This Week I have been mostly thinking the Voynich Manuscript was written in .......

Outremer

http://legacy.fordham.edu/academics/programs_at_fordham_/medieval_studies/french_of_outremer/sources_by_locale/ 

PDFs From the web which may or may not be useful in VM Studies

An ethnobotanical study of Kırklareli (Turkey)
download

A note on the Syriac and Persian sources of the
pharmacological section of the Yŏuyáng zázŭ
download

C.P.Khare- Indian Medicinal Plants- An Illustrated Dictionary
download

Khasi:  a  minority language of North –East India,
From an unwritten to a written language.
download

On THE HERBAL OF
"PSEUDO -APULEIUS"
BY WILLIAM M. IVINS, JR.
download

Chemical Composition and Antioxidant Properties of Malva sylvestris L.
REZA TABARAKI*1, ZEYNABYOSEFI1, HOSSEIN ALI  ASADI GHARNEH
download

Al-Sūfī's Book of the Images of the Fixed Stars and its. Influence on Islamic and
European Celestial Cartography. Robert H. van Gent
download

Selected Early Herbal Titles in the Rare Books Collection
 of the Library of The Herb Society Of America Kirtland, Ohio
download

Medieval herbal iconography and lexicography of Cucumis (cucumber
and melon, Cucurbitaceae) in the Occident, 1300 – 1458
Harry S. Paris1,*, Jules Janick2 and Marie-Christine Daunay3
download

Prolegomena to the Study of the Kurds*
Garnik Asatrian Yerevan State University
{contains some good botanical word translations}
download

ABU HANIFAH AL-DINAWARI'S BOOK OF PLANTS: AN ANNOTATED
ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF THE EXTANT ALPHABETICAL PORTION
Catherine Alice Breslin 
download

Some Persian Drugs
David Hooper
download

Etymological dictionary of the  Armenian inherited lexicon
Hrach K. Martirosyan
download

The Folk-Lore of Herbals
Eleanour Sinclair Rohde
download

Turns out Spud was insane after all never mind Spud is Freee
I cant be the first person to have been driven mad by the VM
Onward and Upward with VM research and Translation
Excelsior!

