According to a news item I found just now, Mary D’Imperio died on 28th May 2020 in Springfield VA, at the age of 90. The details were relayed by her cousin Robert G. D’Imperio.
Voynich researcher Don Hoffman visited her a few times in December 2019 at the nursing home she was in. He put together these notes on her life:
Mary Evelyn D’Imperio Father – Dominic D’Imperio, born Biccari, Foggia, Italy, 31 August 1888 – 29 July 1965, sculptor, came to America in 1905, settled in Philadelphia, PA. Mother – Edith Brownback Roberts D’Imperio, born Philadelphia, PA, 1902 – 1977, artist. Parents married 20 June 1928. Mary Evelyn D’Imperio born in Germantown, PA on 13 January 1930, an only child High School – Germantown Friends School, Germantown, PA College – Radcliffe, majored in comparative philology and classics, graduated 1950, Phi Beta Kappa – University of Pennsylvania, for second degree, this time in structural linguistics She was recruited at her home by the US Government and underwent three days of testing there for her first job – was told by testers that she was one in a million both before testing and after successfully completing it. Jobs – only one for her entire career – started working for US Government at NSA in 1951 as linguist and cryptanalyst, but thought of herself as a computer programmer – she had thought she was doomed to be a secretary, clerk, teacher or nurse before the government came calling. She originally worked with an ATLAS I computer and developed a program for text use on computers called Text Macro Compiler (TEMAC) from 1960 to 1962, but got nowhere with male bosses with it because they couldn’t see a use for it & didn’t think it was worthwhile (and she thinks also because she was female and not forceful). I think she is more proud of her TEMAC work than her Voynich Manuscript work (which she admits she has mostly forgotten). After retirement she worked as volunteer with entomologist Dave Nickle at the Smithsonian Institution. 1987 to 2006 – frequent contributor to North American Breeding Bird Survey. Traveled extensively worldwide for pleasure (but only to safe countries), often to bird watch.
In the Voynich field, D’Imperio was a quiet giant, who will always be well remembered for her (1976) book “The Voynich Manuscript – An Elegant Enigma“. I’m sad to hear of her passing. My thoughts are with her family.
Apparently it’s Voynich Art History trivia weekend here at Cipher Mysteries. First up is this and this, both prints of Master E.S.’s “The Visitation” that I found recently:
Master ES (German, active ca. 1450–67) The Visitation, 15th century German Engraving; sheet: 6 3/16 x 4 11/16 in. (15.7 x 12 cm) The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1922 (22.83.2)
Though classily executed, this is clearly (I think) in the same family as Diebold Lauber’s couples and the Voynich Manuscript Virgo roundel couple.
Ex Libris
I also stumbled upon this nice ex libris at the front of a book owned by Auxiliary Bishop Melchior Fattlin of Constance (1490-1548) (and show me a blogger who doesn’t get a guilty kick out of occasionally linking to catholic-hierarchy.org and I’ll show you a big fat liar):
While eerily reminding me of the Voynich Aries zodiac roundel, this also makes me wonder whether the surname “Fattlin” might have some goat- or sheep-related meaning etc.
Banderoles
The other thing I’m wondering about today is banderoles (aka “speech scrolls”). These started as ornate scrolls filled with text in drawings and paintings, more or less equivalent to modern speech bubbles (e.g. the former by the angel Gabriel, the latter by Garfield).
In the 15th century, these were a favourite of the Master of the Banderoles (active 1450-1475), who Wikipedia rather sniffily describes as a “crude” and “clumsy” copyist of Master E.S. and Rogier van der Weyden.
Why am I interested in banderoles? Because I can’t see anything that better describes the lines of text spiralling out both from the inverted T-O map and the wolkenband on Voynich Manuscript f68v3.
Codicologically, my suspicion here is that the drawing f68v3 came from was itself derived from a French (specifically Parisian) original, but that that predecessor had only had the four seasons’ banderoles added. The extra four banderoles seem to have been added here as an additional construction layer. That is, I suspect that if you looked under a microscope at the boundaries where the extra four banderoles join on to the wolkenband, you would see the marks where the wolkenband was drawn but then erased to add in the extra four banderoles.
Having said that, I haven’t yet found a single fifteenth century astronomical drawing with banderole-style annotation. Perhaps this is something we should be looking for.
As should be clear from thelastfewposts here, my Voynich research focus has recently turned to the wave of astronomical instruments that appeared in the German-speaking lands in the first half of the fifteenth century.
The person behind much of this wave would appear to be John of Gmunden (AKA Johannes von Gmunden, Johannes de Gamundia, etc) (c.1380 – 1442), but I’ll return to him in more detail in a separate post.
Even though I’ve been looking mostly at theorice planetarum of late, I’m also interested in the nocturlabe / nocturnal / sternuhr (‘star clock’), which similarly appeared in the 15th century. Even though the earliest known description of the astronomical mechanism behind this was written by Raymond Llull, the first actual nocturnals started to be built in the fifteenth century.
Hence I’ve long wondered whether the curiously-repetitive circular diagram on the Voynich Manuscript’s page f57v might actually be describing a nocturnal in some way. Yet the practical problem with pursuing this further was that I was lacking a good reference for the very early (fifteenth century) history of the nocturlabe.
Ernst Zinner’s Sternuhr History
This was exactly the point where Ernst Zinner’s (1956) Deutsche und niederländische astronomische Instrumente des 11.-18. Jahrhunderts landed heavily on my doorstep. (Though I bought it second-hand, it was actually from the Adler Planetarium, which was a nice coincidence).
Zinner outlines the history of the Sternuhr on pp. 164-166, but given that our focus here is the fifteenth century, I’ll only transcribe (and lightly HTMLize) p.164.
You’ll need to know that Zinner refers to manuscripts and objects by their index number in Zinner (1925) “Verzeichnis der astronomischen Handschriften des deutschen Kulturgebietes“: astronomy historians typically call these ‘Zinner numbers’ (e.g. “Zi 3593”).
Oh, and you’ll also need to know the names of the stars in Ursa Major (despite having an Astronomy O-Level, I only knew Dubhe):
α – Dubhe
β – Merak
γ – Phecda
δ – Megraz
ε – Alioth
ζ – Mizar
η – Alkaid = Benetnasch = Benenaz = the star right on the end of the plough handle
Finally: Dubhe and Merak were known as the ‘runners’ (Cursores) or ‘brothers’ (Fratres), that point towards Polaris, the Pole Star.
