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About the binding(s?) and missing folios
- About the binding(s?) and missing folios
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RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
Jorge_Stolfi > 10-12-2025, 10:08 PM
(10-12-2025, 07:20 PM)Cuagga Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.That comes from the fact some paint spots cross the binding gutter and reappear on the other side of the bifolio several pages later. The example Rene gives in this page is the continuity in painting between You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (main drawing) and details on the left side of f40r.
That is an important clue, indeed.
However, could it be that the binding gutter was displaced when the book was re-bound by the Jesuits? I see what look like holes from the binding strings on page f40r, to the right of the current gutter; one of them at the level of line 3.
Another possibility is that the Painter noticed that the drawing of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. extended into f40r, and thus opened the book on that page and painted those bits. It seems that the paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. stops a hair before the gutter, and the paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. does not quite match:
But note that both images are somewhat distorted right next to the gutter, because of the curvature of the vellum.
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
Jorge_Stolfi > 10-12-2025, 10:22 PM
(10-12-2025, 07:23 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Are there historical examples of large collections of texts that were written on individual bifolios and were supposed to be kept as separate bifolios and read bifolio after bifolio?
I am guessing that, until 100 years ago and even after, any such collection that ended up in a library would have been bound together by the librarian, for practical handling and control reasons.
I can imagine that the author of a book like the VMS would have preferred to keep it as unbound bifolios. Like one would keep a collection of maps. AFAIK, real herbals (with pressed dried plants) stored in botanical museums are normally kept unbound.
And keeping the bifolios un-nested (so that the reading order would be bifolio-by-bifolio) would make sense if the author expected to add more material to it, a few folios at a time.
When the book left the author, these reasons would no longer hold. Then the author or the new owner may have bound the bifolios together, for the same reasons above. In the case of a herbal, the order would not mater.
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
Cuagga > 10-12-2025, 10:29 PM
(10-12-2025, 10:08 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(10-12-2025, 07:20 PM)Cuagga Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.That comes from the fact some paint spots cross the binding gutter and reappear on the other side of the bifolio several pages later. The example Rene gives in this page is the continuity in painting between You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (main drawing) and details on the left side of f40r.
That is an important clue, indeed.
However, could it be that the binding gutter was displaced when the book was re-bound by the Jesuits? I see what look like holes from the binding strings on page f40r, to the right of the current gutter; one of them at the level of line 3.
Another possibility is that the Painter noticed that the drawing of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. extended into f40r, and thus opened the book on that page and painted those bits. It seems that the paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. stops a hair before the gutter, and the paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. does not quite match:
But note that both images are somewhat distorted right next to the gutter, because of the curvature of the vellum.
All the best, --stolfi
I'll answer this point by point.
Re: the possible displacement of the binding gutter, I do see 3 aligned holes on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (roughly on the level of the 4 last lines of text, more visible on the scan You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.), but they are still unmistakeably aligned with the painted section. And other spots on this page don't look to me regular enough to show old binding traces, and I am certain that people who saw the VMS firsthand would have noted those if they noticed them, and neither Rene nor LFD did, to my knowledge.
Re: the second paragraph, probably someone more skilled than me could do it, but I struggle to imagine that painting while the manuscript is bound would yield such clean result ; colour right up to the margin, while not covering neither the opposite page f34r, nor the binding string visible on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (first flower from the top). It also seems to me that the bottom part of the middle flower shows paint right into the gutter -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
oshfdk > 10-12-2025, 10:30 PM
(10-12-2025, 10:22 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I am guessing that, until 100 years ago and even after, any such collection that ended up in a library would have been bound together by the librarian, for practical handling and control reasons.
But if it wasn't designed to be bound there would likely be texts, titles, labels that would appear right on the center line between two folios.
