several years before he entered the monastery in 1440, at the age of 40.

Biological section most likely coincided with his mystical experience. Nicholas Kempf wrote his Mystical Theology in 1459, which means that he must have had the experience prior to that.
The sketches of open swimming pools could have been created at that time also, because as a prior of the jurklošter charterhouse, Kempf bought a house in Laško where the Carthusians build the open swimming pool for public baths. Could the pictures be the sketches for an open pool to be build?

In the expectation of the use of vernacular languages in religion, Kempf could have invented some letterforms to make reading less confusing for Slovenians living in different kingdoms with different writing conventions. Since Church reforms were not implemented, and since Slovenian dynasty of Counts of Celje was extinct during Kempf's life time, there was no more apparent need for written Slovenian language which existed in oral form for centuries. German and Latin writing became a norm. Besides, the use of the printing presses most likely made tall Voynich Letters unpractical. First Slovenian book was printed in 1550 by a Slovenian Protestant writer in Tubingen.

The picture of a 'castle' looks like the Jurklošter Carthusian monastery in the valley between two mountains.
The other church looks like Maria Laach Abbey, which was related to Carinthian dukes.

While the use of 8-like d, and 9-like y, as well as EVA r (VM glyph) went out of use, by the time Kempf retired at Gamming, the same shape of r is still used in the word OROR, which indicates that the words in marginalia could have been written by Kempf in his old age, when he adopted German writing convention, but he still used some VM glyphs. It could also have been written by somebody close to him.

There was one Slovenian academic, Kempf's contemporary, Thomas of Celje, who was a bishop of Constance, and had been very close to Emperor Frederic III and his son Maximillian. He died the same year as Kempf. There is some speculation in Slovenian sources that Thomas might have written Slovenian Dictionary and grammar book around the year 1470, but the book was never found. Could the pages with the labels be considered a dictionary and a grammar book? Thomas died in the same year as Kempf? Could he have spent his last days at Gamming as well?

Perhaps, the other monks at Gamming were not able to read Slovenian, but if the loose papers were found in Kempf's possession at the time of his death, they would have been aware that the writing was valuable because he was one of the most famous 15th century mystic and Carthusian reformer. The binding might have been done by the monks soon after his death.

According to Stefan Guzy, Wiedemann obtained many books he sold to Emperor Rudolf at Gaming Charterhouse. Could Voynich Manuscript be one of them?

The Czech language in the 15th century was quite similar to Slovenian, however the phonetic Slovenian, in which I believe the manuscript is written, would not be understood by people around the Emperor.
RE: Cvetka's Theory Thread

tavie > 03-12-2025, 01:11 PM

Hi Cvetka. You've been asked several times before to keep your theory to this thread. I've moved your latest post back here. If you want to talk about how other topics interact with your theory, you should post about them here like Antonio does with his thread.
RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

pjburkshire > 05-02-2026, 08:11 PM

Means & Motive

If you watch enough TV detective/crime drama shows, you learn that solving a who-dun-it mystery all starts with means and motive.

I'm also going to start with a few assumptions.

1a
The Voynich Manuscript really was created in the early 15th century (radiocarbon dating between 1404 and 1438). It is not a 20th century forgery by Wilfrid Voynich.

1b
The Voynich Manuscript was created in Europe.

2
More than one person was involved in the creation of the Voynich Manuscript. This touches on the "means" part of the mystery. Aside from the claims of multiple scribes, I don't see a single monk hiding in his room having the "means" to create such a manuscript.

3a
The people who created the Voynich Manuscript were not trying to hide information. They were trying to share information. They were trying to educate.

3b
The Voynich Manuscript was created as a legitimate attempt to communicate information that the creators thought was important to preserve and share. It was not created as a joke or a hoax or a mystical scam or a secret cipher.

3c
The Voynich Manuscript was written in an actual living (of that time) European language, not a constructed language, but only a constructed (non-Latin) alphabet. Sort of like Star Wars Aurebesh is used to write English words to make them look Star Wars-ish but with the goal to educate, not entertain.

4
The language of the Voynich Manuscript is not Latin. This touches on the "motive" part of the mystery. Who in Europe in the early 15th century had "motive" to write in a language other than Latin in a time when "everybody" in Europe used Latin?

5
The Voynich Manuscript was at one time in the possession of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II (1552-1612).

