VMs: RE: Conclusions

["GC" <glenclaston@xxxxxxxxx>]

Chris123 wrote:

> CONCLUSIONS - or why I think it is a load of rubbish
> The VMS was written using an invented 'language' that does not
> have any meaning - as a language or as some form of code / cipher.
> It was probably created in the 15th or 16th century or is a fake
> from a later date that is designed to look like it was created
> then.

One simply has to ask the question "what value did an apparent herbal have
in the 15th/16th century?".  If this manuscript contained beakers, obvious
alchemical symbols, drawings of magical symbols, or something like that, I'd
understand why some would consider it a hoax.  After all, the promise of
extended life lay in the hands of the alchemists, not the lowly herbalists.

If you're going to fake a document, why fake an herbal?  An alchemical had a
host of buyers, collectors of arcane knowledge, but an herbal?  Your buyers
were medieval doctors, physicians, pharmacists and botanists, a pretty
narrow and largely poor clientelle.  You and many other proponents of the
"fake" theory insinuate that the underlying reason for the fake was to
either make claims, (public advancement) of which none is historically
recorded in this instance, or for the purpose of profit, (presumably to make
their efforts more saleable - you suggest) - the most logical human reason
for perpetrating a fraud. This shouldn't be taken to mean frauds haven't
been perpetrated in far greater proportion to expected profits, but it does
make it an unlikely scenario.

I know of some great "frauds" from this time period, and one in particular
comes to mind.  Michelle Nostradamus - under attack from professional
astrologers from his first publication because he all but ignored the
'science' of astrology in his works, yet this "fraud" continues in cult
fashion even today.  His was perpretated for recognition, court status and
monetary recompense, all the elements expected of a fraud.

A fraudulent herbal?  That's a creature of a whole different species.  Its
visual content does not purport to speak of arcane subjects or divination,
and nothing visual about the manuscript causes one to search for the deeper
truths buried within.  If it is a fraud, it was created by a Master Loser,
since he couldn't manage to hit on a proper and profitable subject in all
his extended efforts.

There are visuals in the VMS, to be sure.  They are plants, astrological
diagrams, apothecaries, "medical" plumbing, and naked women.  Apparently a
very strange and occult mix of images, but if you'd drop out of your 21st
century mindset for just a moment and harken to what many of us have been
saying about what was and wasn't "vogue" in these centuries, you'd see that
any physician or herbalist that happened on this manuscript would have
immediately recogized its textbook format and understood the implications of
the images for its content.  Did people usually pay high dollar for an
herbal?  NO.  Could Dr. John Dee have passed it off as a Roger Bacon
manuscript?  Probably.  Would a man of Dee's character knowingly have done
this?  Definitely not.

I'm not in total agreement with your view of fictitious alphabets, either.
A number of us collect these things, and for each there is an historical
purpose for their existence.  Some are repeated from antiquity as an
history, true or mythological, and others are for cryptographic purposes.
None that I've viewed lacks an history or purpose in its design.  This to me
means these are not "fake" alphabets, rather "invented" alphabets, with
their primary design as one of concealment.

Fakery is a common cry, especially when someone who examines a manuscript
cannot fathom an understanding.  In this case I'd hesitantly put forward
that you are too far detached from 15th/16th century reality to grasp what
is in front of you.  If I've reached this conclusion in error, I beg your
forgiveness.

GC

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