Voynich Manuscript in particular has a lot of drawings and labels, and, as I mentioned before, both Rosettes and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. show writing across the fold, so writing across the fold wasn't a taboo for the designer or the scribe. Which means to me with very high certainly that whoever put the manuscript to vellum deliberately placed all the text clear of the centerline, most likely to allow for binding. -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
JoJo_Jost > 10-12-2025, 10:48 PM
Do anyone know exactly which pages are missing? -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
Cuagga > 10-12-2025, 10:56 PM
(10-12-2025, 10:48 PM)JoJo_Jost Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Do anyone know exactly which pages are missing?
Exactly, no ; but by the missing folio numbers, we can have an idea of which pages disappeared since those numbers were written in the manuscript (which seems, itself, to be very late in the VMS's production process, so it doesn't prevent more pages having been misplaced before this point)
The missing folio numbers are (each folio being 2 pages, recto and verso) :
- 12 (ripped, stub visible)
- 59 through 64
- 74 (ripped, stub visible)
- 91 and 92
- 97 and 98
- 109 and 110
- 12 (ripped, stub visible)
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RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
ReneZ > 10-12-2025, 11:43 PM
Before I answer any points in more detail, please note that the descriptions on that page are speculative. They were written quite a few years ago, and I should revisit this part in view of newer information.
Clearly, the existence of quire numbers implies a number of things:
- they are 'needed' (or rather used) at the time when the book is about to be bound in nested quires
- this is after the pages have been written
Given that there is now an indication that the text was not written in order to be bound in nested quires, this information appears to have been lost at the time when the quire numbers were written. Still the 'quirator' seemed to have an idea that he knew what it should be. This requires more thinking...
On the second bullet, typically, 'pages have been written' implies drawn, written and painted.
I do not know if sheets would be folded before writing (drawing and painting) or not, but that seems relevant here. -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
oshfdk > 11-12-2025, 12:14 AM
(10-12-2025, 11:43 PM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I do not know if sheets would be folded before writing (drawing and painting) or not, but that seems relevant here.
In case if this is in reply to my point that the scribe would write across the folds, folds are not really important here. What's important is that:
1) for each leaf of the manuscript there is a way to bind it such that no text crosses the gutter, even though there are a lot of irregular elements in the manuscript, like labels, offset lines of text, circular or rotated writing
2) for wide or tall foldouts like You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. or the Rosettes it's impossible to fold them to 6x9 MS format in a way that no text would cross vertical or horizontal folds, so writing strictly in chunks of 6x9 inches was not a design requirement of the manuscript
From these two I think it seems highly likely that the manuscript was specifically made in a way to allow binding it. -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
Jorge_Stolfi > 11-12-2025, 04:27 AM
There seem to be two independent questions here: (1) were the bifolios meant to be bound, and (2) were they meant to be nested into quires.
The answer to (2) is "not always" because the Zodiac bifolios were clearly not meant to be nested.
I don't know how we could answer (1) without reading it. The observation that text always stays clear of the binding fold is a clue, but I don't think it is "proof".
But probably the answer to both questions is "depends": for some sections "yes", for other sections "no", for others (like Herbal) "it does not matter".
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: About the binding(s?) and missing folios
Jorge_Stolfi > 11-12-2025, 06:04 AM
(10-12-2025, 10:29 PM)Cuagga Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(10-12-2025, 10:08 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Another possibility is that the Painter noticed that the drawing of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. extended into f40r, and thus opened the book on that page and painted those bits. It seems that the paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. stops a hair before the gutter, and the paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. does not quite match:
I struggle to imagine that painting while the manuscript is bound would yield such clean result ; colour right up to the margin, while not covering neither the opposite page f34r, nor the binding string visible on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (first flower from the top). It also seems to me that the bottom part of the middle flower shows paint right into the gutter
But on the top flower the paint seems to stop a pixel or two before the gutter (A):
Also the offsetting of the blue-black paint on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (B,C) seems to be vertically mismatched relative to paint on f33v. What do we make of that?
And could please someone explain what we see at (D,E)? Is that binding string running along the gutter?
All the best, --stolfi