From Wikipedia:

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"Rudolf succeeded his father, Maximilian II, on 12 October 1576.[5] In 1583, he moved the court to Prague.[9]"

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"Marci's 1665/1666 cover letter to Kircher says that, according to his friend the late Raphael Mnishovsky, the book had once been bought by Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Bohemia for 600 ducats, 67.5 ozt (2.10 kg) of actual gold weight. (Mnishovsky had died in 1644, more than 20 years earlier, and the deal must have occurred before Rudolf's abdication in 1611, at least 55 years before Marci's letter. However, Karl Widemann sold books to Rudolf II in March 1599.)"

From these two entries, I'm assuming Rudolf II was in Prague in 1599 when he may have purchased the Voynich Manuscript.

Even if the Voynich Manuscript can be placed in Prague, Kingdom of Bohemia, the Czech Kingdom, in 1599, that does not mean it was created locally. It could have been created in China or at any point in between. But, it seems like a reasonable place to start. Or, to consider, if all other languages in the area have been exhausted.

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"Bohemia retained its name and formal status as a separate Kingdom of Bohemia until 1918, known as a crown land within the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and its capital Prague was one of the empire's leading cities. The Czech language (called the Bohemian language in English usage until the 19th century)[10] was the main language of the Diet and the nobility until 1627 (after the Bohemian Revolt was suppressed)."

What was happening in the area around Prague in the 1404 to 1438 time period? Was there any group of people in that time and place who would have had the means and motive to create something like the Voynich Manuscript, a non-Latin book?

Who in Europe didn't like Latin?

I can think of one person.

Jan Hus

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"...a Czech theologian and philosopher who became a Church reformer and the inspiration of Hussitism, a key predecessor to Protestantism, and a seminal figure in the Bohemian Reformation. Hus is considered to be the first Church reformer, even though some designate the theorist John Wycliffe.[a][2][3][4][5] His teachings had a strong influence, most immediately in the approval of a reformed Bohemian religious denomination and, over a century later, on Martin Luther."

"The name Hus, however, means 'goose' in Bohemian (now called Czech), and he was a century later referenced as a "Bohemian goose" in a dream given to Frederick, the Elector of Saxony."

"Hus was a strong advocate for the Czechs and the Realists, and he was influenced by the writings of John Wycliffe.[26] Although Church authorities banned many of Wycliffe's works in 1403, Hus translated Trialogus into Czech and helped to distribute it.[27]"

Aside from the continuing question of the mystery language, I still affirm that most of the non-plant pages of the Voynich Manuscript are about ensoulment in the tradition of Aristotle (successive souls: vegetative, animal, and finally rational). I still affirm that the star-like images are not representations of stars in the night sky but that they represent pre-born souls. I still affirm that most of the non-plant pages are about the journey of the pre-born soul from Heaven to ensoulment during pregnancy and then birth.

For years Cvetka has said that there are words in the Voynich Manuscript that look like words in the language used in Slovenia. The Slovenian language and the Czech language are both Slavic languages. I do not speak or read Slovenian or Czech but it has been reported that they share many common words due to their shared Slavic language ancestry.

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cvetkakocj@rogers.com
24-08-2021
"The Voynich Manuscript consists of normal language used in Slovenia in the 15th century. The examples could be found on my web page Voynich Slovenian Mystery in the long article on the VM grammar. Since then, I have discovered another manuscript with minims shaped with upward flourishes."

I would really love to hear what scholars of the Hussites and the Hussite Wars (1419-1434) think of the possibility that the Voynich Manuscript could have been created in the Czech language by a group in the Hussite movement. Unfortunately, for many decades the Voynich Manuscript has been so maligned as a hoax, scam, or forgery that legitimate scholars of history fear to tarnish their reputations by having any association with the Voynich Manuscript.

The first obstacle is to convince people that the Voynich Manuscript is a legitimate historical artifact worthy of study.

If the Voynich Manuscript really was created by a group in the Hussite movement, it could be the only surviving work of a people who have been almost erased from history.

Bohemian (Czech), not Bavarian.

I'm probably not posting in the preferred thread. Feel free to move as desired. I couldn't find a Czech language thread. I'm posting here because I quoted the very first message in this thread and I appreciate the work done by Cvetka. I think the similarities between Slovenian and Czech are an important clue that has not been given adequate attention.
RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

Typpi > 06-02-2026, 10:48 AM

(03-12-2025, 04:20 AM)cvetkakocj@rogers.com Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.that are reflected in the VM.

Do you mean in the actual pages of the VM or it's history / provenance?
RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

pjburkshire > 22-02-2026, 12:50 PM

When the facts don't fit my ideas, I am willing to give up my ideas.