First paragraph…
Die Sternuhr, auch Nachtuhr = horologium noctis = noctilabium = nocturnalis gennant, wurde in Frankreich erfunden [149 d S.8] und von Raimondo Lullo in seiner Arte de navegar 1295 beschreiben [Opera omnia, Mainz 1721]. Er verwendete den Polstern und die Fratres genannten Sterne des Großen Bären. Das Gerät wurder im Kreise des Schülers Johanns von Gmunden in Wien verwendet; denn die 1438 beendete Abschrift von Gmundens Arbeit über das Astrolab [253 Nr. 3593] enthält einen Hinweis auf die Sternuhr mit der Verwendung von Polaris und Dubhe. Die Sternuhr besteht aus einer runden Scheibe mit einem Loch in der Mitte, um das sich einige Scheiben und ein über die Scheibe hinausreichender Zeiger bewegen lassen. Durch das Loch wird der Polstern beobachtet und der Zieger auf die beiden Hinterräder des Großen Bären, bezeichnet als die Läufer (cursores) oder Brüder (fratres), oder auf den letzten Deichselstern Benenaz des Großen Bären oder auf andere helle Sterne eingestellt. Wenn das Datum bekannt ist, so läßt sich dann die gleichlange Stunde bestimmen. Um die Stunden in der Nacht abzählen zu können, wurden an der Stundenscheibe Zacken oder Zähne oder Knöpfe der Stunden angebracht. Die Sternuhr wurde gelegentlich auf der Rückseite eines Sonnenquadranten oder einer Sonnenuhr angebracht. Bereits die 1445 bis 1450 auszugsweise abgeschriebene Arbeit [253 Nr. 7464a] zeigt, daß die Sternuhr auf ihrer Rückseite einen Sonnenquadranten für 51° Polhöhe hatte, ebenso 253 Nr 7464 d, e von 1458 und 1512, Nr 7470 b von 1512, Nr. 7465 a von 1492 und 7464, wo das ganzDie Sternuhr, auch Nachtuhr = horologium noctis = noctilabium = nocturnalis gennant, wurde in Frankreich erfunden [149 d S.8] und von Raimondo Lullo in seiner Arte de navegar 1295 beschreiben [Opera omnia, Mainz 1721]. Er verwendete den Polstern und die Fratres genannten Sterne des Großen Bären. Das Gerät wurder im Kreise des Schülers Johanns von Gmunden in Wien verwendet; denn die 1438 beendete Abschrift von Gmundens Arbeit über das Astrolab [253 Nr. 3593] enthält einen Hinweis auf die Sternuhr mit der Verwendung von Polaris und Dubhe. Die Sternuhr besteht aus einer runden Scheibe mit einem Loch in der Mitte, um das sich einige Scheiben und ein über die Scheibe hinausreichender Zeiger bewegen lassen. Durch das Loch wird der Polstern beobachtet und der Zieger auf die beiden Hinterräder des Großen Bären, bezeichnet als die Läufer (cursores) oder Brüder (fratres), oder auf den letzten Deichselstern Benenaz des Großen Bären oder auf andere helle Sterne eingestellt. Wenn das Datum bekannt ist, so läßt sich dann die gleichlange Stunde bestimmen. Um die Stunden in der Nacht abzählen zu können, wurden an der Stundenscheibe Zacken oder Zähne oder Knöpfe der Stunden angebracht. Die Sternuhr wurde gelegentlich auf der Rückseite eines Sonnenquadranten oder einer Sonnenuhr angebracht. Bereits die 1445 bis 1450 auszugsweise abgeschriebene Arbeit [253 Nr. 7464a] zeigt, daß die Sternuhr auf ihrer Rückseite einen Sonnenquadranten für 51° Polhöhe hatte, ebenso 253 Nr 7464 d, e von 1458 und 1512, Nr 7470 b von 1512, Nr. 7465 a von 1492 und 7464, wo das ganze Instrument « spera » genannt ist wie in 7464 a.e Instrument « spera » genannt ist wie in 7464 a.
The star clock (also called night clock = horologium noctis = noctilabium = nocturnalis) was invented in France [Henri Michel. Du Prisme méridien au Siun-ki (Ciel et Terre 1950 S. 1-13) p.8] and described by Raymond Llull in his (1295) Arte de navegar [Opera omnia, Mainz 1721]. Llull used the ‘Fratres’ pair of stars in the Ursa Major constellation. The device was used in the circle of the student Johannes von Gmunden in Vienna; a 1438 copy of Gmunden’s work on the Astrolabe [Zi 3593] describes a star clock using Polaris and Dubhe. The star clock consists of a round disc with a hole in the middle around which both a number of discs and a pointer extending beyond [the edge of] the disc can be rotated. Through the [central] hole, the [Pole Star] is observed and the pointer is then set to the two rear stars of Ursa Major [known as the runners (‘Cursores’) or brothers (‘Fratres’)], or to Benenaz [Eta Ursae Majoris, the ‘plough handle’ star of the Ursa Major constellation] or other bright stars. If the date is known, this device helps determine the hour of the night. To read the hour off in the dark, teeth or buttons (one for each hour) were attached to the hour disc. Star clocks were occasionally attached to the backs of quadrants or sundials. Already in 1445 to 1450 the partially copied work Zi 7464a demonstrates that the star clock on its back had a sun quadrant set for 51° latitude, likewise:
Zi 7464d [1458]
Zi 7464e [1512]
Zi 7470b [1512]
Zi 7465a [1492] and
Zi 7464, where the whole instrument is called a «spera», as in Zi 7464a.
Second paragraph…
Zuerst wurde Dubhe (α Ursa) als der Richtstern des Zeigers genannt. Dieser Stern oder die beiden äußeren Rädersterne werden angegeben auch in den Arbeiten 253 Nr. 7468 b, geschrieben nach 1452, 253 Nr. 7468 nach 1457, 253 Nr. 7467 von 1459, 253 Nr. 7464 von 1461, 253 Nr. 7468 c um 1466, 253 Nr. 7463 a nach 1475. In 253 Nr. 7468 b ist als Leitstern außer Dubhe auch Benenaz genannt und dazu die Örter von Polaris, Dubhe und Benenaz für 1438 angegeben. Benenaz wird auch genannt in Wilhelms Arbeit [253 Nr. 11716] über die Herstellung und Verwendung der Sternuhr um 1471. Da Wilhelm Schüler Peurbachs war, so gehört auch seine Arbeit zu den Wiener Arbeiten.
Dubhe (α Ursa) was the first star to be mentioned in connection with the nocturnal’s pointer. This star or the two outermost stars of Ursa Major are also given in:
Zi 7468b [after 1452]
Zi 7468 [after 1457]
Zi 7467 [from 1459]
Zi 7464 [from 1461]
Zi 7468c [1466]
Zi 7463a [after 1475].
In Zi 7468b, Benenaz is also mentioned as the guiding star in addition to Dubhe and the locations of Polaris, Dubhe and Benenaz for 1438 are given. Benenaz is also mentioned in Wilhelm’s work Zi 11716 [around 1471] on the construction and use of the star clock. Since Wilhelm was a student of Peurbach, his work also belongs to the Viennese circle.
Third paragraph…
In der um 1460 entstandenen Arbeit [253 Nr. 7472] warden die Sterne β (Kochab) und γ des Kleinen Bären und zwar mit ihrem Ort für 1460 angegeben. Nun bilden diese Sterne mit Polaris nicht eine gerade Linie, so daß ein Irrtum vorliegen dürfte. Vielleicht war Kochab, der später auch von Köbel erwähnt wurde, allein gemeint.
In Zi 7472 [written around 1460], the stars β (Kochab) and γ of Ursa Minor are given, with their location for 1460. However these two stars do not form a straight line with Polaris, so there may be an error. Perhaps Kochab, which was later mentioned by Köbel, was meant to be used on its own.
Fourth paragraph…
Die Sternuhr wird so verwendet, daß zuerst die gezackte Stundenscheibe mit 12 Uhr auf den Monatstag gelegt wird ; dann gibt der auf die Hinterräder eingestellte Zeiger die Stunde an (Tafel 57, 1).