Data / Information Dump 001

Spud's Voynich Info Dump 001 {7th July 2014}
"You can't keep a good spud dow-ow-ow-own
Oh No You can't keep a good Spud do-ow-ow-ow-ow-own"
Spud is back once again with the ill behaviour.
Incarcerated against his will at Stans, the holiday home by the sea
(Why would a white englishman go wandering around the countryside barefoot,
covered in mud (clay) and getting scratched by brambles, must be insane, right?)
Big Respect to Sukhwant Singh for giving the best explaination so far of the VM (in my view anyway)
Sukhwant's insistence that the VM "is in Landa Khojki scripts and belongs to Sindh region"
was always at the back of my mind during my own research.
After finally viewing his youtube video spud exclimed "Om Shivaya" and writhed around on
the floor in involuntary yogic postures (his back felt a lot better for it).
This one humbly begs the forgiveness of Sukhwant Singh for not having given him the credit earlier.
Spud has been far to busy talking to all the interesting people he has met in here
(and trying to (peacefully) fight the insane topsy-turvy system) to have done any VM research since mid-june but he has access to some of his notes so here is an 'information dump' of them.
Before that though, the discovery that the VM is (probably) a Secret Roma book raises many issues
One of the things that has kept me from doing any more translation is that i have not yet have permission to read it.
The Roma or Gypsies are one of the few peoples it is still acceptable in England to express a
disliking for in 'polite company'.
Another is the tribe of 'dole scum' or 'benefits claimants' of which Spud is a member.
incidentally it was due to not having a job and therefore being able to stay up night after night
on the computer that led
to Spud making whatever discoveries he may or may not have made.
----- data dump begins -------------------- most of this is probably bo****ks and is therefore
offered for amusement only ----
------------------------{}=transcribers notes-------
=========== -> page/side of page breaks
A Speculative Partial Translation of Voynich MS 5v {i'm still unsure as to if the plant is a
Mallows}
{many of these characters are guesses and Sukhwant's theory blows many of them out of the water
anyway}
K(h)aj(a)har jhan (i)khjhon prachat jhalakheur teur okhoer jhakhr njap?artha hakhjhe i?khar teur
(tor?)
akhjhar teur ke terjhat te kekhar jhoos akhal ikaor chal tor jishar akjhjkour cheakjhal jhal
tauretn.
---------------
JH -> JaH ?
Cajahar - bean (from Handbook of the diseases of the nervous system)
jhan - more (nepali)
atar - assigns (turkish)
teur - tear (turkish)
jhoos - tree coat {origin?}
jhus - 'fine hair on a plant or caterpillar' (a comparative dictionary of the Indo-Aryan Language)
terjahat - 'the worst' (a Comprehensive Indonesian English Dictionary By Alan.M.Stevens
Kajhar - Bahmani, Dasai, dasari, Kajhar. Very common on the Ghaits{?} and Konkan hills
       - indian squirels tails {?}
akhjhar - {the closest i found was Shoaib Akhtar (a cricketer) just found out akhtar means 'star'
in persian}
-----
must have done it in my sleep when i dreamed i was awake
=========
it's surprising how many of the EVA characters are actually correct. What i mean is, they guessed
the right letter
in the western script which corresponds to the char in the eastern language.
----------------------------------------------------
{after digesting the post on the F13r Artichoke by Marco on stephenbax.net}
I've been getting great results with EVA 't' -> BAX 'Kh' as suggested/hinted at in your post
EVA torshor
BAX Tar(ch?)ar
    Tarchar
Kodshol {?}
=================
Stages involved in my so-called 'translation'
1. Knowing about the voynich manuscript. I think it was Skeptoid. led to YouTube.
So i knew what the VM was when i heard that someone{Stephen Bax} had translated a few words of it
(via the 'missed in history' podcast).
Actually I had completely forgotton the other competing theory which came out about the same time
which I will have to look into.
{i still haven't looked into the American-origin theory}
================
F5v Google Translate 
1. KaJHAR (Turkish) -> is KAJH
1. KAJAHAR (Turkish) -> is Kajahn
2. Jhan (Turkish when JH? -> Plant
3. HTJHON -> X (google search gets quiz on Buddha)
    so look as MS carefully.
---
akhjhar (google) -> a blocked indian language mp3 site
poems: [Zindagi Na Milegi, Dobara Shagari]
akhjhar - (google) "akhjhar means" - yahoo search ->
babynamesworld.parentsconnect.com/meaning_of_Akhtar.html
The meaning of the name akhTar is 'star' {so i had already noted that. i'd just forgotten it}
also akhtar name & meaning on ancestry.com
===================================================================================================
=======================
----- i was wrote a long post in response to erics picture superimposing two VM pages in the
stephenbax.net comments ----
---- im afraid i didnt read the rest of erics posts so i probably misconstrued his intentions in
posting that picture -----
----- i didnt post it in the end so i will put it here ----------------
Peace Eric, I have been thinking about your last post.
Do you know anything about peridolia?
If the eyes and brain stare at anything for long enough they will start to see patterns.
I was starng at my 'translation' last night and thought i could see recognisable english words,
forming
sometimes from the beginning of one word and the start of the next, or i thought i could 'divine'
the english meaning
by a sense of inner {i can't read my own writing at this point}
----
however i did not let myself get 'carried away' by these ideas.
...
there must also be a danger of folie-a-tois which may be why translators are wary of each other.
Is anyone else finding Voynich Translation at one moment Joyful then Terrifying
"Do you do your work with fear and trembling?, then you'll do "- William Blake
It would be very dull if imagination and creativity were completely banished from Voynich Studies.
Ask yourself "What would I do if I knew what language the Voynich Manuscript was in,
If I knew what it was about and what the words were."
I think it is at this point that the adventure really begins.
-----
2nd
First thoughts.
It reminded me of some of the videos on YouTube where people 'flip' the image of a page and
superimpose it on
the original image. I can appreciate this as art but don't find it useful in transcribing and
transliterating the VM.
(unless it can also be read from right to left and left to right which is something i have wondered
about.)
We should also look into the possibility that it can be turned upside down and read from right to
left or
left to right.
Personally i am interested in MS 408 from a polymath - multi / many ways
 * herbals
 * Astronomy/Astrology
 (i gave up on the 'Stars' section when i couldn't convincingly translate the word by the Pisces
Fish star)
3rd Thought
"i like this picture, these are the two plants that kept me going. My parents have many centaurea
plants
in their garden and whenever I see one I think 'that looks *just* like the pic in the Vounich
Manuscript
and it gives me the confidence to keep going on.
4. I also think the artist/writer was aware of how thin vellum was and when writing on the other
side was
conscious to try and keep to the 'spaces'. compare with how soldiers in WW1, when paper was scarce
would
write a postcard then turn it at 90 degrees and keep on wrting.
================== drawing ========================
Voynich Turing
A Turing Machine with Voynichese charcters on the 'input' tape
and English/Latin characters on the 'output' tape.
"3 spaces max" written underneath {i.e. i thought the 'tape head' would move a maximum of
three characters on the input before producing one on the output.}
===========================================================================================
"The tragedy of science, the slaying of a beautiful theory by an ugly fact" - Aldous Huxley
{slightly misquoted}
===========================================================================================
i suggest a new mapping name
isa = is same as
eva   isa
 o  -  a
 t  -  kh
 l  -  t
 a  -  e {?}
eva: otolal
isa: akh-atet
==============================================
I am patiently waiting to hear Stephen's Views on this. But I have plenty to occupy myself with in
meantime
ecco-
   homo
=====================================DATA DUMP ENDS+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++
Finally a big thanks to 'Charlie' for taking an interest in my work.
A quiet word (or beep) in the ear of my psychiatrist might convince him that i am not delusional,
or perhaps you were a figment of my imagination after all.