I communicated with Professor Thomas A. Fudge, a Professor of Medieval History at the University of New England, Armidale, NSW, Australia. He is supposed to be one of the top experts on Jan Hus and the Hussite movement. He didn't think much of my idea that the Voynich Manuscript could have been created by followers of Jan Hus. Plus, the Old Czech language isn't looking all that promising. So, I am going to put this idea to the side for now.

I am not ready to say that the mystery language of the Voynich Manuscript is a constructed language but I am forced by the facts to consider that it may be a natural language that was used by a small community of people in the early 1400's that has now gone extinct. I hope it was only the language that went extinct and not the people. I hope the people were absorbed into the larger European community.
RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

pjburkshire > 24-02-2026, 05:57 PM

Maybe I tossed the baby out with the bathwater too soon. As I understand it, the computational study published in 2018 by Greg Kondrak and his students at the University of Alberta that came up with the answer of "Hebrew" was done as a classroom exercise or demonstration. It was not intended to be an actual study of the mystery language of the Voynich Manuscript. As I understand it, he only included modern languages in his classroom project. The project did not include extinct dialects.

The mystery language of the Voynich Manuscript could still be some kind of lost Slavic dialect. Maybe Cvetka really is seeing some recognizable words.

Just because I gave up on the Jan Hus connection idea that doesn't mean I have to give up on the lost Slavic dialect idea. So, I am changing the item 4 "Motive" from my February 5, 2026 post. I no longer think the Motive was to break away from Latin and the Roman Catholic Church. Maybe it was a priest or doctor who had traveled and who had collected books and moved or returned to a small rural village and wanted to educate the people in their own language.
RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

Stefan Wirtz_2 > 07-07-2026, 09:39 PM

(05-02-2026, 08:11 PM)pjburkshire Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[..]
I'm also going to start with a few assumptions.
1a The Voynich Manuscript really was created in the early 15th century (radiocarbon dating between 1404 and 1438). It is not a 20th century forgery by Wilfrid Voynich.
1b The Voynich Manuscript was created in Europe.
2 More than one person was involved in the creation of the Voynich Manuscript. This touches on the "means" part of the mystery. Aside from the claims of multiple scribes, I don't see a single monk hiding in his room having the "means" to create such a manuscript.
3a The people who created the Voynich Manuscript were not trying to hide information. They were trying to share information. They were trying to educate.
3b The Voynich Manuscript was created as a legitimate attempt to communicate information that the creators thought was important to preserve and share. It was not created as a joke or a hoax or a mystical scam or a secret cipher.
3c The Voynich Manuscript was written in an actual living (of that time) European language, not a constructed language, but only a constructed (non-Latin) alphabet. Sort of like Star Wars Aurebesh is used to write English words to make them look Star Wars-ish but with the goal to educate, not entertain.
4 The language of the Voynich Manuscript is not Latin. This touches on the "motive" part of the mystery. Who in Europe in the early 15th century had "motive" to write in a language other than Latin in a time when "everybody" in Europe used Latin?
[..]

To this point, the best comprehension I've seen in this forum so far -- even if those are "just" assumptions...

(04-02-2025, 11:26 AM)bt2901 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.[..]
I think the overall consensus here is that even this degree of mangling won't be enough to decrease h2 down to Voynich levels (recall that h2 measures not just regularities in prefixes/endings, but also regularities in the roots, which are more "random" in Slavic languages), but it would be interesting to actually check.

Those entropy calculations are still very depending upon the type of transliteration;
some more aggressive "experts" here are favourizing an "h2" of 2.3 for Voynichese, while the change of transliteration file can produce a value of ~2.9.
Old Church Slavonic is said to have high h0 and h1, but an "h2" of just 2.5-2.85 , due to harsh restrictions for syllables' endings and several abbreviations.
OCS is considered as a structural relative of VMS -- maybe they are distanced cousins.
So which consensus?
RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

