Every once in a while, I get accosted by something delightfully tangential to the while cipher mysteries arena. A nice example of this recently popped up as part of the University of Western Australia’s Second Life (a well-known online virtual world) presence, where a certain ‘Hypatia Pickens’ built herself a Voynich-themed area, with odd-looking plants and nymphs sliding down a curious slide into the cool water.
Naturally, that’s not the real story here, not when the question I immediately wanted answered was “who is Hypatia Pickens, exactly?”
It turns out Hypatia’s real name is Sarah Higley; she teaches medieval literature at the University of Rochester; she wrote a 2007 book on Hildegard of Bingen’s Lingua Ignota (which I wonder whether my friend Philip Neal has yet seen); she has created a conlang (constructed language) called Teonaht; and she created the (largely satirical) Star Trek character Reginald Barclay.
All of which probably serves to explain her interest in the Voynich Manuscript, which is surely – if you believe all you read on the Internet – nothing less than a medieval constructed lingua ignota invented by aliens… specifically Ferengi (simply because the world is itself a lovable medieval Arabic term meaning Franks). 🙂
Just wondering –
Since I rely on Nick’s posts, to keep up to date with new persons and writings in Voynich research, I expect others do too.
Are there many others here whose work Nick hasn’t had an opportunity to mention: let’s limit it to people who’ve worked on the manuscript seriously, and for more than two years, and who write in the same first language – English.
I’d enjoy the chance to read your work too.
Nick – since you are about at the moment, may I have your retrospective permission /non-permission to reproduce the glyphs from your ‘scrabble’ post?
If no, I’ll remove them from the fairly trivial post
http://voynichimagery.wordpress.com/2012/09/29/nmb-script/
Diane
Diane: I already said ok, that’s fine – http://ciphermysteries.com/2009/03/09/voynich-scrabble/comment-page-1#comment-101434 🙂
Tah heaps
Well, Nick,
I haven’t promised that I wouldn’t be popping up “here and there” on some of your other Voynich-related discussions/reviews. Nymphs — that caught your eye, eh?
Keep on keeping on! Give my regards to Esther Molen, if she’s still online ‘somewhere’. I’m off to Ms Pickens’ cypherworld, now.
Fantastic Fantasy for Fanatical Foynich Friends !
Fondly!
🙂
Nick, I know of this book but I have not yet read it – it is on my long Voynich todo list.
Philip: jolly good, wouldn’t like to think you’d missed a lingua ignota trick. 😉
The art looks good to me. For alternate worlds, start with geography. History will write itself. It’s mostly about going after what someone else has. The conlangs are the hard part. Incidentally, this has been a good day for solutions. I posted one to the scrabble article (see link on this page). Another announcement, not so modest, can be found on The Voynich M(onkey)S, subject: “VMS read”.
I’m responding to this six years later. I saw it six years ago and let it lie–thank you, Nick, for “outing” me; “Hypatia,” however, has long given up all hope of anonymity–but since I’ve just asked to see Diane’s blog, I thought I’d break my silence. I’ve greatly enjoyed your book and used it (and will use it) in a class I teach every now and again on the VMS (slated for this Fall). My work for the SL art challenge so many years ago was mostly for a themed event on “fertility.” The better pictures are from one of the bigger SL festivals. It won a little award, and I exposed a number of people to an artifact they hadn’t heard of. My interest in the VMS goes way back before that and is secondary to my work in Old and Middle English and Middle Welsh, but I tend to valorize my passions by turning them into academic pursuits (hence the book on Hildegard). I’m fascinated by private inventions that mimic real ones (invented maps, invented languages, virtual reality, miniatures) and I’ve written separate articles on these topics. My book on Hildegard’s ‘Unknown Language’ is an edition and translation of her 1012 words (glossed in Latin and German) and it puts it in context with imaginary language in her time and afterwards. I will be reviewing the Brepols edition of it this Fall by Michael Embach. I do have an abiding interest in “outlier art” and other solitary endeavors that are gleefully painted as mad; have either you or Diane seen the book on A.G.Rizzoli and his fantastical architectural drawings? Nick, you once remarked here, referencing the Codex Seraphinianus, that “nothing is more alien than the intensely private.” I quoted that for a talk I gave on Rizzoli and Jean Perdrizet at the American Folk Art Museum in NYC (begging your pardon–it’s a terrific observation). To my great regret, Serafini revealed the origins of his idea for the book, along with the