So, lit, what's your take on the Voynich manuscript? Alchemical code? Roger Bacon's journal written in his secret language? The Enochian language of angels written down by Edward Kelley? Biggest troll in literature? Either way, I think it's pretty fascinating.

File: 114 KB, 542x600, voynich manuscript bathtub.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:17:46 2010 No.1229448 [Reply] [Original]

So, lit, what's your take on the Voynich manuscript?
Alchemical code?
Roger Bacon's journal written in his secret language?
The Enochian language of angels written down by Edward Kelley?
Biggest troll in literature?
Either way, I think it's pretty fascinating.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:18:46 2010 No.1229450 I think it's an illustrated theological tract

Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:23:46 2010 No.1229455

>>1229450
Possibly. One of my theories is that it was something deemed evil, like a "magical tome" or alchemist's cookbook. Something the church would've quickly destroyed if they got their hands on it. So it was written in code. They probably would've destroyed it anyway though, so it doesn't really work.
The pictures are what really confuse me the most, and we're got the difficult task of deciphering the meaning of the pictures without knowing the meaning of the text.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:25:46 2010 No.1229457 File: 180 KB, 1536x783, Voynich_Manuscript_(170).jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:34:46 2010 No.1229463

A circle of monk-scribe/custodians that got too good at their jobs. Not so much as to troll but for their personal pleasure. The effects of pure concept were the literary avant-garde at the time, and so was budding cryptography in the area of linguistics.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:48:46 2010 No.1229471 Whenever I see those illustrations I imagine a bunch of monks huddled over their prankster brother, snickering. I'm with >>1229463.

>>	Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:49:46 2010 No.1229472 >>1229463 Whether it was done out of pure amusement or as a hoax or for some purpose we have yet to discover, it's impressive.

Anonymous Sat Oct 23 05:52:46 2010 No.1229475

>>1229471
Many of the theories about it view it as a hoax. A big one is Edward Kelley, who's pretty well accepted as a charlatan, but a very capable man nonetheless. I wouldn't put it passed him. But in the back of my mind, I kinda hope it isn't a hoax. And a little bit further back than that, I hope we never figure out what it is.

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/lit/ - Literature