cvetkakocj@rogers.com > 08-07-2026, 04:17 AM

(08-07-2026, 01:08 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Those entropy calculations are still very depending upon the type of transliteration;
some more aggressive "experts" here are favourizing an "h2" of 2.3 for Voynichese, while the change of transliteration file can produce a value of ~2.9.
While the conditional entropy calculation is dependent on transliteration, this is not the only reason for low entropy. With my Slovenian transliteration alphabet, I increased the h2 to 2.3, however the minims still remain ambiguous and required to be read in the context. I noticed that EVA does not have separate equivalent for the Voynich glyph that looks like Latin u. Instead, the ee the two curved shapes connected with the rounded line at the bottom are considered ee (or cc in Currier). This makes the Voynich language look so strange, because three, or even four equal vowels cannot be found in a natural language. Because of the ambiguous writing, some u-shapes are more clear than others, however, when there are three same vowels, like eee, they represent either ue or eu. In a similar way ii was used for ji or ij before the letter j came into use in the 16th century.
I am sure that if the Voynich text, which I believe is early Slovenian, would be written down with 44 Glagolitic letters, the h2 would increase, but that was not the option. The option chosen by the author was to invent a few new letterforms. Of course, the alphabet of 100 different letters would also increase the h2, but would such text be readable?

I Used my transliteration alphabet SLO-VA to compare it with ZL transliteration.

My starting comparison of h2

ZL transliteration – all characters
Entropy:
h0 = 5.700439718141093
h1 = 3.9785010591329724
h2 = 2.2069807941051414

SLO-VA transliteration
Entropy:
h0 = 5.882643049361842
h1 = 4.040270713023543
h2 = 2.2971498898978986
Note: I used the same ch and sh combination for č and š Slovenian sounds. Minims were read as EVA n as v, EVA in as n and EVA iin as m, and EVA iiin as im, unless there is a visual indication that m is iw, or n is iv, etc. I transliterated some EVA sh glyphs as be, when initial b was written clearly and was connected with horizontal line in the middle to the next letter. This still leaves enough room to improve entropy, but that is how far one can get without understanding the language.

Transforming EVA n, in, iin and iiin into v, n, m, im increased h2 to 2,28. I imagined that final n to n to w, iv, final iin to jiv, nv, iw, and final iiin to jiw, nu would further increase the h2.

After converting q to p, the h2 does not change, because it is paired with the same letter (PO compared to EVA qo)

Continuing transforming 4870 EVA ee combinations to u increased h2 to 2.3
(I assumed that all ee are u, because there seem to be no double letters, although there are a few double vowels, but too few to make statistical difference).

Transforming 22388 ch to č brings the h2 to 2.4.

Converting ch in SLO-VA transliteration to č increases h2 to 2.39

Changing sh to š increases h2 to 2.41, and changing y to i, j, ij, ji would also increase the h2, while inserting e or a for the missing vowels may decrease the h2.

While the trend shows increase of h2 with some changes, this only affects the transliteration.

ZL transliteration cannot be fully converted to SLO-VA transliteration with find and replace, however even the approximate conversion indicates what increases or what decreased the h2.

I consider SLO-VA also as transcription alphabet that converts Voynich glyphs to Latin letters, not to Slovenian medieval alphabet. Only the words that can be unambiguously transliterated and are comprised from the Latin letters that have stable phonemic value in Slovenian and Latin, could be converted with simple substitution (with one-to-one or two to one ( ch, sh to č, š), or one to two ( EVA p, f to sv, zv, cv), like EVA rod, dar, dal, kar, char.

The more complicated problem is how to normalize the text to be comparable to medieval Slovenian writing, because neither spelling nor pronuciantion was standardized. Different writers used different Latin letters for different sounds (c for k, h, z, č., s for s, z. ) Late in the 16th century j and long s were also used, but r, w, y were dropped.

There is no suitable medieval Slovenian text for comparison, and the Wikipedia articles are absolutely no match to the medieval Slovenian language. Because the Voynich text is too dificult to normalized for comparison with any medieval Slovenian text, because alphabet, spelling and vocabulary has changed drastically, even the simple 'most frequent word test' does not work.
The language is based on the peasant language that was very simple. Words were created in a similar way as Timm explained, there was very little variety of prefixes and prepositions, a lot of repeated suffixes which are in VM also misread, like n and iv, am, ed, il, a lot of words that are spelled the same, but pronounced differently, due to different value of vowel or different accent.

Because of all the above, the Voynich manuscript is so resilient to computational analysis. Unless the text is properly normalized for the language peculiarities, the tests would generate incorrect statistical data and the Voynich grammar based on these data would be incorrect. However, most peculiarities Voynich researchers pointed out can be explained by way of Slovenian language.

The main indications that the language is Slavic is are the word structure and morphology. While Slovenian is close to Czech and Croatian, the differences were noticable even in the middle ages.
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Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

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RE: [split] Cvetka's theory thread

RE: [split] Cvetka's theory threadp

RE: How quickly did the VMS leave the possession of those who understood it?

RE: Cvetka's Theory Thread

RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

RE: Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread