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RE: VMs: Currier A and B
Larry Roux wrote:
> Could the textual differences you are seeing between language "a"
> and "b" be due to content instead of cipher differences? For
> example, two papers in Sky and Telescope may have drastically
> different text even though they are on the same general topic.
> One might include Latin names [Ursa Major] and the other Common
> names [Big Dipper]. Or one might be on the constellations and
> the stars they contain [Dubhe, Mirak] and the other may be a
> study of the motions of the stars [angular momentum, great
> attractor..etc]. Not that I am implying the Voy is any of the
> above, just that a subtle change in intention may cause a large
> change in vocabulary.
IF you can find a language that uses different two, three, four and five
letter words depending on context and content, and changes word endings
(declensions) as well due to content and context, this is a possibility.
The real problem here is that Currier chose the words "language" and
"hand" in his description of statistical similarities. Much like my
personal problem with "character" and "letter", "language" and "hand" mean
different things to different people, even when the context for their use is
evident as statistical, not real. "Language" in these arguments does not
imply a difference in spoken or written language, and Rene makes this point
as well. "Hand" does not signify that someone has actually determined that
this was another writer. These are Currier's definitions for statistical
"language" and apparent "hand", nothing more. I sincerely wish we could
come up with better and less confusing terms for these things. I've already
introduced "glyph" to narrow the wide variation of perception about the
actual transcription of a "character", maybe someone else can find something
to mark differences in "language"?
Rene has "herbal A" and "herbal B", etc., which I like very much. Until
something new comes along I intend to use these and expand them to ha1, ha2,
hb1, hb2, etc. The meaning would be "Herbal A, subset 1", and so forth.
Anytime I address Currier's "Language" and "Hand", I'll add a qualifier for
these identifications so the confusion of suggestive perception of different
"languages" or "hands" is not perpetuated in written speech any further than
it need be, since we have not yet gathered any significant informaation
suggesting that there was more than one scribe, or that there exists more
than one actual written language.
> Or, if the VMs is actually copies of papers from other documents
> there would actually be several differences in underlying use of
> words due to different authorship (I personally would never use
> the word "bifurcate" but Stephen R Donaldson would (and does) in
> a heartbeat).
>
> Just asking these questions so you can think of them while
> analyzing your data. Great work so far! I find all of this very
> interesting.
If anything in the VMS is a "copy" of another work, it is most probably a
"translated copy", from Latin or Greek to the vulgar tongue. A translator
works within the vocabulary of his own understanding. My point being,
someone with a basic education would only be able to translate "War and
Peace" into a language that reflects a basic education, not the fabulous
translations we've come to know. That's just my opinion of course.
Unique words between pages appear to spring up through a combinatorial
process, (forgive me, Nick) pairing word beginnings with new endings. The
"groups" (forgive me again, Nick), are set not to a true pairifed scale,
rather a 3-2, 2-3 pairing. Once you think you have that pegged, a word
comes along that is written in "true cipher", not fitting any of these
"pairifications", as Nick terms them, and not exhibiting any of the signs
that we would expect in our theories.
To me the problem with attempting to attach ha and hb to different content
is that there is no apparent difference in general content between these
folios, no apparently different illustrator, and no apparently different
writer. There is evidence that certain pages were written at different
times, which implies that certain quire folios were left blank in the last
half of the herbal section. If this is the case, that indicates that the
author finally formulated some "schema" to his work, and from there followed
some progressive pattern.
This is not as mad as it seems. In the first quire the writer left folio 1r
blank, a standard practice, and why some of us think f1r is a lengthy "title
page", also quite common. In the first quire he simply recorded herbal
information, without contemplating additions - no future plan. Quire two
demonstrates some minor alteration to this, (I'll show this in the work I'm
producing), quire three even more. 24r and 24v were left blank and filled
in later. By quire three we find a mixture of two sets, ha and hb. We now
have a system developing that includes categorization, alphabetical,
property, sign, or whatever. What we're seeing is a process
systematization. It really isn't as simple as that, but adding all the
complicated details only reinforces this overview, so I in turn offer this
to you to consider while analyzing the data you've accumulated.
GC
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx]On
> Behalf Of Larry Roux
> Sent: Wednesday, July 16, 2003 11:04 PM
> To: vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: RE: VMs: Currier A and B
>
>
> Just wondering:
>
> Could the textual differences you are seeing between language "a"
> and "b" be due to content instead of cipher differences? For
> example, two papers in Sky and Telescope may have drastically
> different text even though they are on the same general topic.
> One might include Latin names [Ursa Major] and the other Common
> names [Big Dipper]. Or one might be on the constellations and
> the stars they contain [Dubhe, Mirak] and the other may be a
> study of the motions of the stars [angular momentum, great
> attractor..etc]. Not that I am implying the Voy is any of the
> above, just that a subtle change in intention may cause a large
> change in vocabulary.
