I was sitting on a train trying to reconcile the Voynich Manuscript’s vellum dating (1404-1438) with its art history dating (1450-1470), while also pondering the various layered aspects of its codicology (such as the pictures apparently behind some the water nymphs), when an unexpected thought popped into my head.
Might the VMs have its (erased) plaintext as a palimpsest beneath its ciphertext?
That is, might the Voynich Manuscript be an enciphered copy of the document that was originally written in broadly the same place on the same pages? The overall timeline could work like this:-
- 1420 or so: the author compiles his/her books of secrets onto brand new vellum.
- 1460 or so: the author copies each line or paragraph onto a wax tablet, erases the line or paragraph from the vellum, and replaces it with an enciphered version.
If this is correct (and though I admit that the odds are against it, I do think it’s worth considering), the issue would then become whether the original plaintext might somehow be made legible again – that is, whether the plaintext’s ink made a sufficiently permanent contact with the vellum that some kind of imaging might now reveal it, even if it was heavily erased at the time.
Over on the MapHist mailing list in recent days, there has been a lot of ink-related discussion about the Vinland Map (which has its own curious cryptographic angle that Jim Enterline has been doggedly pursuing for years): this interesting analytical paper on vellums and inks was cited, as well as “Ink Corrosion” by Gerhard Banik. This latter paper discusses Haerting’s “conclusion that only inks containing iron(II) salts can cause ink degradation damage. The other components of the ink […] do not cause noticeable damage to the support medium.”
At first glance, you’d have to say that the VMs really doesn’t appear to be a classical palimpsest: but this is because palimpsests were typically washed clean and the second layer of writing put down at right angles to the original direction of the text.
But perhaps some of the original ink layer wasn’t erased, in forms other than that of almost imperceptible damage to the support material: I’m thinking in particular of the “hidden house” on f77v that I discussed here back in June 2009.
I’m pretty sure that this originally depicted some kind of house structure (drawn in faint, straight lines), but that the “water nymph” and the “wolkenbanden” were subsequently added in a later pass (in a completely different ink) to mislead the eye.
Codicologically, what is most interesting here is that the original ink (i.e. from the “house”) might be identified and separated out into its own layer… and that understanding its particular composition (and the way that it interacts with the support material) might point to a way of imaging the manuscript’s original (1420?) ink layers from beneath the subsequent (1460?) ink layers (if it exists, of course).
Basicaly, why even try to break the cipher, if it might be possible just to read it? Now wouldn’t that be a surprise for everyone!
Hi,
I don’t see those faint lines as the remnants of a house. The art in V isn’t generally very precise or detailed, but this supposed house is surely the most crooked little house anywhere. The lines don’t even meet, which the surely would have, even in V, if there had been an entire house drawn there first.
You’re suggesting that the original text of V has been erased. But what about the art? It seems you’re suggesting that at least some of it has also been erased and replaced. But that some of the art — this house — has been only half way erased, and something completely different painted over if. I don’t see that, the basin or pond is clearly drawn the take the faint lines into consideration.
I’m no expert, and I certainly don’t know anything about 15th century art. I’m just trying to explain how I interpret this particular idea and picture.
Hi Niels,
Without some other clue as to what the drawing originally looked like, it’s really hard to be sure (or even to guess in a satisfactory way) – and I fully agree that the lines don’t line up, which is why I tried to call it a structure rather than a house. But whatever it is, I hope you agree that it’s plainly there on the page, and that my basic codicological argument (i.e. that there are at least two layers visible here) should be pursued.
For what it’s worth, I’m also now wondering whether many of the strange plants can be explained by a two-pass drawing process: draw it properly (1420), erase part or all of it and replace with something strange (1450-1470).
What I’m least sure about are those (few) places that I have argued indicate that we are looking at a copy: the copied space in the margin in the starred recipe section, and the rubbed-through hole. Very strange (but interesting). 🙂
Cheers, …Nick Pelling…
Hi again,
no, I don’t agree with your argument that there are two layers. Not two independent layers. As I see it, the drawing of the basin (or pond or water device or whatever it’s called…) clearly tries not to disturb the house structure. As I see it, both are parts of the finished drawing. And there’s no sign of a line going through the figure’s legs.
