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Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
- Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
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RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
R. Sale > 31-08-2025, 08:50 PM
In the Middle Ages, would poor quality ink tend to settle out with darker elements at the bottom? -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
quimqu > 31-08-2025, 08:55 PM
(31-08-2025, 07:55 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.And I now believe that the "restoration" of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. was a disaster, because whoever did it assumed that the faded text of lines 2-4 was Latin script when it quite probably was Voynichese. Therefore this possibility must be investigated and settled as well as we can before spending more time trying to decipher that "Latin" text.
I don't see why would he leave two words in voynichese if he thought it was latin. And why wouldn't he retrace in correct latin? -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Jorge_Stolfi > 31-08-2025, 09:20 PM
(31-08-2025, 08:50 PM)R. Sale Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.In the Middle Ages, would poor quality ink tend to settle out with darker elements at the bottom?
From what I know, when iron-gall ink is just prepared, the black compound that gives its color is mostly soluble. But as soon as it is applied it starts to combine with oxygen from the air and becomes insoluble. At the same time it combines with protein in the parchment so that the black stuff binds firmly to it. The end result is a black film that cannot be removed by water or by rubbing with bread, like other common inks would.
The same reaction will happen with ink left in the bottle, gradually turning the black compound insoluble there too. But since there is no protein for it to bind to, the stuff will just settle to the bottom. Even if that spent ink is stirred, the insoluble black stuff cannot bind to the parchment like fresh ink does. Writing with spent ink would leave a trail of black specks that are just sitting on top of the vellum, not bound to it. It is not a matter of "quality", but only of fresh vs. old.
If someone knows better, please correct me...
All the best, --jorge -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Bernd > 01-09-2025, 11:18 PM
The ink has surprisingly coherent albedo over UV and VIS and only becomes transparent in far IR. The only obvious exception is 'vix' where there's a rightward downstroke in the 'x' that clearly is something else than iron gall ink. Transparent in UV, visibility increases throughout BGR as wavelengths increase and becomes strongest in IR. What is this? the stroke appears to start exactly in the leftward downstroke of the 'x'. Coincidence or intended?
The 'i' contains an exceptionally thick layer of ink and looks like it was overwritten, but with normal ink. There appears to be a small horizontal stroke underneath.
Here's a spread spectrum UV-Y-IR image I made by mapping the longest, a medium and the shortest wavelength to RGB channels
940nm IR0 -> R
570nm AM0 -> G
365nm UV0 -> B
570 nm Amber renders the vellum in a more natural tone, otherwise there is no big difference from 535 nm Green - so I used AM for the Green channel. You can see the Iron gall ink in red while the rightward downstroke in the 'x' is black.
Also what is going on in the 'g' of 'gas'? How was this character drawn that it contains a horizontal rightward stroke into the 'a'? the 's' has a vertical downstroke. But these are indistinguishable from the ink throughout the spectrum so probably made by the author during writing. -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Jorge_Stolfi > Yesterday, 02:50 AM
(01-09-2025, 11:18 PM)Bernd Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The only obvious exception is 'vix' where there's a rightward downstroke in the 'x' that clearly is something else than iron gall ink.
I believe that it is actually the other way: the ink used by the original Scribe of the VMS was not iron-gall ink. The color is wrong, and the (lack of) resistance to weal and water is wrong. It looks more like a tempera or watercolor paint: a water suspension of a solid pigment, such as ocher or umbra, with some binder like gum arabic.
The first round of restoration was careful to match not only the letter shapes but also the color of the original ink. However, that meant using the same kind of ink, since iron-gall ink is like the Ford Model T -- you can have it in any color you like, as long as it is black. But, as a result, the restored text too started to fade. Another Retracer, some unknown time later, tried to extend and/or redo the restoration, but did not bother to match the ink color and used (black) iron-gall ink.
