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Re: Illustrations
I like this idea!! I believe the page is f75r (the
boiling babes are in the right bottom corner). It
makes sense, more sense than anything I've heard in
quite a while.
Adam McLean, what do you think? (Incidentally, I'll
post a note that Adam sent me a long time ago and I
just put in the Historical Precedents.)
Brian Eric Farnell wrote:
> I'd like to try to
> peg the symbolism to a school of thought. I've seen one
> description as a model of pregnancy, but I looked at that page
> and saw a description of breaking compounds ino their
> components, the different positions and actions of the nymphs
> describing solutes and a precipitate as well as gasses boiling
> off. I believe that's 58r. You can see the nymphs kind of
> angry in a chamber to the bottom left (probably because they are
> being boiled) and they seem to be trying to stick together.
> Then they move to the bottom middle chamber with a babe in a
> bucket representing a precipitate while a nymph floating above
> seems to be in solution. Still others are exiting through the
> top. From that I took all of the other babes in tubs to
> indicate an element (or a compound they couldn't or didn't ant
> to break) with it's 'pure spirit' captured, ie pure. I think if
> we understood enough of what the hieroglyphics mean, we might be
> able to use their method of symbolism to peg the VMS to a school
> of thought or a region. I know using anthropomorphic figures to
> represent reactions wasn't uncommon, but I've only seen the
> later glossy versions. There they also seem to represent larger
> concepts. I don't know if it's got merit or not, but it's worth
> a try. If the nymphs represent elements, maybe some of the
> other diagrams will show us their planetary correspondances
> along with their names.
> How prevalent was the use of latin
> names for elements across languages in the alchemical world? My
> guess is that they were mostly Latin, with possibilities for
> Greek and Arabic.
Many names would have been Arabic, I guess. al-chemy
is an Arabic word. I know that the
(Muslim) Arabs were the first practitioners in the
Middle Ages. I believe that the works from classical
times were in Greek, so you could have a lot of that
too. I've seen a number of alchemical works that use
Latin, but of course those are just the ones commonly
available at ordinary libraries in the West.
> Some of those astrological diagrams with all
> of the hot chicks look like alchemical 'periodic tables'. Maybe
> that's our Rosetta Stone. If we could find a place where we
> expected to find Latin tossed in, it would go along way towards
> understanding the cipher.
See Adam's note below. Alas, I doubt we'll find
anything obvious in alchemy. From what I've seen,
they were never very consistent. I (a chemical
engineer) have never taken the time to understand the
chemical (as opposed to the mystical) part of alchemy.
Sometimes they used the four classical
elements (air, water, earth, and fire). Sometimes they
added a fifth element - the quintessence -
that underlay the basic four. They no doubt hoped that
if one could isolate the quintessence, they could turn
it into anything -- especially gold! Sometimes they
thought the elements were mercury, sulfur, and salt
(NaCl). It's easy to see mercury and sulfur, since
they react to mercurous sulfate, but I don't understand
how salt fits in.
They seem to have been pretty casual about handling
mercury and some no doubt died for
it. Nowadays mercury is handled with a great deal of
respect; I've seen a big change over the course of
my own life. (I remember seeing a note somewhere in
cyberspace that said that mercury was the semen of
Shiva! It will certainly maim or destroy you; ask the
citizens of Minimata.)
Anyway, here's Adam's note.
Dennis
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[EDITOR'S NOTE: Adam McLean is probably the world's
greatest expert
on alchemy. Therefore, this note is probably the last
word on the
subject. ]
Subject: Re: Your Expert Opinion on the VMs
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 17:36:43 +0000
From: Adam McLean <alchemy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: Dennis <ixohoxi@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
At 09:40 AM 11/19/98 -0600, you wrote:
>Hello, Adam! I know about your extensive knowledge of alchemy. Mary
>D'Imperio, in her survey of VMs studies up to 1978, thought that alchemy
>might be the key to understanding the VMs. However, current
>voynich@xxxxxxxx list members, including myself, see little if any
>alchemical content in the VMs. None of us, however, are experts.
>
>What is your opinion on this. What alchemical imagery can you see in
>the VMs?
Dear Dennis
All I can say is that I have never seen an alchemical
manuscript
with the same imagery and pictures as are found in the
Voynich.
The plant drawings in the 'Herbal section' have many
forerunners some
going back centuries before the Voynich, as has been
extensively
documented. The drawings in the Astronomical section
again seem to
have many parallels in known manuscripts.
The main 'alchemical' resonance is supposed to be the
'balneological'
section, but here I find no parallels with alchemical
manuscripts,
except in a very general way. If this was an alchemical
work one
would expect to find some other alchemical manuscript
with similar
drawings - but I do not know of one. The drawings after
all are not in code!
I have an open mind on the subject, but have yet to see
any real parallels.
Perhaps one day I will find a manuscript that I
recognize has common
features with the Voynich - but not so far.
My view is that we can only 'crack' the Voynich when we
can put it into
some context. The herbal section is probably the most
amenable to
this approach as there are many early herbals with
similar structures.
It really needs someone to make a study of the
semiotics of herbals,
and see if any of these features can be recognized as
patterns in the
Voynich text. Such things as repetitions of phrases,
maybe things like
"collect the fruits in the month of" or "this plant is
for the lungs". If the
Voynich section is a herbal then it should share some
of such
phrases, and one might be able to find repetitive
elements that give
us a clue to the way in which Voynichese is structured
and written.
I don't think I could find any way at present to use
alchemical manuscripts
or ideas to throw light on the 'Balneological section.
It may be that it will be someone with a background in
semiotics rather
than cryptography that will first read the Voynich MS.
I don't think it
will be a scholar of alchemy.
Best wishes,
Adam McLean
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> Reagrds,
> Brian