The Voynich Manuscript

[Parsons]

The ancient text has no known title, no known author, and is written in no known language: what does it say and why does it have many astronomy illustrations? The mysterious book was once bought by an emperor, forgotten on a library shelf, sold for thousands of dollars, and later donated to Yale. Possibly written in the 15th century, the over 200-page volume is known most recently as the Voynich Manuscript, after its (re-)discoverer in 1912. Pictured above is an illustration from the book that appears to be somehow related to the Sun. The book labels some patches of the sky with unfamiliar constellations. The inability of modern historians of astronomy to understand the origins of these constellations is perhaps dwarfed by the inability of modern code-breakers to understand the book's text. The book itself remains in Yale's rare book collection under catalog number "MS 408."

Has anyone heard of this before? I just stumbled on it and it absolutely fascinates me.

Is it merely a 500 year old prank or is it something much more? It is written in no known language and nobody has been able to decipher it.

Very extensive information can be found about it on wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript

More photos (too big, we really need an image auto-resizer):
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co...158%29.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co...832%29.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co...135%29.jpg

[Melissa]

Yes, I've spent some time deeply intrigued and reseaching this manuscript a couple of months ago.
There are quite a few documentaries about it on the net. Very fascinating indeed!

[BrownEye]

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/12/0...anuscript/

[Ashim]

[indiGo33]

Turns out the manuscript was partially decoded this week and it is concluded not to be a hoax:

[/quote] The manuscript has a lot of illustrations of stars and plants. I was able to identify some of these, with their names, by looking at mediaeval herbal manuscripts in Arabic and other languages, and I then made a start on a decoding, with some exciting results.”

Among the words he has identified is the term for Taurus, alongside a picture of seven stars which seem to be the Pleiades, and also the word KANTAIRON alongside a picture of the plant Centaury, a known mediaeval herb, as well as a number of other plants. [quote]

Full Article: http://www.beds.ac.uk/news/2014/february...-professor

[Melissa]

The entire manuscript has been uploaded here; www.jasondavies.com/voynich

The drawings are so funny yet strangely mesmerizing.