Unsolved mystery - Based on the evidence of the calligraphy, the
drawings, the vellum, and the pigments, Wilfrid Voynich estimated
that the Manuscript was created in the late 13th century. The
manuscript is small, seven by ten inches, but thick, nearly 235
pages. It is written in an unknown script of which there is no known
other instance in the world.
The Voynich Manuscript is considered to be 'The Most Mysterious
Manuscript in the World'. To this day this medieval artifact resists all efforts at
translation. It is either an ingenious hoax or an unbreakable
cipher. The manuscript is named after its discoverer, the
American antique book dealer and collector, Wilfrid M. Voynich, who
discovered it in 1912, amongst a collection of ancient manuscripts
kept in villa Mondragone in Frascati, near Rome, which had been by
then turned into a Jesuit College (closed in 1953).
The Voynich Manuscript is a cipher manuscript, sometimes
attributed to Roger Bacon.
Scientific text in an unidentified language, in cipher, possibly written in central Europe in the 15th century.
It is abundantly illustrated with awkward coloured drawings of::Scientific text in an unidentified language, in cipher, possibly written in central Europe in the 15th century.
- unidentified plants;
- what seems to be herbal recipes;
- tiny naked women frolicking in bathtubs connected by intricate plumbing looking more like anatomical parts than hydraulic contraptions;
- mysterious charts in which some have seem astronomical objects seen through a telescope, some live cells seen through a microscope;
- charts into which you may see a strange calendar of zodiacal signs, populated by tiny naked people in rubbish bins.
Detail from page 78r of Voynich Manuscript depicting the
"biological" section
"Tiny naked women frolicking in bathtubs" - a fragment of
page 70
Copyright: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale UniversityPage 70r Image Source >>
Copyright: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale UniversityPage 70r Image Source >>
No one really knows the origins of the manuscript. The experts believe it is
European They believe it was written between the 15th and 17th centuries.
From a piece of paper which was once attached to the Voynich
manuscript, and which is now stored in one of the boxes belonging
with the Voynich manuscript holdings of the Beinecke library, it is
known that the manuscript once formed part of the private library of
Petrus Beckx S.J., 22nd general of the Society of Jesus.
A sample of untranslatable text from the
Voynich manuscript
There is no other example of the language in which the manual is
written.
It is an alphabetic script, but of an alphabet variously reckoned to have from nineteen to twenty-eight letters, none of which bear any relationship to any English or European letter system. The text has no apparent corrections. There is evidence for two different "languages" (investigated by Currier and D'Imperio) and more than one scribe, probably indicating an ambiguous coding scheme.
It is an alphabetic script, but of an alphabet variously reckoned to have from nineteen to twenty-eight letters, none of which bear any relationship to any English or European letter system. The text has no apparent corrections. There is evidence for two different "languages" (investigated by Currier and D'Imperio) and more than one scribe, probably indicating an ambiguous coding scheme.
The VM is written in a language of which no other example is known to
exist. It is an alphabetic script, but of an alphabet variously
reckoned to have from nineteen to twenty-eight letters, none of
which bear any relationship to any English or European letter
system.
Apparently, Voynich wanted to have the mysterious manuscript
deciphered and provided photographic copies to a number of experts.
However, despite the efforts of many well known cryptologists and
scholars, the book remains unread. There are some claims of
decipherment, but to date, none of these can be substantiated with a
complete translation.
View
Voynich photos
curtesy of the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript
Library, Yale University.
To see all images go to
http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/digitallibrary/
http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/digitallibrary/
and search for "Voynich
Manuscript"
Few Examples:
Click on image to enlarge. Page 70r Image Source >>
Copyright: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
Page 85v.
Copyright: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
Copyright: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