Actually I see the house structure as some sort of chair or “sitting device”.
Also, it doesn’t look (from the image posted here) that there have ever been any other house structures drawn near the one were talking about. It seems unlikely to me that there was just this one simple box there, that the artist made a half hearted attempt to erase it and then drew something completely different over it, taking care to incorporate the remnants in the new art.
Would you agree that there are two quite different types of line and ink in use here, and that it does look as though the thin (structure) lines are on the earlier of the two layers? If you look at the ‘pool’, it seems to me that the top left was drawn in the thin line, but that the remainder was drawn (or overdrawn) in the wider lines. I’m not saying I’ve got all the answers, but I do think I’ve got quite a good question here – “what’s going on?” 🙂
Yes, the house is certainly drawn in a finer and fainter line. I don’t know about the ink. Yes, the top left of the inner circle of the pool is the same fine line. Could this simply be the result of changing the pen? How common are the fine and broader line types in V?
A closeup of the places where the lines of the various elements intersect might tell us the order they were drawn in.
The “What’s going on?” question is what makes V so intriguing, imo. Everything is strange and we’re not really sure about anything. Well, a fact or two we might be sure about, but in general it’s all just plain weird. And the more we learn, the weirder it becomes.
You have to remember that we’ve had decades (if not centuries) of people speculating about what the VMs might be, as if hypnotized by the immensity of the historical challenge. It is only in the last few years that a handful of people have started to look at incongruous or awkward details such as this and ask “what happened here so as to leave this page in this state?”, which is a far more forensic (and, dare I say it, a far more useful) approach. Welcome aboard! 🙂
It’s hard to generalize about fine and broad lines in the VMs: what is striking about this image is its (apparently layered) juxtaposition of the two. The scans released by the Beinecke are at the same (dpi) resolution as this image, so you’d have to do a higher-res scan to get any more detail.
Incidentally, the water quire has a number of other anomalously-layered drawings I’m not sure about: f76v top right, f77v top left, f77v bottom left, f79v bottom left, f80v middle left, f83v top left, etc. I really do think that some kind of non-obvious layering is going on with the water nymphs, and that some kind of multispectral imaging might be able to help us understand what the layers were (and how each layer transformed the preceding layers).
There is definitely no rubbing on the manuscript, which would be a sign
of erasure of a previous text. This is the essence of the press
statement which was misunderstood to mean that the ink was
immediately applied to the vellum after it was created. Thus,
unsurprisingly the palimpsest theory is out (as it was never ‘in’ anyway).
For me, the next step would rather be to (re-)evaluate ‘all the’ evidence
for the late 15th C.
First of all, theories like ‘it was probably written by Mr.X’, don’t have any
weight at all. For the C-14 dating we have a probability interval.
Similarly, for the other observations one would also need an ‘error
bar’ or a weight. Erwin Panofsky suggested 1470, but was willing to
go up to the early 16th century. Does this imply an uncertainty of 40 years?
Unfortunately, he is no longer around to ask, but Sergio Toresella is…
Also, I could very well imagine that the creation of the MS took someone
15 or 20 years.
On layers: I should have mentioned this before.
Nick, you suggested (long ago) that one detail to look at during the
forensic examinations was the folio number 42 which is written
through a plant drawing. During the film recordings in October
I asked Joe Barabe on your behalf, and he had a look through the
microscope, concluding that the folio number was written while
the green pigment was already on the page.
This of course fits with the ‘normal scenario’ that these folio numbers
were added later.
The problem seems to be that it is highly unlikely that a large batch of vellum would be cut into unusual shapes all at the same time and stored for 40 years before actually being used. Hence it is very likely that the vellum was indeed first used pretty much at the time it was made. The question I’m posing here is whether this initial writing may have later been erased before being re-enciphered in place (i.e. on the same sheet).