To use the star clock, once the jagged hour disc is placed on the day of the month at 12 o’clock, the pointer set on the rear wheels should indicate the hour (plate 57, 1).
Guards, Guards!
This is all very interesting, and helps to give an overall timeline. The ‘guards’ I mentioned previously (that point to Polaris) are another name for the same cursores / fratres first mentioned by Llull. I also didn’t know that Dubhe is the official star of the State of Utah. 🙂
The next step here will be to look more closely at the specific early 15th century manuscripts listed by Zinner, to see how they fit together into the overall nocturlabe timeline.
Theorica planetarum [antiqua] (misattributed to Gerard of Cremona)
Theorica planetarum of Campanus of Novara
Jean de Lignieres’ abbreviation of Campanus of Novara’s theorica
Petrus Philomena de Dacia (Peter Nightingale)’s Equatorium
Theorica novelle
Theoricae novae planetarum of Georg von Peurbach
In Emmanuel Poulle’s (1100+-page) work on astronomical instruments and equatoria used to calculate planetary movements (“Les Instruments de la Théorie des Planètes selon Ptolemée: Équatoires et Horlogerie Planétaire du XIIIe au XVIe siècle”, 2 Bde, Genf/Paris 1980 (Centre de Recherches d’Histoire et de Philologie V: Hautes Études Médiévales et Modernes 42)), he named the instrument modelled in the 15th century theorice novelle as the ‘Erfurt-Leipziger instrument’, after two of its manuscripts. [pp.375-416]
(And no, I haven’t got my own copy of Poulle, much as I’d like to.)
So the first question is this: what specifically differentiated this theorice novelle from, say, Campanus of Novara’s theorica planetarum?
Equatoria vs volvelles
Carrying out the computations necessary to draw up a horoscope was fiddly and boring: it required the person doing to have not only access to tables of planetary positions (typically the Alfonsine Tables), but also the spherical trigonometry skills to do a load of tricksy interpolation to determine the planetary positions at times between the entries in the Tables.
Clearly, what was needed was some kind of physical instrument – broadly along the lines of an astrolabe – to do all the heavy lifting / maths for you. The ‘theoric’ (Latin: theorica) in all these titles is in fact not just a theory about the planets, but also a physical model that physically manifests a theory about the planets, and is therefore able to perform work.
What was initially devised was an equatorium. This was (in the case of Campanus of Novara, at least) an astrolabe-like backplate with a circular hole (a mater) into which a series of plugin disc devices (one per planet) was inserted. These plugin plates physically modelled the Ptolemaic deferents, epicycles, and equants that had been used to (numerically) model planetary movements for over a millennium.
Campanus of Novara’s theorica planetarum described exactly this kind of bulky equatorium, while its updated versions (such as that of Jean de Lignieres) tried to simply its mechanisms a little, with the aim of producing something a little more lightweight. Or at least, not quite so heavyweight.
The oldest known extant equatorium is in Merton College, Oxford (Merton SC/OB/AST/2), and dates to about 1350. Here is a photo of its back:
Somewhat extraordinarily, there is also a pair of (pretty much) contemporaneous manuscripts that specifically described this equatorium, which you can read about in Seb Falk’s fascinating (2016) “A Merton College Equatorium: Text, Translation, Commentary“.
Cambridge University Library, Ms. Gg.6.3, ff. 217v–220v (c. 1348)
According to the text, the Merton College equatorium was based on the equatoria of Campanus of Novara, Jean de Lignieres, and also that of Profatius Judaeus. However, Falk cautions (p.2) that this last attribution is incorrect (though widespread). Its third (and indeed closest) equatorium was in fact described in a family of manuscripts known as the Semissa, described in F. S. Pedersen’s (1983) “Petri Philomenae de Dacia et Petri de S. Audomaro opera quadrivialia“, Copenhagen. (Pedersen’s 1979 dissertation solely on the Semissa is online here.)
What united these 13th/14th century theoric tracts was that they described how to build a big, fat, brass equatorium – the Big Science of the day.
By comparison, the theorice novelle manuscripts were – as I understand it – completely different: the instrument they described (and indeed manifested) was a set of paper or parchment volvelles, one volvelle per planet. This was lithe, modern, exciting, lightweight science – much more like a tech startup.
Manuscripts in the equatorium genre were widely copied and disseminated through Europe’s astronomical / astrological communities – they were ‘open source’, effectively. But what of the theorice novelle mss?
Theorice novelle manuscripts
Of the three known manuscripts in this genre, the main two are from Erfurt and Leipzig (hence Poulle’s name). Even now, these two mss languish undigitized (and close to completely unknown) in local museums:
Angermuseum Erfurt, Cod. 3153, [1458]
Historisches Museum Frankfurt/M., Cod. X 16027 [1458-1464]
No prizes for guessing, however, that the third one is Gotha Chart A 472 (my current favourite volvelle-heavy mysterious manuscript), dated by Zinner to 1461. Scans for this are online courtesy of Jena.
However, I suspect – admittedly without proof – that the attribution of Gotha Chart A 472 to Profatius Judaeus will prove to be just as specious as the widespread attribution to him of Peter Nightingale’s Semissa manuscript.
All the same, it will take a very much closer reading of all three manuscripts to be able to trace the origins of the theorice novelle more accurately. What we really need is to find someone who has been looking at this for some years…
Theorica novelle researchers
So here’s where it gets interesting. Post-doc Samuel Gessner of SYRTE (at the Observatoire de Paris) is/was due to give a talk in Paris on 18th June 2020:
Between astronomical diagrams and instruments: spatializing numerical data of astronomical tables Astronomers have connected their computational methods with geometrical representations in various ways. The ways these connections were elaborated on are not universal, but historically contingent of the local astronomical practice. Parchment instruments to graphically determine (approximate) positions of the planets, i.e. the family of planetary “equatoria” instruments, saw renewed developments in the 15th century. We will start with a European case study about a particular type of instrument that emerged in manuscripts from Erfurt and Leipzig termed “Theorice novelle”. In discussing this material the talk proposes to look into possible connections between the representation of computed data in tables and corresponding diagrammatic representations on the “Theorice novelle” and similar instruments. More generally, it raises the question of how the use of tables was preparing the minds for experimenting with new types of instruments and whether this trait can be used to characterise a specific astronomical practice.
In 2019, Gessner described his research focus here:
I focus on the diverse mathematical cultures in medieval and early modern Europe and how they communicate by studying the role of mathematical instruments as conceived by both theoreticians and practitioners. Using artefacts of material culture as primary sources along side with textual documents has become my favourite approach. I currently participate in a research project on Alfonsine astronomy lead by Matthieu Husson, Paris. My longer term goal is to understand the material and mechanical realisations of Ptolemaic theory in models, equatoria and planetary clocks and their role in history of astronomy. I was a co-organiser of the Oberwolfach Workshop “Mathematical Instruments Between Material Artifacts and Ideal Machines”, December 2017.