At least that is my current belief. All the best, --jorge -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Koen G > Yesterday, 08:51 AM
Bernd: about the connecting stroke of "g", I think it was made too long and the "a" was then written over it instead of connected to it. You can see exactly the same thing happening in "tar" before tere/cere. So this writer seems to have been in the habit of making (too) long connecting strokes when he decided to use one at all.
I must say that I've become less and less convinced by visions of Pellingesque phantom parades of plonkers "fixing" each others' writings. "Oh no, someone messed up their marginal note, let me fix it". Clearly one scribe was enough to obtain the mess.
The long connecting stroke with a letter then written over it does remind me of something though. Let me sit on a bench and think about it. -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Jorge_Stolfi > Yesterday, 06:51 PM
(Yesterday, 08:51 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I must say that I've become less and less convinced by visions of Pellingesque phantom parades of plonkers "fixing" each others' writings. "Oh no, someone messed up their marginal note, let me fix it".
I understand the reluctance, since there is no middle option: either there was no retracing, or a large fraction of the text (near 100% on some pages) was carefully but still visibly retraced, a long time after it was written -- because the original ink was fading towards invisibility.
I agree that one should not accept this second theory without substantial evidence.
I am working on it...
(Meanwhile, consider that theory as one possible explanation for why no paleographer has been able to identify the language of f116v, or read a single word with certainty...)
All the best, --jorge -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
oshfdk > 6 hours ago
(Yesterday, 06:51 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I understand the reluctance, since there is no middle option: either there was no retracing, or a large fraction of the text (near 100% on some pages) was carefully but still visibly retraced, a long time after it was written -- because the original ink was fading towards invisibility.
Is there any practical difference between the retracing hypothesis and the idea that the manuscript is an imperfect copy made by someone who didn't know the original language or script, hence full of mistakes? -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Koen G > 4 hours ago
One version of a middle ground would be that various people were working on the manuscript in a hierarchial manner, with one having the authority to amend the other's work. Father and son, teacher and student, coördinator and novice...
Another might be that the same person noticed right away that there were problems with the ink and decided to use a better batch to fix the problematic areas. Why often the same areas, like the breasts of nymphs? I don't know, this question equally applies to all explanations. Maybe certain parts were drawn first and others were added afterwards with a fresh, better batch of ink.
Which is basically another option: higher quality ink (better? fresher?) was prepared at some point and the nature of the workflow resulted in what we have now.
It could really be any of those and a bunch more. Maybe the ink was such that it resulted in darker lines depending on angle, pressure, thickness and whatnot. Maybe it was the same scribe on the same day.
I understand that the differences in ink color are worth pointing out, but people (especially in the mailing list days, I think) have allowed their imaginations to run wild about potential causes. -
RE: Bad news: f116v was substantially mangled by Retracer
Jorge_Stolfi > 1 hour ago
(6 hours ago)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Is there any practical difference between the retracing hypothesis and the idea that the manuscript is an imperfect copy made by someone who didn't know the original language or script, hence full of mistakes?
You mean, in terms of impact on our investigations? I think the second hypothesis would be worse.
In both cases, the Retracer or Copyist can misread a glyph and change it into another glyph, even if it is against the rules of the language or makes no sense; or change a glyph into an invalid weirdo. Like the s turned into o, and the Sh turned into >blip<, of my earlier "pareidolia quiz" post.
But a Copyist may also skip glyphs and words, or duplicate words and phrases. Seems that paleographers have many name for these -- "homeoteleuton", "homeoarchy", "parablepsis", "dittography", ... Errors which the Retracer cannot make.
And a Copyist can also confuse word and character spaces. (The expression "busillis" once was popular as a term for a problem that leaves all experts baffled. The story goes that a Latin student came across the term in a book and no Latin or history experts he consulted knew what it meant. It turned out that what he had read as "in die busillis" = "on the day of the busillis" was in fact "in diebus illis" = "in those days"...)
All the best, --jorge