RE: VMs: Latin abbreviations

["GC" <glenclaston@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Matthew wrote:

Does the idea of Latin abbreviations not raise questions about who the
Voynich manuscript was intended for? If it's a write-only document with
incomprehensible abbreviations, only understood by the author(s), then the
neatness, the lack of crossings-out, the exotic drawings of nymphs and the
like do not make much sense. Why would the author go to the trouble of
ensuring that the VMS was a more-or-less pristine copy with precise diagrams
if it was only a set of notes for his own benefit?


Hi Matthew,

I thought I'd clarify a point that is made a lot of, but may not be a valid
observation.  Several web pages mention that the VMS is virtually devoid of
errors, but having studied the text I don't get the sense that this is true.
There are words with an "o" written over the word, as if the glyph was left
out, and there are what appear to be corrections on several pages.  Lest we
forget, this is written on vellum, not paper.  It was a practice to scrape
or rub the ink from the surface when errors were made, so in this light few
errors would actaully appear to us.  So much bad has been said about the
copyflo (me included), but the one thing it seems to be good for is showing
varying grades of "dirt" embedded on the surface of the manuscript.  Start
looking through for smudged or rubbed areas and your opinion about errors in
the VMS may well soon change.

GC


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx]On
Behalf Of Matthew Platts
Sent: Thursday, July 10, 2003 12:31 PM
To: vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: VMs: Latin abbreviations


I'm afraid I am relatively new to this game, so please have mercy if what I
say seems ridiculous, or has been said too many times before.

Does the idea of Latin abbreviations not raise questions about who the
Voynich manuscript was intended for? If it's a write-only document with
incomprehensible abbreviations, only understood by the author(s), then the
neatness, the lack of crossings-out, the exotic drawings of nymphs and the
like do not make much sense. Why would the author go to the trouble of
ensuring that the VMS was a more-or-less pristine copy with precise diagrams
if it was only a set of notes for his own benefit?

If, on the other hand, the VMS is intended for someone else, maybe for
posterity, it might be ciphered so that only men of learning could
understand it. This would require the cipher to be logical, and
context-dependancy wouldn't help matters.

Is it possible that the characters in the VMS represent syllables, perhaps,
or whole words? This might be a method of encoding to save space. Vellum,
after all, is, and always was, expensive. Alternatively the symbols in the
VMS might not be plaintext at all. They could indicate symbols used in, for
instance, predicate logic, or mathematics, or alchemical formulae. If I were
to write OOsOsl&Of, for instance, I have no doubt you would all be puzzled;
but I might say that there was no problem at all: it's a quadratic equation,
s^2 + s = -f.

Alternatively, perhaps f116's "michiton oladabas multos te tær cerc portas"
indicates the decryption method. To me it looks (but remember, I am a new
amateur) like a scribbled note, maybe translating a portion of text back
into Latin, "michi dabas multas portas", dropping some null characters, "ton
ola te tær cerc". This might indicate that the decryption algorithm leaves
some null characters in the translation.

Just some thoughts.

Matthew David Platts

"I agree to a certain extent.  Latin abbreviations are pretty extensive (ie
what looks like a "9" can mean '-us', '-s', etc).  17th Century French has
similar abbreviations (P^e for Premiere or Pierre).  Context has always, and
will always mean a lot in any form of shorthand system.

You could translate the shorthand sentence to "and then three were awards"
instead of "and then there were words" but if the previous sentence was "In
the beginning there were Letters" then your translation makes little sense."

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