Unsurprisingly, I’ll be emailing Samuel Gessner shortly, and will let you know what I find out…
It struck me increasingly hard as I reached the end of my last post that I didn’t really know the history of astronomical volvelles in manuscripts. That is, pretty much all the astronomical volvelles I’d actually seen images of were either in incunabula or were from the 16th century (printed books or otherwise). For example, while revisiting Regiomontanus recently, I noted that his 1476 printed Kalendario contained volvelles. But what about volvelles in 14th and 15th century manuscripts?
Looking for useful sources, I found Jessica Helfand’s (2006) “Reinventing the Wheel“: though probably unlikely to be of precise relevance to what I’m looking for, it does look like a fun read. But then I found Gianfranco Crupi…
Gianfranco Crupi
My search for the history of manuscript astronomical volvelles only began properly when I stumbled upon Gianfranco Crupi’s (2019) “Volvelles of knowledge. Origin and development of an instrument of scientific imagination (13th-17th centuries)” in the Italian Journal of Library, Archives, and Information Science (JLIS.it). I’d describe this as a well-illustrated whistlestop tour through the history of volvelles. (And would recommend it as a nice accessible read too. 🙂 )
Crupi cracks crisply onwards from Lull to Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora to Wheels of Fortune to Alberti’s cipherdisk to Fontana to Trithemius to Della Porta; and then from Regiomontanus’ Kalendario with its remarkably beautiful front page…
…to Petrus Apianus and to the extraordinary Dess Menschen Circkel…
…and to Ottavio Pisani’s volvelles. As I mentioned, this is a nice little read. 🙂
As far as astronomical volvelles in manuscripts go, Crupi lists three articles:
Gingerich, Owen. 1993. “Astronomical paper instruments with moving parts.” In Making instruments count: Essays on historical scientific instruments presented to Gerard L’Estrange Turner, edited by R. Anderson, J. Bennett, W. Ryan, 63−74. Aldershot: Variorum. (Abstract: “Discusses the development and decline of early printed books with moving parts, as teaching demonstrations or for actual calculations, chiefly of the 16th c.“)
Even though Bennett’s article is available online, it only discusses volvelles briefly, and not really in manuscripts at all. And much as I love everything by Owen Gingerich (am I the only person who read his “The Book Nobody Read”?), his 1993 article’s abstract indicates that the primary focus there was on volvelles in printed books, so it is probably not relevant here.
However, because Kremer’s footnotes are online, I was extremely excited to find out from them that he talks extensively about Gotha Chart. A 472 (yes, the same manuscript I mentioned a few days ago). And so it should be no surprise that article is definitely what I want to read next.
Can I therefore ask if any of my lovely Cipher Mysteries readers with institutional access would please be so kind as to send me a copy of Kremer’s JHA article (Sage Journals, accessible via Shibboleth or Open Athens) so that I can continue following this volvelle research strand onwards? Thanks! 🙂
Back in 2006, I argued (in ‘Curse’, pp.58-61) that a series of seven consecutive circular diagrams in the Voynich Manuscript’s Q9 (‘Quire 9’) and Q10 probably represented the seven ‘planets’ of traditional astrology / astronomy.
(Note that the wide Q9 bifolio had been incorrectly rebound at some point in the manuscript’s history, making this sequence far from visually obvious). My argument relied on these observations:
The page immediately preceding the set contains a rotated / inverted T-O map (representing the Earth) surrounded by a wolkenband (representing the heavens). Note: we now also know that this strongly parallels a drawing in a high-quality presentation manuscript by Nicolas Oresme.
The pages immediately following the set contain a series of zodiac roundels (that we now know seem to have been copied from a 1420s Alsace calendar).
The zodiac roundels also seem to be related to Vat Gr 1291, a copy of Ptolemy’s Handy Tables, which I blogged about here.
One of the pages in the set contains a sun roundel (f68v1)
Another of the pages contains a large moon roundel (f67r1)
One of the pages has a 46-way radial symmetry, which eerily coincides with Mercury’s Babylonian 46-year goal year period. (Saturn has a 59-year period, Jupiter a 71-year period, Mars a 79-year period, while the octaeteris was where 8 Earth years correspond to 13 Venus years). It’s not proof that the roundel on f69r is linked to Mercury, but it’s a good start.
But now it’s 2020, and I’m wondering if I can now take this argument up to the next level. This is because some medieval / early modern astronomical manuscripts also contain a series of large circular diagrams corresponding to the seven classical planets. These are known as Theorica Planetarum manuscripts, and their circular diagrams are paper machines – that is, they are rotating volvelles duplicating the Ptolemaic epicycles long used by astronomers and astrologers to approximate the movements of the planets.
Hence the Theorica Planetarum Voynich Manuscript hypothesis is simply the suggestions that the set of seven consecutive circular diagrams in the Voynich Manuscript’s Q9 and Q10 might actually be (in some way) standing in for the circular paper machines in Theorica Planetarum manuscripts.
But to follow this research thread through to its logical end, we will need to know a lot more not only about Theorica Planetarum manuscripts (and their diffusion through Europe), but also about Ptolemaic epicycles, which is what the Theorica Planetarum models were trying to emulate.
Epicycles
In the pre-Copernican time period we’re interested in, the dominant belief (because all the rest was heresy) was that the celestial spheres rotated around the Earth in a perfectly circular manner. Bede’s De Natura Rerum depicted it thus:
Unfortunately, if you were an astronomer and tried to use this model to predict the movements of the wandering ‘planets’ (which back then included the sun and the moon), you’d be quickly disappointed. Because it doesn’t work. Not even close.
The most obvious thing that goes wrong is that planets often appear to be travelling backwards relative to how you would expect to see them move if they were rotating around simply (this is known as ‘retrograde motion’).
To fix this, the Greeks (specifically Hipparchus and Ptolemy) came up with a mathematical trick that instead modelled a planet’s movement as a smaller circle (an “epicycle”) attached to (i.e. offsetting from) a larger circle (a “deferent”). While not perfect, this was a step in the right direction.
Mathematically, you can think of epicycles as a kind of two-term Fourier approximation of a more complex function. And this trick was what astronomers and astrologers were still using more than a millennium later.
Oh, and there was a further trick: even if your epicycles are able to account for retrograde motion, the velocities of the planetary motion were still variable. And so Ptolemy added the idea of the equant, based on observations made by Theon (probably Theon of Smyrna), which offset the (virtual) place of observation to account for variable velocities.
Mathematically, this was a secondary kludge with no basis in anything anyone could point to as an actual reason. In fact, the whole idea of the equant annoyed Copernicus so much that it has been argued he came up with his whole heliocentric system simply to throw equants away.
All the same, the combination of Ptolemy’s equant and a deferent/epicycle per-planet pair proved to be a practical enough solution to the problem of predicting planetary motion, regardless of what Copernicus thought. 😉
Note that some (old-fashioned) astronomy historians asserted that more and more epicycles were added over the centuries to try to make the models better approximate the reality, but this is a myth. It’s true that Copernicus added an extra epicycle per planet, but this was because he was trying to get rid of that pesky equant. The two were essentially the same.
Clockwork Cosmoses
Putting the equant to one side, the epicycle/deferent values reduce to a discussion of ratios:
What is the ratio between the deferent period and the solar year?
What is the ratio between the deferent period and the epicycle period?
What is the ratio between the deferent radius and the epicycle radius?
