Re: VMs: VMS Revisited

[Gordon Rugg <g.rugg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I think someone made the point some time ago that the "nymphs" could be explained
as allegorical for spirits during distillation (so "spirits of wine" = alcohol
distilled from wine). The diagrams could therefore represent alchemical
distillation, with the lower vessel containing unrefined liquids, and the higher
ones containing distilled liquids. A bold soul might suggest that the number of
nymphs in each vessel represents proportions (e.g. "stop distilling when the
higher vessel contains seven units and the lower one contains thirteen").

Best wishes,

Gordon

Nick Pelling wrote:

> Hi everyone,
>
> At 22:40 29/05/2003 -0700, Dana Scott wrote:
> >Hmm. I wonder who "compiled" this article on the VMS? Be sure to click on
> >the 'Features' in the left hand column.
> >
> >http://www.pharo.com/history/voynich_manuscript/articles/mhvm_00a_voynich_ho
> >mepage.asp
>
> I don't recall anyone's using the word "gravida" (for "nymph") on list
> beforehand, so whoever put those pages together may not be a particularly
> vocal list-member. :-)
>
>          Anatomical illustrations dating from as early as the first
>          millenium of babies in the womb became a convention,
>          called gravida figures.  They were more than babies really,
>          because the conventional way of depicting them was as
>          miniature adults who pose.  By the 15th century many of
>          these gravida figures, which appropriately lived in the
>          uterus, gained stylisations which had nothing to do with anatomy.
>
> There's plenty more interesting stuff to be read there... :-)
>
> The (unnamed) author (who appears to be English, and to use Microsoft
> FrontPage) writes:-
>          The pipes and valves of the plumbing in folios 75 to 84 are
>          unusually modern-looking if they are to be interpreted as a
>          man-made fluid transport system.  A reading of Vitruvius on
>          plumbing suggests that the joining, branching, tapering,
>          curving of the VMS designs could not be realised with the
>          technology of the time, but the Murano glassworks of the
>          Republic of Venice ( founded in 1291 ) could turn tubing
>          thus, albeit on a smaller scale.  So, if the plumbing of the
>          VMS is glass, then the text is indeed probably alchemical
>          and the gravidae or nymphs are correspondingly allegorical.
>
> I recently read "The Mirror - A History" by Sabine Melchior-Bonnet (2002
> English edition, translated from the 1994 French original). This makes it
> quite clear that the artisans of Murano (and all their trade secrets) were
> kept in place by the powerful Venetian political machinery, to prevent
> Murano's "competitive advantage" over the rest of Europe from diminishing.
> For a number of reasons, I'm quite confident that the balneological section
> does include some secrets spirited out of Venice (though amongst many other
> things). In the past, I've also pointed to the very Murano-like decoration
> on the glass containers on f89r.
>
> BTW, from my research into the history of plumbing, it's clear that a
> number of major buildings in Northern Italy circa 1460 had extremely
> complicated, modern-looking plumbing systems - though it's also true that
> the limitations of implementation, as in Leonardo's failed automated
> kitchen for the Duke of Milan, proved these to be more theoretical advances
> than practical advances.
>
> People seem consistently to underestimate the ingenuity and intellect of
> the Quattrocento - I think that's a big mistake, and one which a solution
> to the VMS might help to correct. :-)
>
> Our (presently anonymous) author also points to a similarity between
> Bartholomeus Del Bene's "Civitas veri sive morum" (Paris 1609) and the
> 9-rosette map page. "His circular city has five roads ( five senses ) which
> function as connectors between the outside world and the heart, at the
> all-seeing nexus of the city's centre." Here's a link to a (scratchy) copy
> of this map, so judge for yourselves:-
> http://www.phil-hum-ren.uni-muenchen.de/GermLat/Acta/Berschin.htm
>          (scroll down to the first illustration, Abbildung 1)
>
> Cheers, .....Nick Pelling.....
>
> PS: all quotes (c) Pharo plc 2002. :-)
>
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