VMs: RE: The Eva alphabet

["GC" <glenclaston@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Rene, I'm glad you can appreciate the difficulties
I face in expressing myself and my work.  I have
added a field to the database for EVA equivalents,
but I can do this better if you could make your
chart available once more.

I'm still having a problem that I need to resolve
involving expression of characters.  The EVA "ee"
is sometimes "ee", but other times a character I
call "u" because it looks like a "u".  This is two
'c's run together.  Since I have over 200 examples
of this character in the herbal section alone, as
well as decrypt examples that substantiate this as
a stand-alone character, you might see my
frustration.  (For a page containing numerous
examples of this character, see the top paragraph
of folio 68r).

I still have that problem with the two different
types of plumes over EVA 'sh', and a few others,
such as a rare one with 'ccc' as one character.
For many of these there don't appear to be Currier
equivalents or EVA equivalents, and that puts me
in a rather awkward position when trying to
explain these characters.

GC




> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-voynich@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:owner-voynich@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On
> Behalf Of Rene Zandbergen
> Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2002 1:48 PM
> To: Voynich Ms. mailing list
> Subject: VMs: The Eva alphabet
>
>
> Dear all,
>
> first of all, thanks to Jim G. for his
> quick action
> to keep the list running.
>
> This mail is clearly prompted by some (valid)
> remarks by Glen Claston, but should be
> of interest
> to all the newer members.
>
> The Eva transcription alphabet is a method of
> representing the text in the Voynich MS in a
> computer-readable form. One of the aims of it is
> to be able to represent the entire MS
> in a consistent
> way. That is: the so-called weirdoes, for which
> none of the previously existing alphabets had a
> complete answer, are also covered in a
> consistent
> manner.
>
> The alphabet does not pretend to answer
> the question
> of what is one character in the underlying text.
> I would bet a very, very large pizza on the fact
> that it is probably wrong in that area.
> This also
> means
> that analyses of the text (independent
> of whether one
> does belong to one of the cipher/language camps
> or not) should best not be done using the Eva
> alphabet.
>
> However, there already was, at the time
> that the Eva
> alphabet was conceived, a tool called BITRANS,
> which allows one to change the
> transcripion alphabet
> to any one that one desires to use.
> (It was written by Jacques Guy and runs on
> literally every type of PC.)
>
> The real shortcoming of Eva is not in
> that the way
> to represent weirdoes and ligatures is
> inelegant.
> It is in the fact that a choice had to
> be made on
> which
> character variations should be ignored.
> (E.g. on the
> Eva character 'sh', where the shape of the plume
> is not considered).
>
> The real strength of Eva is that it is
> easy to learn,
> easy to use for transcription and a good way to
> communicate on the list.
>
> I would advise all who have never heard
> of BITRANS
> before, to find out about it.
> Translation tables from
> Eva to Currier or to FSG already exist.
> Tables to
> translate to your favourite alphabet,
> or your test
> alphabet of the day, are extremely easy to make.
>
> Cheers, Rene
>
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