If you know these values, not only can you calculate tables of planetary positions, but you can also build physical models – both volvelles and clockwork mechanisms.
Famously, the (pre-Ptolemy) Antikythera Mechanism used tricky gearing to model the moon’s anomalous movements. Incidentally, Freeth and Jones (2012) proposed an interesting reconstruction of the rest of the planetary movements in the AK by ‘scaling up’ its tricky lunar gearing.
However, because all other Greco-Roman models are lost to history (despite mentions in Cicero, no extant artefacts are known), we now have to fast-forward to the 14th century, and the Ptolemaic clockwork cosmos of Giovanni Dondi. His astrarium was much seen, described and admired, and in 1381 he gave it to Gian Galeazzo Visconti: it stayed in Pavia till at least 1485. (It seems likely that Leonardo da Vinci saw it). There are a number of modern reconstructions, such as this one which I once saw in Milan:
Helpfully, Giovanni Dondi described his astrarium’s inner workings in his Tractatus astrarii (Padova, Biblioteca Capitolare, Ms. D.39 and one other were by Dondi, but at least ten other manuscript copies exist). There’s a critical edition: Giovanni Dondi dall’ Orologio, Emmanuel Poulle (ed., trans.) (1987–1988) Johannis de Dondis Padovani Civis Astrarium. 2 vols. Opera omnia Jacobi et Johannis de Dondis. [Padova]: Ed. 1+1; Paris: Les Belles Lettres.
Giovanni Dondi’s dial of Venus (fol. 12v)
From this, we know that Dondi designed his astrarium to function according to the 13th century Theorica planetarum of Campanus of Novara (more on him later) and the Alfonsine tables (circa 1272).
Might the Voynich Manuscript’s seven planet pages be not astronomical but simply a copy of the relevant pages of Dondi’s Tractatus astrarii? It’s very possible, but let’s not sink into the murky world of theories just yet. 😉
Theorica Planetarum Gerardi
Olaf Pedersen’s 1981 paper “The Origins of the ‘Theorica Planetarum” notes that the Theorica Planetarum specifically described the motions of the planets: and was much copied because other texts like the Sphaera of Sacrobosco were quite lacking in that respect.
The incipit was “Circulus eccentricus vel egresse cuspidis vel egredientis centri dicitur qui non habet centum suum cum centro mundi“: and Pedersen reports (in 1981) having more than 210 entries on his checklist of copies, which makes it almost as widely circulated as Sacrobosco’s Sphaera.
As to its author, it was widely believed to have been written by Gerard of Cremona (hence you’ll often see it referred to as Theorica Planetarum Gerardi). Regiomontanus called it by this name, though he was aware there was no proof that Gerard had written it – and by Regiomontanus’ time, it had become known as Theorica Planetarum Antiqua.
Pedersen himself came to no conclusion about who actually wrote this, but considered that he knew of nothing that “[invalidated] the assumption that it originated from the hand of a thirteenth-century author”. (p.122)
Campanus of Novara’s Theorica Planetarum
The next Theorica Planetarum to take the medieval stage was by Campanus of Novara (c.1220-1296), and was composed (1261-1264) at broadly the same time as the Theorica Planetarum Gerardi.
This was a very much more solid affair (without a number of the erroneous simplications the other Theorica had included), and included a description of how to make an equatorium. This is essentially a single mater (an astrolabe-like back disk), into which other disk-sets are inserted, one disk-set per planet. This would be cumbersome and impractical, though the equatorium article linked here says: “[I]t is however likely that Campanus envisaged an instrument of gigantic dimensions.”
There’s a critical edition of Campanus’ Theorica Planetarum by Benjamin and Toomer, which I’ve ordered a copy of from America (though I don’t expect it to come anytime soon).
There was also a tidied-up version of Campanus’ work from circa 1320, called “Abbreviatio instrumenti Campani, sive aequatorium” by Johannes de Lineriis (Jean de Linières or Lignières). I’m guessing that Benjamin and Toomer’s book covers this (but I’ll find out when it arrives).
Georg von Peurbach’s Theoricae Novae Planetarum
In many ways, Georg von Peurbach’s much-updated Theoricae Novae Planetarum (1454) was the last hurrah of the Theorica Planetarum genre. Regiomontanus (von Peurbach’s student) even went to immense expense to print his late teacher/mentor’s work in 1472.
Michela Malpangotto’s (2012) article “The Early Manuscripts of Georg von Peuerbach’s Theoricae Novae Planetarum” lists five very interesting early copies of the manuscript, dating from 1454 to the early 1460s:
Here, there are particularly strong relationships between the A/B/C copies, that make it look as though all three were created in 1454 in Vienna.
What About Gotha Chart. A 472?
I discussed this manuscript in my previous post, and I’m sorry to say that I don’t as yet know how this – and by implication the whole Profatius Judaeus thing – fits into the Theorica Planetarum landscape.
Volvelles or Equatorium Inserts?
So here’s one of the many problems to clear up. Campanus’ Theorica Planetarum describes an equatorium, i.e. a series of multi-layer circular inserts that slot into an astrolabe-like mater… not volvelles.
Moreover, even though Georg von Peurbach’s Theoricae Novae Planetarum was printed as volvelles in the 16th century (e.g. the LJS 64 copy I showed the video of before), I’m entirely unsure whether the transition to volvelles there was by Regiomontanus (Regiomontanus certainly had volvelles in his 1474 Calendar) or a later thing.
So, without reading a ton more stuff, I’m entirely unsure whether volvelles (as volvelles, not as equatorium inserts) were found in the Theorica Planetarum genre at all pre-1500.
But these are early days. I’ll blog more as things become clearer. 🙂
While idly flicking through the splendid ex-library copy of Hellmut Lehmann-Haupt’s (1929) “Schwäbische Federzeichnungen” that landed on my doorstep this morning, my eye was drawn to Abb. 52, a drawing from Gotha Chart A 158 (and more on that another time). What is Gotha (and might it be home to Batma?), and how come it has so many wonderful 15th century German books?
Forschungsbibliothek Gotha
According to this page (containing descriptions of many Gotha mss):
The old German manuscripts of the FB Gotha [i.e. Forschungsbibliothek Gotha, now at Uni Erfurt] form one of the last large collections of medieval German-language manuscripts for which no modern scientific index has yet been made available. Its inventory shows the typical profile of a princely collection: it contains numerous literary and illustrated texts, including testimonies of classic Middle High German literature as well as unique pieces such as the verse novel “Reinfried von Braunschweig”. In addition, the entire spectrum of late medieval German literature is represented in Gotha.
The Gotha collection contains plenty of the German manuscripts we’ve been discussing: Der welsche Gast, Andreas Capellanus’ “De amore“, Macer floridus, Feuerwerkbuch von 1420, Ars moriendi, Astrologisch-medizinische Sammelhandschrift, Biblia pauperum, Sachsenspiegel, Minnereden, Parzival, Johannes Hartlieb’s Namenmantik, etc. As far as I can tell, few of these have yet been digitized: not many more have been properly studied.
Basically, Gotha is like the Mars of 15th century manuscripts – distant, little known, but with plenty to study. Time to send a probe down to its surface!