respect to all strictly peaceful Pykees and Thugees
peace out
spud
x

Voynich-Transliteration-and-Translation-Human-Readable

 PLEASE NOTE THIS PAGE IS STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION AND MAY
CONTAIN ERRORS

Voynich-EVA-BAX Recipe AKA MS408:TRanslatiAn fAR Tummies v0.00

[1). Take EVA Text File
  If you don't know what EVA is see:
http://www.voynich.nu/extra/eva.html
  if you don't have an EVA text file you can get one at:
 http://voynich.freie-literatur.de/index.php?show=extractor

  OR type one in yourself

(2). Open you Favorite Text Editor
(3). Load The File into the Text Editor

(4).
  Using 'Find and Replace'
 
  
EVA  --> AKA       
                                               Using 'Find and Replace'
                                              (in my editor it is under the menu  Edit > Find)
FIND --> REPLACE WITH (Remember to 'Replace All' not just 'Replace')


 'iin' -->  'UR'
 'ce' --> 'JH'
 'o'  -->  'A'

 'e'  -->  'O'

 'y'  -->  'N'
 'a'  -->  'U'
 'r'  -->  'R'
 'k'  -->  'K'
 's'  -->  'S'

(5).
and any more in the form
EVA  --> AKA


lowercase --> UPPERCASE
                                        the above is what i am working with at the moment

you can even try your own experimental mappings




(6).
EVA  --> ?



end of transliteration stage


Other Suggested Candidate Mappings are Available
eg 't'  -->  'l'






[prime chars:eg bax-marco-spud-english-8th-June-2014]

{I hope computer nerds can see the possibities for automation of the Transliteration process}


Comments Welcome especially corrections and Suggestions of missing mappings.

`phrase for the week

JAHIM JAHAT JAHEY

VOYNICHESE TRANSLATION FOR HUMANS WITH COMPUTERS

NOTE I NEED TO CHECK MY MAPPINGS ARE CORRECT
So take that with a pinch of salt
yours are probablys are much better

Voynich-Transliteration-and-Translation-Human-Readable



 PLEASE NOTE THIS PAGE IS STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION AND MAY

CONTAIN ERRORS


Voynich-EVA-AKA Recipe AKA MS408:TRanslatiAn fAR Tummies v0.00


[1). Take EVA Text File

  If you don't know what EVA is see

 http://www.voynich.nu/extra/eva.html

  if you don't have an EVA text file you can get one at:

 http://voynich.freie-literatur.de/index.php?show=extractor


  OR type one in yourself

(2). Open you Favorite Text Editor
(3). Load The File into the Text Editor

(4).