>
> Or, if the VMs is actually copies of papers from other documents
> there would actually be several differences in underlying use of
> words due to different authorship (I personally would never use
> the word "bifurcate" but Stephen R Donaldson would (and does) in
> a heartbeat).
>
> Just asking these questions so you can think of them while
> analyzing your data. Great work so far! I find all of this very
> interesting.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ******************************
> Larry Roux
> Syracuse University
> lroux@xxxxxxx
> *******************************
> >>> glenclaston@xxxxxxxxxxx 07/16/03 23:42 PM >>>
> Nick wrote:
>
> > In fact, you might well characterise a typical word ending of the
> > type I'm
> > describing as typically being placed *inside* a VMS word and
> > having the form:-
> >
> > (-/ch/sh) + (-/e/ee) + (o)
>
> This page was only on the 89 ending, which clearly demonstrates
> that certain
> word forms are well defined as a1 or b2. Other word endings
> follow similar
> patterns. There are many things I could say about this, but I'm
> working on
> something rather definitive which will say most of what I have to say in a
> similar page.
>
> Unfortunately my view does not seem to lead to false word breaks, rather
> that these are *real* encrypted words. (with the exception of those pesky
> "half spaces"). I guess I'd need to see a page divided as you think it
> should be, to get a better feel of what you're getting at. We may be
> looking at similar artifacts and offering different explanations for their
> behaviour.
>
> Meanwhile, back to a1/b2 in the herbal section - The 89 page alone
> demonstrates vividly that there are major structure differences between
> certain words in these pages, leading to the division of them into a1 and
> b2. As Rene points out, these definitions are at best hazy, but as a
> starting point they do very nicely.
>
> One of the things I haven't mentioned is that, since the b2 pages don't
> start until f26r, we now have a very good subset of a1 in f1r-f25v.
> Analyzing this subset reveals yet another split, similar to a1
> and b2. I've
> yet to find a good naming system for these, but you'll never
> guess what they
> correlate to, heh heh. Throw out f1r because of the fact that it was not
> written at the same time as the herbal pages, recategorize f48v to the b2
> subset, keep a close eye on 24r and 24v, ponder 34r as a hybrid a1/b2, and
> then go from there.
>
> a1 has as a minimum two of subsets, while b2 is more than half a1-subsets
> and b2. It's a lot more work than I really wanted to take on right now,
> with other things on the plate, but I'm still here and what the
> hey, I have
> to do it if I'm to continue much further. :-)
>
> I did a run last night where I placed definition markers in the database,
> had it print out the folios using the subset markers, (example: word in b2
> printed as /4o8am/, with defining slashes on both sides of the word). I
> then used Word to accent the contents of anything between the
> slashes with a
> color command, and then globally removed the slashes. What I
> wound up with
> was a font representation of each folio, line by line, paragraph by
> paragraph, highlighted in its proper subsets. A database simply can't
> provide this sort of view, and this view offers some very clear and
> penetrating information that you'll never get looking at sets of numbers,
> percentages and graphs. A little more work on statistically defining my
> perceived subsets, and I'll be able to offer a view of the herbal pages
> never before seen. Once I get this finished and posted Lucy, you're gonna
> have a lot of esplaining to do! :-) I think you're going to like it.
>
> GC
>
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx]On
> > Behalf Of Nick Pelling
> > Sent: Wednesday, July 16, 2003 7:32 PM
> > To: vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx
> > Subject: Re: VMs: Currier A and B
> >
> >
> > Hi GC,
> >
> > >http://voynich.info/xcrptn/89.pdf
> >
> > Excellent page, thanks! :-) For my own current set of ideas, it really
> > makes a lot of things clearly visible - for example, I think
> what you may
> > actually be observing here is the structure of word endings (with -dy
> > attached) as I think that <dy> mostly functions as a standalone
> > word in its
> > own right.
> >
> > What, then, to make of all the -ody words here? This (-o, quite
> > apart from
> > <qo>) looks like another type of word ending modifier (which the
> > encode is
> > trying to hide from view by placing in the middle of [fake] VMS
> > words), to
> > add to the <-e> and <-ee> groups.
> >
> > In fact, you might well characterise a typical word ending of the
> > type I'm
> > describing as typically being placed *inside* a VMS word and
> > having the form:-
> >
> > (-/ch/sh) + (-/e/ee) + (o)
> >
> > This seems to capture many of the occasions where my general
> > pairification
> > tends to lead to an otherwise unconnected "o" glyph: note that this is
> > independent of following pairs like <oe>, <or> etc.
> >
> > Cheers, .....Nick Pelling.....
> >
> >
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