This contains a series of circular volvelles described in Ernst Zinner (1956) “Astronomische Instrumente des 11.-18. Jh.s” (p.153). The catalogue description has the following to say (largely quoting Zinner):
17 disk-shaped diagrams of the instruments are described. These are the theoricae planetarum, first introduced by the astronomer Jakob ben Machir (Profatius Judaeus) around 1300: these are “discs of paper or parchment that rotate over the basic drawing. Threads run from the center point, adjusting the various movements of the planetary volvelles, so that the location marked on the epicyclic disc indicates the correct planet location. One volvelle was constructed for each planet ” [Zinner 1956, p.32]. Fol. 3r-8r have the titles: 3r Circulus orbis signorum, 4r Circulus anni, 5r Circulus Saturni, 5v Circulus Jouis, 6r Circulus Martis, 7r Circulus Veneris, 8r Circulus augum planetarum. 15r and 17v are diagrams without movable attachments. Pages 12r, 22r, 30r, 34r, 39r, 42r, 47r and 52r contain volvelles with multi-part, rotatable attachments, some of which have come loose (now included) though some have been lost. On 39v a thread is inserted into the center of the disc for line drawing; circular holes are in the center of the diagram.
To my eyes, the interesting thing about this is that the Voynich Manuscript’s Quire #9 (‘Q9’) has a super-wide hexfolio, which – if you virtually rebind it along the correct crease, as I discussed in Curse (2006) – contains seven full-page circular diagrams, starting with the Sun and Moon. And even though I have seen many 15th century manuscripts listing the seven ‘wanderers’ on consecutive pages, I had never yet found a 15th century manuscript with a set of full-size circular diagrams for those seven astrological planets.
Until now. So let’s just say I’m suddenly very interested.
The Voynich’s Seven Planets
For reference, here’s what the Voynich Manuscript’s seven planets look like:
In Curse (p.60), I labelled these:
Planet A, Sun, Moon, Planet B Planet C, Planet D, Planet E
I also noted that the diagram for Planet B comprised 46 radiating lines, which I noted (p.61) matched Mercury’s goal year period of 46 years. But that was as far as I was able to pursue this back in 2006.
Might there be more to find here, possibly even a block paradigm match to be had?
Georg von Peurbach
Now, I also happen to know that Georg von Peurbach created similar epicycle-based volvelles in his Novae Theoricae Planetarum. There’s a really cool online page from the Lawrence J. Schoenberg Collection showing these in action (albeit in a later printed book):
Introduction to University of Pennsylvania Library’s LJS 64
Though LJS 64 was printed in Padua between 1525 and 1575, Georg von Peurbach (1423-1461) wrote his original work back in the 15th century: he was Regiomontanus’ teacher and mentor.
As an aside, I’d previously read the English translation of Zinner’s chunky book on Regiomontanus (which I mentioned here in 2018, in my discussion of nocturnals and f57v): but before now I’d never really considered von Peurbach’s Novae Theoricae Planetarum.
Note that von Peurbach was giving lectures in Italy in 1448 to 1451, so would be a plausible candidate for someone who somehow bridged between German scientific culture and Northern Italian culture at just about the right time and place. So there’s a lot of lines criss-crossing here.
Might all these things be tied together by Gotha Chart. A 472?
Gotha Chart. A 472 Bibliography
The Handschriftencensus page lists three references, the main one of which (Zinner 1956) I have just ordered from America (but don’t expect to see for a fair while, to be honest):
Ernst Zinner, Verzeichnis der astronomischen Handschriften des deutschen Kulturgebietes, München 1925, Nr. 9839.
Ernst Zinner, Deutsche und niederländische astronomische Instrumente des 11.-18. Jahrhunderts, München 1956, S. 153.
Oliver Schwarz, Cornelia Hopf und Hans Stein, Quellen zur Astronomie in der Forschungs- und Landesbibliothek Gotha unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Gothaer Sternwarten (Veröffentlichungen der Forschungs- und Landesbibliothek Gotha 36), Gotha 1998, S. 54. This is also online here.
Meanwhile, I’m also going to contact the curators at FB Gotha to see if they can tell me any more about Chart. A 472. As always, asking is free!
If, like me, you’ve been looking for a nice guide to illustrated manuscripts in the Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg’s Cod. Pal. Germ. collection for a while, you’re in for a bit of a treat here. 🙂
German librarian / book historian Hans Wegener’s (1927) “Beschreibendes Verzeichnis der deutschen Bilder-Handschriften des späten Mittelalters in der Heidelberger Universitäts-Bibliothek” (which you can download from UB Heidelberg here) runs through a (mostly) chronological series of illustrated manuscripts from the library, discussing each one’s writer(s) and (usually unnamed) illustrator(s).
(For reference, the para at the top of its p.10 was where Hans Wegener asserted that the illustrator of Cod. Pal. Germ. 530 also drew the pictures for Staatsbibliothek Eichstätt MS 212, as I mentioned in my last post.)
The easiest way to view all the illustrations is to use UB Heidelberg’s HeidICON tool (there’s a link on the left of each CPG page). There, you can jump straight to a grid of illustrations in that manuscript, i.e. clicking on a thumbnail brings up the full-size picture on the right-hand side.
I went through all the drawings from 1400 to about 1470, and have pasted in some of the most interesting drawings. Enjoy!
Cod. Pal. Germ. 362 – Flore und Blancheflor [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, 1430-1440]
It’s not quite Stockfish vs LC0, but it’ll do nicely.
Cod. Pal. Germ. 324 – Dietrich und seine Gesellen. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1440]
It’s that couple again!
Here they are again!
Apparently Diebold Lauber’s Werkstatt invented the High Five
(The next five items form “Deutsche Bibel in 5 Bänden”.)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 19 – Die Bücher Mose, Josua und Richter [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1440] (not very interesting drawings)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 20 – Bücher der Könige und Paralipomenon I und IL [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1440] (also not very interesting drawings)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 21 – Die Bücher Esra, Nehemia, Tobias, Judith, Esther, Hiob, Psalter, Parabole Ecclesiastes, Cantica, Sapientia und Ecclesiasticus. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1440] (again, pretty dull)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 22 – Die Bücher jesaia, Jercmia, Baiiieli, Hesekiel, Daniel und die zwölf kleinen Propheten. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1440] (didn’t work for me at all)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 23 – Das Neue Testament [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1440] (nope, the whole set failed to press my buttons)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 300 – Megenberg: Buch der Natur. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, 1440-1450]
Cpg300 contains an old pair of friends, but some other stuff too:
Another image we’ve discussed before!
A crossbowman.
A mermaid, in the page of sea creatures.
Cod. Pal. Germ. 149 – Sieben weise Meister und die Chronik des Martin von Polen. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1450]
Wait… did they just put crowns and a bit of trim on the couple?
Yes, they added a beard to try to mess with your mind.
Wait, no, what?
Now this is getting just plain silly.
Apparently Diebold Lauber invented rock and roll too.
Cod. Pal. Germ. 339 – Parzival. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1450]
Wait, what? Did Diebold Lauber invent bromance too?