  Using 'Find and Replace'

 

EVA  --> AKA      

                                               Using 'Find and Replace'

                                              (in my editor it is under the menu  Edit > Find)

FIND --> REPLACE WITH (Remember to 'Replace All' not just 'Replace')



 'iin' -->  'UR'

 'ce' --> 'JH'

 'o'  -->  'A'


 'e'  -->  'O'



 'y'  -->  'N'

 'a'  -->  'U'

 'r'  -->  'R'
 'k'  -->  'K'

 's'  -->  'S'


(5).
and any more in the form
EVA  --> AKA


lowercase --> UPPERCASE

                                            this is what i am working with at the moment


you can even try your own experimental mappings

(6).

EVA  --> ?







end of transliteration stage





Other Suggested Candidate Mappings are Available

eg 't'  -->  'l'









[prime chars:eg bax-marco-spud-english-8th-June-2014]



{I hope computer nerds can see the possibities for automation}

dewy    morn-

these    saucepans

are     beautiful
      
                     [BUSON]

LANGUAGE TRANSLITERATION

Step 1: Transliteration
Transliteration
From Wikipedia: "Transliteration is the conversion of a text from one script to another"

so lets for example say
Script A =  Voynichese

and we want to turn it into characters that are more recognisable to us personaly
for me at the moment this would be the character set used for writing English.

that is to say the letters (given in their usual order)

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

these are called lower case letters and they are the ones most usually used


the character set used for writing English is also known as the Latin character set,
it is used for many European languages

 

The Clues are there

As David Frost used to say.

Video - Youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTevO16vjL8

Voynich Folio 5v Translation

{Please note this is a work in progress}

Previous Posts
[first guess: Rough Draft]
Needs all the mappings from VOYNICH[ch] --> SPUD[ch] checking.
explaination of above:
ch is just a  shorter way of writing the word 'character' or letter
eg. VOYNICH [5] is the fifth letter in the Voynichese alphabet
Voynichese is the name many call the language of the VM
VM is a shorter way of writing 'TheVoynich Manuscript'
'The Voynich Manuscript' is currently (9th June 2014) in the Yale University Library in America
Voynich Manuscript | Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library


for each character (shoretened to ch) we subtitute another character.

note: Voynichese is a kind a 'Temporary Name' until the actual language the text is written in can be Established.



In Englished Voynichese: { ? - yet to be confirmed transliterated character}  [estimte de correctitus: halva]

[

(1)Kajhar  jhar        i?khjhon      p?rachat       jhal(s)      i?kheur      tor???            oj?hoer           jhatr



I?jhap?artha     hakhj?he        ik?har        tor???        akhjhar       teur???        ke               terjhat           te



kether     jhoos        ekhel        ikeor          chel          tor        jishar       akjnikhor     chekjhel


jhel         taureti(o)

]







in The Original Voynichese

Voynichese Word of the Day: Jhakhr

Voynichese word of the day: 

Jhákhr, n.m. A shrub.

 

 

source of definition:

Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. [May, 1911 ]

 Volume VII number 5 - A Dictionary of the Pahari Dialects  

link to source: https://archive.org/stream/mobot31753002183827#page/177/mode/2up  

Source of word: The Voynich Manuscipt [MS 408]

Line 2, Second word from right.

letters transliterated by: jh:spud,  kh:marco,  a,r:bax.     et al

[note: When using a search enjine always be wary of search-matches that occur within 

an OCR transcribed document don't believe it until you look at the scanned 

(photographed) page] 

Source of word: The Voynich Manuscipt (MS 408) 

interesting snippets regarding mallows from various online sources

VOYNICH PLANT 5v MALLOW???

With regards to my first post on Stephen Bax's site:
In my rush to start playing 'Guess the letter',
I had not even properly looked and the drawing to see if it was what I was
assuming it to be which should have been the first step.

On the Question of "Is Malva Officianalis a better fit than Malva Sylvestris,
now I'm looking at them both (Google Picture Search) I'm not sure.
The VM flowers (ignoring the colouring for a moment) seem more like the rounded Marsh Mallow ones not the Heart Shaped Common Mallow ones (although some Marsh Mallow flowers look heart-shared) but the The Colouring on the VM flowers does make the plant quite a good match for most of the photos of the Common Mallow.

If we assume the VM colourist knew what they were doing then the plant cannot be the Marsh Mallow which has White or hint-of-Pinkish flowers in all the photos I've seen.