As far as erasures go, I think the absence of signs of rubbing may not be the ‘deal breaker’ you suggest. According to the research I cited in the post, not all medieval inks interact with the support material – for example, you can usefully think of many carbon-based inks as floating on the surface of the vellum, not really binding to it. Accordingly, some inks and paints can simply be washed off vellum, rather than forcefully removed. Remember that vellum is processed animal skin, so has a natural water-resistance: as I understand it, to leave a waterstain on vellum, you’d have to leave it immersed in water for a while – just washing it and drying it wouldn’t be enough.
The point I was making was that in f77v, I suspect that the thin ‘structure’ lines may well still be from that initial layer, and so we could perform spectroscopic analysis on a tiny spot of that material to see if it would be able to be washed easily off, or whether it would need to be scraped off.
Sergio Toresella’s dating was emphatic: that the handwriting was distinctly similar to a number of those from Milan circa 1470. I don’t think he would accept even a pre-1460 dating for it, let alone 1420, which provides another element of historical dissonance to deal with. As far as Panofsky goes, I get the impression that he was pretty sold on 1470 too, but that he wanted to hedge around the sunflower issue (which was then being far more actively debated than it is now):-
Finally: excellent news about the f42 folio number – though only a small detail, it all helps to sequence the layering. Much appreciated! 🙂
With Panofsky, it is clear what he is saying. 1470 is his middle date,
but we have no information on his uncertainty. He considers a later
date only in order to accommodate the supposed sunflower, but he was
clearly thinking pre-Columbian (and German).
With respect to Toresella, in the original note from Jim Reeds he
quotes 1450-1460. I know that you have also talked to him a lot.
Rather than speculate, it would seem valuable to get his opinion on
his uncertainty margin. I have noticed several times that the real
experts tend to be very careful with their conclusions and
interpretations.
For me, a ‘completion date’ (apart from the folio numbers) around
1440-1445 does not seem to violate the available evidence
too strongly. This, however, is only based on the numbers.
I fully agree that the unusually shaped foldout sheets are a relevant
piece of the puzzle of the MS construction timeline.
The traditional art history notion is usually that styles originate in the cities and then diffuse out into the provinces: so if an artefact has a more provincial style, you tend to allow (say) up to a couple of decades to account for that diffusion. So, the uncertainty that lets Panofsky skew his latest dating right up to 1510-1520 is a fairly one-sided affair. That is, his 1470 … 1510/1520 probably meant 1470 +/- 20 years (dating uncertainty) + 0..20 years (provincial diffusion uncertainty).
As for Sergio’s dating range, I’ll ask him again, see what his current thoughts are…
Whoever did the Vms was no artist, it’s enough to look at the drawings!, but someone with no talent but a like of drawing would know that finer lines ( turning the nib) would be used to make perspective ( ie make something look behind) darker, thicker lines are used for something in the foreground. Regarding the time-lapse: seeing that there are no errors and crossings out, I would guess that the Vms was written over a longer period of time, rather than just copied all at once. So maybe the author kept adding to his little book that he started earlier in his ( or her) life.
Oh and he might have been trying to purvey an idea of 2 different perspectives in the same drawing, ie that there is a covered well or fountain with water IN it, how would he do this except for drawing both (thus drawing it ‘lighter’).
Hi Michelle,
I suspect that a different ink and a different quill were used for the two types of line, and that the two layers serve quite different purposes. My hope is that forensically separating those layers will help us reconstruct what those different purposes were. Because other examples of layering don’t seem to have perspective / depth based intention, I doubt that perspective will turn out to be the whole story here…
Cheers, …Nick Pelling…
This doesn’t seem to be the spot to talk about the ‘wolkenbanden’ – or in plain English the sign of the world’s limit which was also used in one of the scripts too (will check which) as a sign of terminus.
It’s actually another indication that the imagery in the Voynich is most likely to have been copied from at least one earlier work.
Missing link for the Persian band’s introduction to the west.
In a Thracian horde of the Achaemenid period it appears in some grave goods found in modern Bulgaria. Picture of it here:
http://bnr.bg/sites/en/Lifestyle/HistoryAndReligion/Pages/1002NewbookThracians%E2%80%99treasures.aspx