Traces of a wheel or similar
takrobat > Today, 07:15 AM
Hi,
I have been studying the text statistically the last days, and want to know if anyone else have noticed this.
I know tavie and MarcoP have shown that a line's first glyph depends on the line above, what I have found is that there is some sort of direction to this. Among d, q and y, consecutive line starts step d -> q -> y -> d more often than the reverse.
Example :
<f79v.13,+P0> dain.ar.olshey.dytain.qokain.checthy.okeedy.qokeedy.ror
<f79v.14,+P0> qokeey.qokedy.okeey.qokol.sheedy.qokeedy.rolchey.qokeedy
<f79v.15,+P0> yteedy.qokeedy.qokain.olkeey.cheokain.dy,teey.qokain
<f79v.16,+P0> dol.sheey.qol.olkshey.qokeedy.olkeedy.qol.okaiin.oly
These are the counts for the whole manuscript:
forward: d→q 125 q→y 75 y→d 119 (total 319)
backward: q→d 75 y→q 35 d→y 81 (total 191)
Total the wheel moves forward 63% of the time (expected 50%). The difference is about 5.7 standard deviations from the expected. Permutation tests give the same result (p<0.0001).
Frequencies alone can not produce this, if it had fixed probablities (50% d, 30% q, 20% y) the count would be expected to be the same in both directions (0.5*0.3==0.3*0.5).
This is valid through the whole document, not just parts of it. It could appear everywhere.
It also seems like ONLY the line preceding the line counts. Both lines need to have d,q or y to see this pattern. If one line appears between them, the pattern disappears (or so my initial investiagation shows). It seems like the scribe looks at the preceding line ONLY when dealing with d,q,y changes. There is no hidden "counter" keeping track.
The first line of a paragraph is outside (often other glyphs).
What I have checked:
Two transcriptions give the same result (ZL3b and voynichese.com)
Currier A,B and different scribes all follow the "rule".
It goes from start to start, not a seam between line breaks.
It is JUST the first glyph - no matter what the rest of the word is.
Currier A also has a similar rule, it seems : y-o-q-y
I can not find any direction anywhere else line to line.
What does it mean?
It could mean that some rule is governing these letters. It *could* be a wheel that is cycled, or some sort of weighted random variable. It seems like they move forward 2 of 3 times, roughly. Backwards 1/3 of the time.