The VM leaves look more like jagged edged Marsh Mallow leaves whereas some Common Mallow photos show quite rounded leaves)

The roots of both plants seem to grow downwards in photos and not sideways as in the VM drawing although some of the VM roots are growing downwards.
So to sum up, I'm confused. I will try and find pictures in old herbals/manuscripts. I've just found a drawing which shows a very similar root to the VM.{sorry i havent put any links up yet}

Of course it could be another Malva Species or a different plant entirely.
As for the stem splitting in two then joining together - I've never seen that in any real plant. I thought the split may be to the flowering and seed(nutlet?) formation occuring at different times, then I thought it may be to show the method of extracting the mucilage which occurs throughout the plant:

From 'A Modern Herbal' by Mrs. M. Grieve (first published in 1931)
http://www.botanical.com/botanical/mgmh/m/mallow07.html
Mallows
"Lindley states that about a thousand species had been discovered, all of which not only contain much mucilage, but are totally devoid of unwholesome properties."
....
Marsh Mallow (Althaea officinalis)
"The whole plant, particularly the root, abounds with a mild mucilage, which is emollient to a much greater degree than the common Mallow. The generic name, Althaea, is derived from the Greek, altho (to cure), from its healing properties. The name of the order, Malvaceae, is derived from the Greek, malake (soft), from the special qualities of the Mallows in softening and healing."
....
"Pliny said: 'Whosoever shall take a spoonful of the Mallows shall that day be free from all diseases that may come to him.' All Mallows contain abundant mucilage, and the Arab physicians in early times used the leaves as a poultice to suppress inflammation."
----
"MALLOW, BLUE Botanical: Malva sylvestris (LINN.) --Synonym--Common Mallow.
Cattle do not appear to be fond of this plant, every part of which abounds with a mild mucilage."
---Medicinal Action and Uses---
"The use of this species of Mallow has been much superseded by Marsh Mallow, which possesses its valuable properties in a superior degree, but it is still a favourite remedy with country people where Marsh Mallow is not obtainable. The roots are not considered of much value compared with those of the Marsh Mallow, and as a rule the leaves and flowers are used only, mainly externally in fomentations and poultices. The infusion has been a popular remedy for coughs and colds, but the internal use of the leaves has fallen into disuse, giving place to Marsh Mallow root, though they are still employed as a decoction for injection, which, made strong, cures strangury and gravel."
... <end>

no mention of splitting the stem here I know but Malva sylvestris flower/leaf/stem extract is for sale online.
The text entry in the VM is very short,there doesn't seem enough words to go into much detail about the medical uses.
{i have a theory that the first part may be botanical description and
where the plant grows}

My first impressions of the other suggested candidate plants:

GERANIUM - Yes I think the VM plant does look very much like
Geranium sylvaticum (wood cranesbill, woodland geranium)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geranium_sylvaticum
compare the top-right (unpainted) leaf in the VM with this picture:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fe/Geranium_bohemicum_02.jpg/220px-Geranium_bohemicum_02.jpg

See the cranesbill pictures on the link below where this quote appears
"Unlike meadow cranesbill, whose seed-pods droop, wood cranesbill's are erect."
http://sandywildlife.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/teesdalian-botanophilia-part-one.html
i dont think the leaves of the meadow cranesbill are as good a match for the VM plant
also the flowers have large stamens? which i think the vm artist would have drawn.
the VM plant has tall main stem *does cranesbill*

Potentilla argentea (Hoary Cinquefoil) - Could Be. The Cinquefoils do have medicinal uses.
Even accounting for the slapdash painting the leaves of the VM dont seem as 'regular' to me as the Cinquefoil (five leaves) but the Hoary Cinquefoil's  does look more like the VM than other Cinquefoils.
(from wikipedia Potentila) The flowers are usually yellow, but may be white, pinkish or red. Is this true of the Hoary Cinquefoil.

