Re: VMs: Various observations/questions

["GC" <gc-@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Nick wrote:

> Also: if you want to speak the same language (when discussing Voynichese)
> as most of us here, please try to learn the basics of EVA (which is very
> easy to learn). It's not perfect, but I suspect that it's closer than its
> main critic might have you believe. :-)
>          http://www.voynich.nu/extra/eva.html

As the main critic in question, I'd just like to go on record - I think EVA
is a wonderful "language", and if I ever have the opportunity to actually
"speak" the words 'qoteedy daiin.okchey.kokaiin' in a real-life situation
where I'm not cursing myself or listening to Led Zeppelin on LSD, I'll take
every advantage of the opportunity.  Unfortunately I do not "speak" on this
list, I write, so I guess I'll never have the opportunity to talk dirty like
that to a real person.  I love EVA, just love it, love it love it. :-)

> >Frankly, most of the illustrations in the "biological" section doesn't
> >make much sense to me. I'm not an expert, but this doesn't look as
> >illustrations from the average religious document.
>
> There are only two (hotly contested) VMs images that *might* be a cross,
> and AFAIK nobody has yet reviewed those pages in the new hi-res sidfiles.
> GC, any opinion?

Indeed I do! :-)  I think you'll find that many of the hand-written herbals
are from monasteries, but very few contain religious iconography AFAIK.
It's simply not part of the subject matter.  We also look at notebooks on
astronomy/astrology, and the same there, even when we know the students to
be members of a religious order.  That we have any religious symbols present
at all in the VMS is probably due to the artist attempting to depict the
women in "everyday" life, or at least natural situations.  With that we get
different hair styles, different clothing, and indications that some of the
women are of higher social status than others, up to ones wearing tiarras or
crowns.  Some of the women are all dressed up, and others are simple farm
maidens, in my view.  The artist apparently attempted to cover the spectrum.

I've tried to place in my mind in modern terms the social position a
physician would maintain in the 15th/16th century, and the best I can come
up with is "civil servant".  They were usually endentured into the religious
order in exchange for education.  In other words, not volunteers, and those
without an outside stipend coming in were extremely poor.  Not exactly
faithful to their vow of chastisty, and probably not too eager to include
religious duty as part of their outside recreation.

But primarily it's the subject matter.  There is only one cross in a woman's
hand, and another on top of a crown, if I remember, but there are several
instances of medical instruments, the bladder or "syringe" used for both
douche and enema purposes.  There is also the "top", a device with a hollow
tube and a disc attached that was used for the placement of suppositories.
(The disc kept the device from being inserted too far.)   Remind me sometime
this week, and I'll try to find the pages again where these occur - duh -
they're in the balneological section, silly me, so I won't have to look far.
The artistry isn't very good, but there are a few images that suggest one
woman doing something with another woman's eyes, etc., images I believe to
be medically related, though this is just one interpretation.

Hope this gives you some ideas.

GC

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