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Re: VMs: Repeats and Blitherings

Hi Barbara,

As you describe, one sensible way to build something like the VMs would have been to write onto a pre-bound set of bifolios, so as to keep everything in order along the way.

However, this falls over when looking at (for example) quire 9 (which John and I have been discussing recently). The evidence there is that the outermost bifolio originally consisted of a normal-sized first folio and a super-wide second fold-out folio, and that this was the state the quire was in when it had its quire signature added: and, further, that a later owner rebound it, stitching that bifolio along a different fold so that it then consisted of two tolerably-wide fold-out folios (and it was at this state that it had its foliation added).

If our author's methodology was (as you suggest) to use pre-bound books and add in extra wide sheets where necessary, that is inconsistent with quire 9: there, the author deliberately sought out a super-wide *bifolio*, and used the first page as if it were a normal-page-sized page.

Your argument that someone adding pagination would have numbered (but then removed) blank pages seems to avoid the issue that, apart from folio 12 (which was excised from its containing bifolio), we are missing entire bifolios. Why go to the trouble of writing a 200+ page manuscript and leave a load of bifolios blank?

Further, this seems doubly inconsistent with your idea of a pre-bound blank notebook. Surely the point of using one of those would be to work sequentially through it - in which case, blank pages would be both sequential and at the end, not blank bifolios in the middle?

I am sympathetic with what you're saying - for example, I do think that it was likely that the VMs was written sequentially (if the drawing ink bleed-across on f3r was from a water stain, it would surely have transferred some of the stem with it), and I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out to have been loosely bound during its construction (examining its binding stations should show this). However, I don't think there's evidence that supports the idea of its having been written in a pre-bound blank booklet.

Philip Neal has also argued that the VMs was a copy, not an original (the indentation on both sides of f112 appears to have been duplicated from the original - and countering GC's earlier reply on that, there doesn't appear to be any reason from the sidfile images [such as vellum flaws] why this would have been introduced in a copy). If so, then it would simply be a question of duplicating the pages that already existed. So, perhaps the original ms was made in the way you describe - that would make sense. However, that wouldn't be consistent with what we know about the folio layout and structure of the VMs as it stands.

The VMS author on what I've seen uses heavy up strokes and diminishing
pressure
down strokes, whereas the paginator uses heavy down strokes and light
upstrokes
- a difference in mediaeval and renaissance styles. So the paginator was a
different
person from the author.

As it seems to have been misordered and rebound between the quire signatures being added and the pagination being added, that isn't a great surprise. But what of the difference in stroke style between the quiration hand and the VMs' hand?

As Maurizio M. Gavioli and I have shown the superficial connections between
"humanist hand" and Voynichese are the same ones that Humanist Hand was
 based upon; Carolinian minuscule (and which "humanist hand" was
*deliberately*
based upon) -  which predates Humanist hand by 800 years. Although there are
elements of both Carolinian Minuscule and a drop of the hat towards earlier
Merovingian Minuscule too, there is a much greater similarity with litera
moderna
(aka Black letter, Gothic) styles (quill angle, stroke usage and
connections) which
Humanist replaced.

I understand your argument on this point: but isn't it the case that Carolinian miniscule had fallen out of use for many centuries before being revived by the humanists?

In which case, surely you can only sensibly argue a date for the VMs for either very early medieval (say pre-1000?) or early modern (post-1400)? However, the remainder of your argument seems to be trying to point to a hinterland in between the two - say, 1200 or so - which isn't obviously supportable by the writing. I don't think those historians who, when looking at the lettering, layout and overall style of the VMs, identified it as looking like an Italian humanist document from circa 1450-1500 spent too long wondering whether it could actually have been a stray Carolinian document from circa 800.

In short, I use the phrase "humanist hand" fully in the knowledge that the lettering is consistent both with Carolinian hands and with humanist hands - but that I don't see any supporting evidence for the earlier dating at all. In contrast, pictorial elements (like the Sagittarius crossbowman) seem to point to a later date, not to the kind of earlier date you propose.

Also the secondary labels in the astrological section seem or the B/W jpegs
to
be Litera Moderna. If this turns out to be the case then these labels could
were most likely added when litera Modera was either contemporary with, or
followed, the creation
of the vms, which in turn would date the additional labels to before the
late 13thC, and
the MSS older again.

Granted there were areas of europe where litera Modern survived, longer,
even up to
the 20thC in Germany (although more in printing than handwriting - book or
document
hands) so any dating by document hand styles while being a very strong
"possibility",
isn't, and can never be, proven fact.

Interestingly, one of the month names in that hand appears to be "augst", which might well point to some kind of German education (though YMMV).

But added to the circular cartography
(a medieval signature) and the medieval T-O maps. I think the evidence is
mounting up for a medieval origin of the VMS.

No, not really. The Massajo map of Milan is famously circular, and that was well-known during the Quattrocento. Circular volvelles were well-used even into the Renaissance. We don't even know if the VMs' T-O shape even represents a T-O map. And so forth.

A hoaxer probably wouldn't goof up the quire marks or page order, he/she
*knows* the right order even if its gibberish, whereas a genuine rebinder,
who can not read the mss, is almost certain to missorder pages and
misidentify quires.

The fact that we're only just beginning to disentangle all the layers to get at the correct folio order would seem to point to the subtlety of the whole artefact. Those hoaxers are downright cunning people, are they not? :-)

So I conclude that as the vms has *apparently* got quires and pages out of
order, the mss was rebound several times by different folk, during a long
existence. From this in turn I conclude that the vms is likely to be much
much older than the renaissance.

Erm... the VMs hasn't had *that* many additional layers added - we have the zodiac month hand, the quiration, the foliation, the "muss del" hand, and even the "michiton" hand. Doesn't sound like 400+ years' worth of additions to me... perhaps you disagree. :-9

Cheers, .....Nick Pelling..... 


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