Parietaria (from wikipedia)
As of November 2013[update], The Plant List accepted only 10 species
did they mean nettles?


alkanna tinctoria (alkanet) VM not multi flowers so close together
or
stachys officinalis (Betony or woundwort) flowers not like VM
  Wood Betony (Stachys officinalis ) leaves closer but flowers still not like VM

CRC World Dictionary
GERANIUM NAMES
Geranium mascatense: chakkarpati
Geranium ocellatum: kaphlya,
kaphal, kidi jadi, chyaktu, kaphal, kidi jadi
chyaktu


My Candidate Plant Suggestion:
POTENTILLA

"Himalayan Cinquefoil (Potentilla argyrophylla var. atrosanguinea), a wonderful small clump with silvery leaves and a bright scarlet-red flower."
source
http://astridsgardendesign.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/garden-bloggers-bloom-day-june-2013.html

potentilla lineata (flowers yellow)
in india: bajardantu, bajardanti , khalepey, rattanjot, samokhil, vajrandanti
in nepal: bajrandanti, kanthamun, rehu
[source of names: CDC World Dictionary of Plant Names - Umberto Quattrocchi.]


Closing Remarks

I think a key to decide the plant is what are those things just below the flowers, the blue 'ruff' and the bud or forming seedpod?, And the root. Also the splitting and rejoining stem. Notice how two of the flower heads are drooping and the rest are pointing upright.The two drooping flowers still have the 'ruff' its not painted and its closer to the petals of the flower, closing or opening but not pulled back like in the upright flowers.
I think what i call the ruff is technically called the Calyx. Yes the
calyx is made up of the individual Sepals (The spiky bits on the ruff).
from wikipedia:
"The number of sepals in a flower is its merosity. Flower merosity is indicative of a plant's classification. The merosity of a eudicot flower is typically four or five. The merosity of a monocot or palaeodicot flower is three, or a multiple of three."

VOYNICH PLANT 5v MALLOW???
WORK IN PROGRESS LINKS BEING CHECKED
interesting snippets regarding mallows from various online sources

http://herbsgujarat.tripod.com/
"Sida cordifolia Linn.
Bala, Khareti (G), Bala (S), Khiraiti (H),
Country mallow (E)

[4] Scientific name: Malva sylvestris L.
Family: Malvaceae
English name: High mallow, marsh mallow
Persian name: Panīrak
Nature: Cold
Suggested Actions and pharmacology: Liver tonic,
blood tonic, hypolipidemic, hypoglycemic, kidney "

"Pythagoras declared that the eating of meat clouded the reasoning faculties. While he did not condemn its use or totally abstain therefrom himself, he declared that judges should refrain from eating meat before a trial, in order that those who appeared before them might receive the most honest and astute decisions. When Pythagoras decided (as he often did) to retire into the temple of God for an extended period of time to meditate and pray, he took with his supply of specially prepared food and drink. The food consisted of equal parts of the seeds of poppy and sesame, the skin of the sea onion from which the juice had been thoroughly extracted, the flower of daffodil, the leaves of mallows, and a paste of barley and peas. These he compounded together with the addition of wild honey. For a beverage he took the seeds of cucumbers, dried raisins (with seeds removed), the flowers of coriander, the seeds of mallows and purslane, scraped cheese, meal, and cream, mixed together and sweetened with wild honey. Pythagoras claimed that this was the diet of Hercules while wandering in the Libyan desert and was according to the formula given to that hero by the goddess Ceres herself."


"persian
Tulah , nan e-Kelugh, Khubazi
arabic - Khebz algherab"

'nan e-Kelugh' and 'Khebz algherab' signify 'crows or raven's bread'
Khubazi is a species of Khatmi and called by the Shirazians 'Khatmi Kuchek' ("the small mallows") (the author says his source was the MS Berhan Kattea)
...

 )tin is the only term for "grapes" in Kurmanji dialects, attested
also in Sorani, tire, though, in the latter, with a limited usage compared
to hangur. — From Arm. *tdli; cf. Middle Armenian toli (toyli) 'vine'. The
modern dialects of Armenian use this term in the meaning of "bottle
gourd (Lagenaria sp.)", from which we have tolik "mallow" (see the next
item). Arm. toli is, likely, a substrate word; cf. Urartian uduli "grapes"
(Lap'anc'yan 1961: 330); also (GIS) ti'Hatu "vine" in Akkadian (Mkrtcyan
1983: 35). The Udi tal 'id.' comes, probably, from Armenian.

In the 16th-17th centuries, tin was already a widespread lexeme in
Kurmanji, attested also in the poetry of Faqiye Tayran, a prominent
author of that time (see above). Cf.: Bihonya li ta tiri (zi) razT — "(The time
of taking) grapes from the vine is (already) passed for you" (Rudenko
1965: 49). Therefore, it seems the word to have been borrowed before
the mentioned period, at least one or two centuries earlier.

