Re: VMs: Mixtures of languages in the VMS

["Jeff" <jeff@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Nick Pelling incoming@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Wrote


> Hi everyone,
>
> At 20:27 03/11/2003 -0600, Dennis wrote:
> >         Other possibilities.  An unattested or poorly attested
> >Romance or Germanic language, (say Dalmatian, a Romance
> >language which became extinct in the 20th century),
> >which however would bear strong resemblance to known
> >cognates.  A pidgin language resembling Lingua Franca
> >which is poorly attested.
>
> I thought the whole point of a pidgin language was to aid communication,
by
> using a simplified grammar and words stolen wholesale from the existing
> languages known by the people who want to communicate using it?
>
> Of course, parts of the VMS (like the herbal and the astrological pages)
> might well contain words taken from many languages - in the case of the
> herbal, names of plants in multiple languages was almost obligatory. But
> surely this can't be true of *every page* on the VMS?
>

I believe either the VMS is a mechanically constructed hoax or in multiple
languages with a particularly evil twist added. Because of the sensitive
nature of the content it was probably intended that no one other than the
intended recipient would be able to read it if it fell into the wrong hands.
I also believe that if it is not a hoax then you are on the right lines with
your thinking as to the origins.

> Basically, while we can't easily distinguish the contents of the former
> (possibly less structured pages, with synonyms in multiple languages) from
> the contents of the latter (possibly more structured pages [like recipes,
> balneological, cosmological, etc]), I fail to see any obvious explanation
> for the VMs' entire contents apart from *hoax*, *code*, or *shorthand*.
>

I concur totally with this view.

> Although there's a *remote* possibility it's written in a lost pidgin
> language, I can't presently see a single piece of physical evidence to
> support the idea. Please tell me if I'm wrong!
>

I also agree here.

> The related view sometimes taken of the VMs' set of "words" - "that, as
the
> VMs has an apparently large vocabulary, it must therefore be appropriating
> words from multiple language sources" - similarly appears to be
unsupported.
>
> One piece of evidence which I suggest strongly contradicts this second
> point of view is that many, many words in the VMs appear combinatorial -
> [qo|o][l][t|k|ch]e[e][dy|ky], or dai[i][i][n|r] etc - which (I believe)
> fails to accord with any known languages, whether taken singly or
> together... apart from (a) completely artificial languages, (b) artificial
> memory systems (where names denote addresses within a taxonomy, similar to
> mnemotechnics, Lullian systems, etc), or (c) numbering systems (like Roman
> numerals).
>

This all depends upon the scheme used to encipher the plain text. As I have
said previously daiin and daiin might not mean the same thing even if
appearing in multple successive instances. Think of the quick brown fox
jumps over the lazy dog. The and quick migh always appear together. Brown
and fox might also appear together. These pairs of words might signify
something else. This way the structure of the VMS could easily be explained.
However this example is not intended to be taken seriously. It is just
another method of obfuscating the solution.

> Structurally, the closest match with the VMs would appear to be either an
> "accessorised number code", where words are converted to numbers (and
those
> numbers then obfuscated), or a wholly artificial language (though,
strictly
> speaking, these are rarely combinatorial). I'm saying this not because I
> particularly want either of these last two ideas to be true, but because I
> can argue the case for either of these without having to jump through
> endless hoops.
>

If you read the VMS upside down then numerals become more visible! So
maybe....

> Perhaps it's time to crossing things off the list, rather than continually
> adding to it? Yes, the different explanations for the VMs are all
> *possible*... but not *equally possible*, surely? :-o
>
> Cheers, .....Nick Pelling.....
>

New ideas always evolve better through the process of brainstorming. Any
idea no matter how obsurd is thrown into the mix. Then at a tangent someone
comes up with the bright idea. To stop people throwing their strange
thoughts into the debate is to narrow the possibility of solution.

Just a few thought for the mix.

Jeff.

BTW Nick do you have any information or web links for the encryption methods
of Cicco
Simonetta?


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