The Voynich manuscript is a historical mystery shrouded in darkness. According to researchers, the events described in the manuscript took place in Central Europe in the 15th or 16th century. It should be noted that not much is known about this cryptic text either.
Title of the manuscript
The name of the manuscript comes from a Polish antique book dealer named Wilfrid Voynich, who bought the manuscripts in Italy back in 1912. Flip through the pages and you will find botanical and astronomical drawings in ink, as well as text written in an unfamiliar language (it has not yet been deciphered by historians).
Multiple theories
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Over the years, World War II linguists, mathematicians, and cryptographers have studied the manuscript. Although several theories have been created, no one has been able to decipher the language or determine what the book is for. Many believe that the work is a hoax, and believe that the text does not contain any meaning.
Other researchers look at the problem from a different angle. According to one of the scientific hypotheses, this document was written by an alien stuck on Earth. Another theory claims that this is a guide to alchemy.
Historian Nicholas Gibbs's theory
Historian Nicholas Gibbs is confident that he has found the right answer. In his opinion, the Voynich manuscript is a manual for women.
Submitting the article in the Times Supplement, Gibbs first compares the manuscript to other medieval texts on women's health. In addition to images of plants and signs of the zodiac, the manuscript also contains drawings of bathing women.
“One of the most notable aspects of the manuscript is the illustrations on the subject of bathing, so it would be logical to look at bathing techniques in the medieval period. It became pretty obvious that I had entered the realm of medieval healing,”says researcher Gibbs.
“Classical medicine had separate sections devoted to complaints and diseases of women, but not only in the field of gynecology. It also covered topics such as hygiene, nutrition, phlebotomy, fumigation, tonics, tinctures, cosmetics, perfumery, and even bathing, bathing and swallowing,”Gibbs writes in the Times Literary Supplement.
The historian then explains the content of the unusual writing in the manuscript, which contains “control marks” in an abbreviated Latin format. From this, he determines that each character is, in fact, an abbreviated word, and not a letter.
Then he puts forward the essence of his theory - the manuscript contains a series of bathing recipes and the names of medicines related to gynecology.
Gibbs' theory is not accepted
Many historians have already publicly denounced Gibbs' arguments. As the researchers note, the key thread of his reasoning is that there are no names of plants or diseases in the manuscript. Gibbs explains this situation by the fact that they would be recorded in the index. This is hard to believe because there is no index.
Unfortunately, this is probably just another failed theory that complements many others.
“I've looked at dozens of solutions, and that fact is as unconvincing as the last three thousand,” Lisa Fagin Davis, executive director of the American Academy of the Middle Ages, tweeted. Scientists already assumed the manuscript had something to do with health, she said, so Gibbs's contribution is not a new discovery.
The acronym theory may have a right to exist, but the evidence provided by Gibbs is scarce and shaky. "The two examples he includes in the article are not grammatically correct," Davis says. “This does not lead to the conclusion that what is written in Latin makes sense. And as for the part of the theory that explains that the index is missing, then this is the moment that really disappointed me completely."
At the moment, it is safe to say that no breakthrough has been made in the field of manuscript research. The Voynich manuscript remains a mystery.
You can see the original Voynacha manuscript here.
Maya Muzashvili