VMs: 1400's statistics and (en)coding standards

[Rene Zandbergen <r_zandbergen@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- Nick Pelling <incoming@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi Gabriel,

> > What we know, though, (if one assumes that the
> > ms was written in 1400s or thereabouts) that a 
> > number of its statistical properties are very
> > unlikely to have been planned because their 
> > existence was not apparent at that time. One
> > cannot design what one does not know.
> 
> Cicco Simonetta (arguably the father of modern
> cryptology), [...]  gives a systematic set of
> rules for breaking monoalphabetic ciphers. This 
> specifically relies on an understanding of 
> statistical properties!

But which ones: not much more than the single-letter
frequency distribution, and the fact that not 
hiding it is a dead giveaway. Hence the multiple
encodings for high-frequency characters, the 
use of nomenclature words and the idea of
poly-alphabetic substitution.
This, then, is the extent of the statistical 
knowledge of languages in the time that the VMs
was probably composed. 

And what was encrypted in those days?
Diplomatic information exchanges. 

I could employ one of GC's favourite arguments here:
don't forget that the Voynich MS is essentially
a herbal. Why encode it? Existing Arabic ones are
already illegible enough.

If the VMs is in a complicated code (15th C
state-of-the-art) then we must seriously consider
that the book is not about plants or ointments,
but that the text is unrelated to the pictures
and has some diplomatic meaning.



__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
______________________________________________________________________
To unsubscribe, send mail to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxx with a body saying:
unsubscribe vms-list