Cod. Pal. Germ. 137 – Martin von Polen: Chronik. [Werkstatt des Diebolt Lauber in Hagenau, Um 1460] (dull as ditchwater, unless you really like grinding your way through endless unconvincing drawings of popes)
More Other Stuff
Cod. Pal. Germ. 311 – Megenberg: Buch der Natur [Mittelrhemische Hs, 1450-1460] (Has a nice catoblepas)
Cod. Pal. Germ. 438 – Gedieht von den zehn Geboten, der Bulie, der Beichte und den sieben Todsünden. [Mitteldeutsche Hs., 1450-1460]
Cod. Pal. Germ. 344 – Gedichte (“Von dem Eilenden Buoben”, Spruchgedicht von der Minne und dem Pfennig und Spruchgedicht vom Streite zweier Frauen über Liebe und Leid der Minne) [Oberrheinische Hs, Um 1459]
They’re doing that hand thing!
Looks to have been adapted from the same source image as the previous drawing.
Cod. Pal. Germ. 60 – Deutsche Bibel, Brief des Juden Samuel, Ars moriendi. Legende des hl. Patricius und die Legende des hl. Brandon. [Oberdeutsche Hs, Um 1460]
Cod. Pal. Germ. 111 – Legende vom hl. Mauritius und Legende vom hl. Meinrat. [Schwäbische Hs., Um 1470]
Hans Wegener continues his book with CPG manuscripts from Ludwig Hennfflin’s Werkstatt, but this is now well out of our window of interest, so I’ll stop here. 🙂
While searching for the early 15th century German source images from which some images in the Voynich Manuscript were copied, we have so far found two manuscripts of the Welcher Gast (one from Eichstätt (1420), and one from Heilsbronn) that contain some eerily Voynichian motifs – a bird, a fish, and a child. But are there other manuscripts from Eichstätt and Heilsbronn dating to this period? I’ll start with Eichstätt…
Eichstätt manuscripts
If you don’t happen to know much about the town of Eichstätt, its two claims to fame are (1) that it holds the relics of St Walpurga (an 8th Century abbess of Heidenheim in Bavaria), whose feast is still celebrated today as Walpurgisnacht (1st May), and (2) that it held three phases of witch trials between 1532 and 1723. Oddly, St Walpurga’s name was invoked in the Middle Ages as protection against “plague, rabies and whooping cough, as well as against witchcraft”, which were often the subject of charms and amulets. According to Wikipedia, St Walpurga’s tomb miraculously oozes oil, which Benedictine nuns place in vials and sell to pilgrims. Nice.
As far as 15th century Eichstätt manuscripts go, undoubtedly the most famous one is Konrad Kyeser’s Bellifortis (1405). This contains a long series of drawings of instruments of war (some real, some planned, some historical, many just plain imagined), that Kyeser (who was from Eichstätt) produced for Ruprecht III (Emperor Palatine and King of the Germans).
After a long career all over Europe, Kyeser had not long before then been unceremoniously ejected from the Imperial court in Prague: the scribes who illustrated his high-class manuscript had themselves also been ejected from the Imperial court’s scriptorium, but had temporarily moved to Eichstätt (the details are unclear). According to Lynn White Jr, the link between Prague and the Bellifortis was made by art historian Augustus von Eye in 1871.
However, I have to say I’m really struggling to find many other illustrated manuscripts from Eichstätt from the first half of the 15th century. In fact, so far I’ve found only one…
UB Eichstätt Cod. st 212
The entry for Heidelberg cod pal germ 330 (Heidelberg UB holds three other copies of the Welscher Gast, don’t mix them up!) notes that Wegener (p.10) stylistically dates the ms to between 1410 and 1420, and that he thought its illustrations were by the same artist who drew the illustrations for Eichstätt UB Cod. st 212, the Eichstätter Evangelienpostille (a copy of a short 14th century religious work on the apostles composed by Ulrich von Lilienfeld).
The Eichstatt UB catalogue entry for Cod st 212 similarly dates that to between 1410 and 1420 (again citing Wegener), and notes that it was owned by Heinrich Gottsperger in 1425, who in 1427/8 became the Prior of the Dominikanerkloster Eichstätt (156v: “Iste liber fuit reuerendi patris et fratris Henrici de Monte Dei“).
Also: Cod st 212 seems (according to “Reform und früher Humanismus in Eichstätt: Bischof von Eych (1445-1464)”, ed. Jurgen Dendorfer) to have later been in the library of Bischof Johann von Eych. There’s also a useful 1913 monograph on this specific manuscript.
For Heinrich Gottsperger / Heinrich Gotzberger, there are (according to Spicilegii Friburgensis Subsidia, p.393) two manuscripts copied by him in Cologne in 1404 (Madrid I. G. 443 s.16 (“sic Catal.”), and Vat. lat 964), and one written in Esslingen in 1429 (Munchen Clm 26885 f.140-f.163). There’s a paragraph summarizing his life in David Sheffler’s “Schools and Schooling in Late Medieval Germany: Regensburg, 1250-1500”, p.241, plus more in Chapter 2 (not available online).
Note that UB Eichstätt holds various other books owned by Frater Georg Schwarz of Dominikanerkloster Eichstätt (Cod st 683-687 and 689), but these (according to Maarten J. F. M. Hoenen’s (1994) “Die Handschriftensammlung des Dominikaners Georg Schwarz (+ nach 1484)” are nearly all from 1450 or later (apart from a part of Cod st 683, which dates to 1417). This is nice because also on fol.156v of Cod st 212 is the following (dating to 1489):
“Felix Rosa Ave Tripudans Ethereo Regno Gloria Extas Omnium Rerum. Inclita Virgo Salve”
OK, so it’s not quite as funky as the acrostic dedication in Hypnerotomachia Poliphilii, but it was a nice surprise nonetheless. 🙂
There’s a nice discussion of this in the introductory chapter of the 1913 monograph I mentioned above. This book also (p.6) quotes the second of the two articles (from 1801?) by ex-Dominican librarian W. (Apollinar) Nittermayr / Nittermaier / Nidermaier “Necrologium Eystettense Fratrum Praedicatorum, Pars I”, Eichstatt Diozesanarchiv B 151 and “Necrologii Eichstadiani fratrum Praedicatorum Pars Altera”, Eichstatt Diozesanarchiv B 152 (neither of which I could find online, but see 1186). Ultimately this seems to be the source which lists “fr. Henricus Gatsberger” (alias Gotsberger) becoming prior in 1427.
So… Where Next, Then?
Well, that’s indeed the question. If you accept Wegener’s dating, Cod. st 212 was made before Fr. Gotsberger even got to Eichstätt: hence I would perhaps like to look at Nittermaier’s book to find the prior priors, to then see if I can find other manuscripts linked with them.
But… this is a loose and fine historical thread to be reaching out to find blindfold, and I’d like to do much better. The underlying problem is that even though the BSB holds so many illustrated manuscripts, it has (unless you know better?) no obvious finding aid oriented towards geographic origin (perhaps because this is known only for a minority of manuscripts?).
Specifically, what I’d actually like to be referring to here is some kind of study of Bavarian illustrated manuscripts from the first half of the 15th century, along the same lines as the many studies of scribal houses in Alsace. I’m fairly certain that such a synthetic study must have been done several times over, but I’ve had basically zero luck finding anything close.
And so I share the question with you (slightly reframed). What historical research trickery can I use to try to find illustrated manuscripts from the first half of the 15th century from around Eichstätt in a systematic way?
