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Hidden animals in the roots
- Hidden animals in the roots
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RE: Hidden animals in the roots
Rafal > 14-12-2025, 01:49 PM
These examples given by Marco are really good. Especially You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view..
By the way the woman at the picture looks like coming from a modern cartoon for kids and not medieval herbal
Anyway will try to do some summary:
- roots in old herbals were often drawn in symbolic and not realistic way so they would resemble some stuff
- the symbolism was usually more obvious than in VM but pictures similar to VM did happen
- in case of VM these roots unfortunately don't help with identifying the plants
Even if we have some strong hint like "lavender" at You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. then it is rather not lavender because the leaves are totally different
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And here we come to "the imaginary plants" concept. What if the plants are some frankensteins built of parts of real plants?
In such case the symbolism for roots wouldn't work. The plant was invented by the artist so it doesn't really have any folklore connected to it.
And roots were probably copied in a mindless way from some reference.
Or maybe the author was totally freestyling and made some roots look like a dog just for fun, without any deeper story behing it.
It would also mean that we cannot for sure say that the roots were meant to be a dog. If the plant doesn't exist and the supposed text doesn't mention dogs, what is the sure way to say that roots represent a dog?
And generally what would the text say if the plant is an unexisting frankenstein?
"It grows on sunny hillsides and blossoms in June. It is liked by dogs who eat it to feel better. Drink it hot with wine for your stomach and kidneys"
Does it make sense to think up such fake stories for fake plants? Or would you rather make some filler text about whatever or about nothing at all?
Just a few thoughts. -
RE: Hidden animals in the roots
Jorge_Stolfi > 14-12-2025, 07:12 PM
(14-12-2025, 01:49 PM)Rafal Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.What if the plants are some frankensteins built of parts of real plants?
The texts in the herbal may be coherent descriptions for a single plant. I have no firm idea whether that plant is real of imaginary, European or not.
But I firmly believe that the plant illustrations in the Herbal are Frankenstein monsters with some parts copied from the Author's sketches (in particular, details that closely match Pharma drawings), some parts copied from random herbals (including "alchemist herbals"), some parts maybe copied from nature or from dried samples, and some parts just made up. Except for the first case, the details are not related to the plant that is the subject of the text.
The drawings in the Pharma section may be of actual plants. However, I believe that some of them are as would be obtained from a farmers' market or apothecary shop. The roots with flat tops are cut away to show how they look inside (or at least that was the case in the source book that the Author got them from). The plants with leaves that seem to sprout directly from the root are probably misunderstanding, by the Author or by us: the leaves and roots were supposed to be separate sketches of the important parts only.
The labels in the Pharma section may be names or codes of the plants in question. However the text of pharma seems to be too short to be descriptions of those plants. Maybe each parag describes a composite medicine created from the ingredients shown.
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: Hidden animals in the roots
DG97EEB > 23-12-2025, 12:14 AM
Could be iatromathematical... in iatromathematical contexts (you know, the whole medical astrology tradition, humoral theory, planetary hours for harvesting), the form of the plant in the illustration told you what it did. Serpentine = heating properties, transformative, good for venoms. Leonine forms = solar, choleric, hot and dry. The image was functional information, not just identification.
There's also the whole Picatrix influence on this period - astrological pharmacy where plants get associated with planetary qualities and the imagery reflects that association rather than strict botanical accuracy.
Makes me wonder if we've been asking the wrong question about the VMS plants. Everyone argues about whether they're "realistic" vs "imaginary" vs "composite." But what if the manuscript is from a tradition where depicting properties mattered more than depicting species? Where a lion-root isn't bad botany, it's procedural notation? -
RE: Hidden animals in the roots
Koen G > 23-12-2025, 12:25 AM
Good point. And there is certainly a whole group of herbal manuscripts where botanical features are an afterthought at best, both in the image and the textual description.
One issue here might be that most of the many roots are unique. So why not more snakes, for example? In manuscripts that use them as part of their visual language, there may be a lot of them. But here it would seem that each plant has a unique property, or a unique combination. -
RE: Hidden animals in the roots
DG97EEB > 23-12-2025, 08:13 AM
(23-12-2025, 12:25 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Good point. And there is certainly a whole group of herbal manuscripts where botanical features are an afterthought at best, both in the image and the textual description.
One issue here might be that most of the many roots are unique. So why not more snakes, for example? In manuscripts that use them as part of their visual language, there may be a lot of them. But here it would seem that each plant has a unique property, or a unique combination.
The answer may be something really simple, and that this is actually a more straightforward pharmaceutical manuscript that occasionally uses symbolic conventions (mandrake-style) for a few specific plants - the dangerous ones, the really powerful ones, whatever warranted special marking. -
RE: Hidden animals in the roots
Bluetoes101 > 23-12-2025, 11:33 PM
I wonder if there's is actually anything to this, or if I am doing 2+2=pineapple again..
Lion+fleur-de-lis I am guessing would be well known in Europe a the time, fleur-de-lis (I found out today) is not (at least the modern name) Lily but Iris.
The leaves are the same shape, but without the little stems. I'm not sure this sort of leaf actually exists? The long dagger shape leaves usually attach to the stem no? (not a plant expert..). Just a quick comparison of the symbolism (showing it at the right date) and real flower example.
Interestingly it would sort of require the flowers to be flat again (like the Viola Tri-colour)
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RE: Hidden animals in the roots
Rafal > 26-12-2025, 06:04 PM
I have just noticed that roots at the page 45r look like some burning torch:
![[Image: f045r_crd.jpg]](https://voynich.nu/q06/f045r_crd.jpg)
It can suggest some "hot" properties of the plant.
And the plant looks a bit like some red pepper. But as pepper (Capsicum) comes from America, it is rather inspired by something different. -
RE: Hidden animals in the roots
Jorge_Stolfi > 26-12-2025, 06:38 PM
(26-12-2025, 06:04 PM)Rafal Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.And the plant looks a bit like some red pepper. But as pepper (Capsicum) comes from America, it is rather inspired by something different.
The colors are not original. Those ochre-yellow "peppers" are just leaves, like the green ones.
All the best, --stolfi
![[Image: f090v1_crd.jpg]](https://voynich.nu/q15/f090v1_crd.jpg)
![[Image: vermont-ms-2-wolf-root-300x162.jpg]](https://ciphermysteries.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2019/06/vermont-ms-2-wolf-root-300x162.jpg)