meaninglessness of his “language” in the Second Edition. It was best left alien. (And by the way, the ST episode is about exactly this: a private world that imitates and “improves upon” Barclay’s insufficient relationships in RL–a fantasy within a fantasy. They ruined it by making me have him destroy his holodeck programs, as though private endeavors can’t compete with approved adult activity and it’s best to leave them behind.) I feel the same way about the VMS and rather delighted that it yields so many tantalizing details that just don’t quite explain the entire book definitively, this self-enfolded text, this great cornucopia, this late medieval “Mentaculus.” The material on the Internet alone is enough to saturate you beyond endurance, even more than the fifteenth-century book itself. Which is so full of noise that excluding the nulls and finding the bits that communicate can drive you (wonderfully) nuts. So I don’t attempt it. I just admire it, and I read the theories about it. I admire what you all are doing, and suspect that some of you who have hidden your sites are intending to a) keep outsiders out and/or b) write a book. There are already so many of you with the expertise and training to examine its parts that I feel there is nothing much I can contribute, except to ask questions. And expose others to it as a serious manuscript that enriches our understanding of the late bizarre Middle Ages. If it shows Eastern influences, it is an important contribution to our efforts at the UR’s Humanities Center and Early Medieval Worlds to expand medieval studies beyond Western Europe. So I like to share it. I’m not going to ask to lick it, or suggest that aliens created it. I’ve been “serious” about it, especially the Rosettes page, which fits well with studies of medieval mappae mundi. I write in English. I stay away from the shlocky novels. I do have a private life of painting and fiction, somewhat private, and my great ambition is to be an outlier artist discovered after I’m dead. 😉 In the meantime, I’m doing my best to contribute what I can to the riches of medieval studies! Sarah Higley (Hypatia)
Sarah Higley: thank you for your refreshing comment, it’s good to be reminded once in a while that there is a point to the stuff I write here.
Rizzoli I know a little about (and would like to see the film of his life one day), but I haven’t really yielded to the lure of the outsider: I find it hard enough to work out what the mainstream position on any of the things I research should be. (And nobody else seems to have a clue.)
I guess the thin line that separates us is simply that I can’t accept that these things are ineffably unknowable, or even that they are somehow richer for their current state of undecryptedness. Rather, I think that the thick crust of nonsense shovelled on top of them (as if that somehow counterbalances the lack of genuine knowledge) makes intellectual beggars of us all: we are not richer for the abundance of proffered mad theories, but poorer.
Sarah: I sympathise with some of what you have said. Though I am of two minds. On the one hand a solution to the Voynich will end the torment of those clutching at straws for a solution. On the other hand a solution will mean that there is one less fascinating mystery. If the solution is very interesting e.g. Nahuti theory then a solution will still be captivating. If the solution is rather prosaic then a lot of people will lose interest in the Voynich which will be sad. But mysteries have to be solved that is my abiding perspective.
And I might hasten to add, we’d be a heck of a lot poorer, if we were to stick our frivolous heads in the sand, thereby keeping any opinions and wacky ideas to ourselves. What would the likes of Wilfred and Lily think of us; not much I’d expect.
Sarah, regarding access to Diane’s blog: she’s been inactive for a few months now, which is usually not her habit. I’m starting to suspect she’s taken a break from the online Voynich world…
Yet again, I’m coming to this very, very late. Initially, I was a little dismayed at being “outed” so thoroughly as I try to keep my zanier experiments secret from my academic colleagues. Private pursuits, like “Hollow” ones, are tender, and often frowned on. Back to the issue: I agree with you whole-heartedly that the VMS should not be treated as “ineffably unknowable.” I would love nothing better than a convincing solution to this mystery. (What the heck is a “PROTO-Romance language doing in the 15th century?? Righto, Nick: “Vulgar Latin” LOL) Frankly, Mark and John, I think that deciphering it credibly (even if the solution is “prosaic”) would still open up a new set of questions about medieval culture and variety of expression that would be so useful. So do carry on. I am reading you as often as I can, and now and then I stick my head in (hopefully not in the sand. :))) Oh and thanks, Koen.