No.
You might instead ask: “Was the author of the Voynich Manuscript a nymphomaniac lesbian from Baden Baden obsessed with clysters?”
Or how about: “Was the author of the Voynich Manuscript a medieval psychoactive drugs harvester from (the place now known as) Milton Keynes?”
Or: “Was the author of the Voynich Manuscript a Somalian Humiliatus obsessed with mis-shapen vegetables starting with the letter ‘A’, writing down the results of a six-year-long trek through the Amazon rainforest in a perversely private language?”
The answers to these are, errrm, no, no, and no (respectively).
When the Voynich Manuscript contains so many unexplained points of data (a thousand? Ten thousand?), why on earth should I or anyone else spend more than a minimal amount of time evaluating a Voynich theory that seems to attempt to join together just two of them with what can only be described as the flimsiest of thread?
What – a – waste – of – time – that – would – be.
Nick and ants.
The author of the manuscript is a Czech Jew. When you are to read what is written in the manuscript.
So find out that author was named Elizabeth of Rosenberg. ( Eliška z Rožmberka ).
Nick: Love the alternative theories! I am most persuaded by the Somalian; though so don’t think we should discount the idea that the author was an Ethiopian Humiliati.
You could include the link to the newspaper article, but maybe you don’t want to give it such credence.
The document #at least superficially# looks like an Italian manuscript of the 15th century (and the paleographer I showed a website on it to seemed to think so too).
There is the possibility that ‘someone who could write but was unfamiliar with the Italian script’ was copying an existing document without comprehension, and getting it wrong. (Try copying a German blackletter or Cyrillic text to see the issues involved.)
To such a theorist I’d say (if you will permit me to) …
“please explain how you came to form the idea that
(I) this manuscript was manufactured in northern Italy;
(ii) that it has a fifteenth century ‘author’ *at all* given that most extant manuscripts are copies of earlier works;
and
(iii) precisely which elements in the pictorial or written text admit no other explanation that than the whole is by some single ‘author’ who was a Jew and a native of northern Italy?
So much bluster and hypothesis that sometimes one neglects to ask if a conclusion mightn’t be other than fantasy, hypothesis, imagination or imitation.
You never know.
The vellum dates to the 15th century; and a quick websearch on ’15th century Italian manuscripts’ shows texts which are visually not dissimilar.
I think for the purposes of discussion ‘author(s)’ and ‘scribe(s)’ are treated interchangeably – and the VM may well be the written equivalent of a sammelband.
No
bd
Humiliati is plural. You mean he wasn’t a humiliatus.
*departs sorrowfully wearing mediaeval Italian penitential anorak*
SirHubert: I’m really sorry to have distressed you so, lazy typing fixed. 😉
It’s Hard To Be Humble
Certain Itialian noblemen were taken prisoner by the Emperor Henry V (1081–1125) following a rebellion in the area. They were taken as captives to northern Germany and after suffering the miseries of exile for some time, they assumed a penitential garb of grey and gave themselves up to works of charity.
Their acquaintance with the German woolen manufactures enabled them to introduce improved methods into Italy supplying the poor, unemployed and homeless with employment and distributing their gains among those in need. The wool business was very good they could make the best cloth and sell it
for less.That went by the wayside when they found real estate and wealth. They bought up so much property that they made Filippo Maria Visconti think they would soon own all of Milan. The Humiliati hired the best artists to paint the churchs, like Giotto and Botticelli . The even rented space to Michaelangelo.
You ask what do noblemen know of money. It just so happens the jews in Spain were under pressure to leave. Would you rather be a Converso in Spain or Milan and who better to handle the money business?
Did Athanasius Kircher know what the Voynich Manuscript was about ?
I suggest prominent use of the lesbian nymphomaniac theory on the dust cover, purely to increase book sales.
I agree on the dust cover design. The insides still need some work. It is like someone opened a can of alphabet soup and poured it on the table , then threw away the can. Everyone since has tried to arrange the letters and make sense of them. The place to start would be a Five W’s Chart.
Why are Capricorn and Aquarius missing ?
The Jewish Women Only Bathhouse Theory does rather crumble when one looks at:
De Balneis Puteolanis by Peter of Eboli
I believe this is well known to many Voynich researchers. The similarities with the Voynich images are striking.
In the drawings I have seen from “De Balneis Puteolanis” there appear to be no religious illustrations such as crosses. Peter of Eboli was a monk yet there is an absense of religious illustrations.
It is often said that the author of the Voynich could not have been a monk given the sparcity of religious symbols. What is the evidence that herbal or astrological manuscripts produced by religious people were peppered with crosses of other religious drawings?
If the subject matter was not of a religious nature what purpose would there have been for a monk to litter his manuscript with religious imagery?
This is where the Great Humiliati hypothesis hits the brick wall. While making the best woolen cloth they also made their clothing from the sheep skin. See the white pelisses. One would think they made the book from sheep skin. Now we must check the Protein testing done by the Beinecke for errors.