A recent comment by Marco Ponzi on Voynich Ninja helpfully highlighted a 2019 comment there by Linda which pretty much everyone else had overlooked. She had previously suggested visual parallels between the Voynich Manuscript’s drawings and the ones in Erlangen-Nürnberg, Universitätsbibliothek MS B7, but when Marco (and then Koen Gheuens too) looked a little further, they found some unusually strong matches.
In my opinion, the first excellent match is Marco’s bird:
The second is Marco’s fish:
And the third is Koen’s child (from Heidelberg Cod. pal. germ. 330)
So what do we know about this manuscript?
A Welscher Gast mini-bibliography
The text of the Welscher Gast was written around 1215/1216 by Thomasin von Zerklaere (a cleric from Friuli), and is the first known code of conduct written in German. The ‘Italian Guest’ of the title is the Italian-speaking Thomasin himself, who apologizes for shortcomings in his German.
Given that numerous copies of the WG still survive today, it seems to have been a much-copied text. There is also, it has to be said, an ample secondary literature on the subject.
The great-granddaddy of this particular bibliographic tree was Heinrich Rückert, ed., Der walsche Gast des Thomasin von Zirclaria, Deutsche Neudrucke ; Reihe : Texte des Mittelalters (1852 ; rpt. Berlin : De Gruyter, 1965), which discussed twelve versions of the text.
This was then heartily supplanted by F. W. von Kries’ “Textkritische Studien zum Welschen Gast Thomasins von Zerclaere” in Quellen und Forschungen zur Sprach- und Kulturgeschichte der germanischen Volker, Neue Folge, 23 (147) (Berlin : De Gruyter, 1967), which expanded the study to twenty one mss, and included a partial stemma.
Books and articles since have discussed other WG mss and fragments unknown to Rückert and von Kries, such as those given the titles Si, F, and N. For more, you might check ARLIMA’s nice long list, though anyone thinking this is even 10% of the total set of WG articles is likely to be in for a bit of a shock.
Helpfully, Judith-A. Davidson’s “The Contamination of MS D of Der Welsche Gast” (Dresden, Sächs. Landesbibl. M 67), A Comparative Study of Text and Illustration Cycle, nicely lists these alongside their modern Sigles:
Parchment manuscripts
A : Heidelberg, Universitätsbibl., Cod. pal. germ. 389.
G : Gotha, Forschungsbibl., Membrana I 120.
S : Stuttgart, Wùrttemberg. Landesbibl., Cod. poet. et philol. f. 1.
E : New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, Glazier Ms. 54.
H : East Berlin, Deutsche Staatsbibl., Hamilton Ms. 675.
Parchment fragments
Gr : Formerly in Berlin, Preussische Staatsbibl., Ms. germ. 4° 978. (The MS, lost in 1945, was presumably destroyed by fire).
Pe : Budapest, National Szechenyi Library, Ms. Clmae 210 (formerly Cod. Misc. Hist. Hung, et Germ. Nr. 1559 f. lat). (The fragment was stolen, but had been published by R. M. Werner prior to the theft).
Wo : Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibl., 404 9 (6) Novi.
Wa : Watzendorf bei Coburg, Evangelisches-Lutherisches Pfarramt.
Erl : Erlangen, Universitätsbibl., Ms. B7.
Ma : Berlin, Staatsbibl. Preussisch. Kulturbesitz, Ms. germ. f. 757.
Si : Sibiu (Hermannstadt), Rumanian State Archive, GG 3/X Tomus A.
Paper manuscripts
U : Munich, Bayerisch. Staatsbibl., Cgm 571.
W : Wolfenbuttel, Herzog-August-Bibl., Ms. 37.19 Aug. 2°.
a : Heidelberg, Universitätsbibl., Cod. pal. germ. 320.
c : Heidelberg, Universitätsbibl., Cod. pal. germ. 338.
K : Karlsruhe, Badisch. Landesbibl., St. Peter pap. 35.
M : Munich, Bayerisch. Staatsbibl., Cgm 340.
b : Heidelberg, Universitätsbibl., Cod. pal. germ. 330.
D : Dresden, Sachs. Landesbibl., M. 67.
N : Nürnberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Hs. 86035.
F : Stift Schlierbach, Hs. 28. (Grubmüller, who identified the MS., used the sigle « C »).
Note that, according to Davidson (who I heavily rely on in the following), “The thirteen illustrated MSS are A, G, S, E, H, Gr, Bu, Erl, U, W, a, b and D.”
Messy Stemmas
Given that we’re specifically interested in the illustrations in the 15th century ‘Erl’ copy, what we’d really like to see now is a nice neat Lachmannian stemma, to point us at related manuscripts (and to help bracket out all the 12th and 13th century copies that are unlikely to be of interest). And here’s the stemma that Davidson gives, adapted from von Kries’ stemma (she had access to all his photographs and collations):
Yet I should caution that the whole reason for Davidson’s article is that there are problems taking too literal a view of the WG stemma. Her argument is that the D copy was “contaminated”, in that it suffers from “horizontal transmission” (von Kries also highlights that book 10 of H is similarly contaminated) between that original (left) half of the tree and the S** (right) half that branched off in the mid-13th century. Her modified sub-stemma looks like this, with an extra (lost) D* manuscript feeding in to D as well as the (lost) AD* copy:
Davidson also argues that the earliest description of the WG illustration tradition by Adolf von Oechelhäuser, “Der Bilderkreis zum Walschen Gaste des Thomasin von Zerclaere” [Heidelberg : Gustav Koester, 1890] got quite a lot of important stuff wrong. Which is important because she thinks that the illustration contamination of D there parallels the textual contamination of D.
All the same, the two obviously later manuscripts on the right hand side half of the tree to consider are b and N:
N : Nürnberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Hs. 86035. (which, annoyingly, has blank areas left for drawings that were never copied in)
Cod Pal germ 330 was made in Nordbayern (Eichstätt?) in 1420, according to the Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg description. Here are its birds:
Incidentally, the Erlangen bird page in context looks like this:
Initial Thoughts
Anyone who thinks using stemmae for tracing illustrations are innately easy should have a look at the Welscher Gast. The Welscher Gast digital project has patiently catalogued all the illustrations across all the known manuscripts (though I must admit I found the ways they cross-linked things more than a little confusing at times). However, the illustrations vary so enormously that it’s often hard to see (if you discount all the easy pages, like Euclid etc) how X’s illustrations relate to Y’s illustrations.
My thoughts are therefore that the German scribal copy shops putting together all these copies had so many drawings to make that they, exactly like the Alsace scribes we have discussed before, simply copied whatever material they had at hand to get the job done. (And what a sadly banal phrase that has now become, *sigh*.)
So, whereas I went into the Welscher Gast world wondering if there might be some kind of scribal transmission of the images to pick up on, I now think that – for the very most part – the WG simply wasn’t that kind of a beast. That is, its diagrams weren’t implicitly interesting: rather, they were window-dressing the text, because this was a text-centric gig, not an illustration-centric one.
Hence I confidently predict that the bird, the fish and the child were all taken from other 1420s German manuscripts done in these and similar copy shops, and which were happily reused when these kinds of copying commissions came in. But the Welscher Gast was probably a recipient of these images, not a source.