2) tolik "mallow (Malva sylvestris L.)"; also in the Southern dialects
tolaka 'id.'; cf. the Kurm. saying: Mind a'rabe cav tolike k'ava = "to look at
something with greed or passion", lit. "Like an Arab (when he) looks at
the mallow". 52 — Is taken from the Middle Armenian toli (see the previ-
ous item) probably during the 14th-15th centuries, for in New Armenian
dialects it has different phonetic manifestations. The semantic aspect,
however, is not clear: in Middle Armenian, toli meant "vine" — according
to a 13th century text, in which it is attested (Acarean 1979: 416). We
can assume then that in the Armenian dialects of the time, from which
the word has penetrated into Kurmanji, it was used in other meanings
as well, including "mallow" and "bottle gourd".
{from Prolegomena to the Study of the Kurds - Garnik Asatrian}

Some Sources Of Useful Information for Voynich Studies.

stephenbax.net evidence discussion and information


 


SOME SOURCES OF INFORMATION
*HERBALS
*history of herbals

Herbals: Their Origin and Evolution: A Chapter in the History of Botany 1470-1670
By Agnes Arber
https://archive.org/details/cu31924019103872

Medieval Herbal Remedies: The Old English Herbarium and Anglo-Saxon Medicine
 By Anne Van Arsdall

Giant List Of Herbals - Herbs info
http://www.herbs-info.com/herbal.html

*herbals

DIOSCORIDES DE MATERIA MEDICA - five books in one volume: New Modern English Translation. {download not-for-resale pdfs}
http://www.ibidispress.scriptmania.com/custom.html





*Here are some more resources/sources that I have found useful.

Interlinear transcription archive extractor
(saves all or portions of the VM as a text file in EVA)
http://voynich.freie-literatur.de/index.php?show=extractor
{If nothing is put in the page range the entire manuscript will be downloaded!.}

Of course nothing compares to actually looking at the Manuscript to get all the nuances.

I found actually writing out the text on a piece of paper was useful to get a better idea of the language/script.

Remember that the Indo-European language was called the Aryan language before a certain Mr Hitler made that
term 'politically incorrect'. So many Pre-c1945 books may be called something like:



http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=UX_AeDYzhBQC&pg=PA299&lpg=PA299&dq=jhus+plant&source=bl&ots=KsaRD5jYFZ&sig=p0xMDE60MA6OtaLgF5arPuzvT6A&hl=en&sa=X&ei=VFmTU7d1yZI499GB2As&ved=0CDcQ6AEwBQ

{please note this page is a Work-In-Progress and if you visit it later you may find it has been changed/Added to}
All Comments and Suggestions Welcome

A Speculative Partial Translation of Voynich Plant 5vBy Spud.

Assuming Marsh Mallow could be the Plant shown,the closest match
for the name I could find to bax: KA?OAR was Hindi - Kajhor

My only language is English and 'oar' and 'or' are pronounced
the same to me so i thought i might be onto something.
This suggested that the missing letters could be JH

I plugged the new proposed letters into a text file of the VM
with the EVA character already replaced with BAX characters.
(using find and replace all in a simple text editor).
The EVA characters were in lowercase and the BAX characters
were in UPPERCASE so any completely transliterated words stood out.

A few words in the VM seemed promising
(eg the word JHAR = plant/forest/water spring/jungle in
 Nepali/Hindi/Indian type languages.)

and the word KSHAR <f49v.P.1;H> which linked to a Wikipedia Article
about an Ayurvedic preperation which gave me quite a shock!.

But I wasn't sure if these few words amongst the 'gobbledigook' were
'statistically relevent' so I followed Professor Bax's methods and
started again 'from scratch' and had a good look at the Plant pictures
to see if it could be any of the other plants being described.

Many of the Plants suggested did indeed look very much like the Artist's
picture and strangely I found some plants from the Himalaya region that
looked like a close match to the Artists Drawing.

i have yet to write up all i have done but

if i am right about my assumptions that :-

1. The underlying Language of page 5v is an Indian or closely related language or a language of the indian himalayan area (im not that great at geography) possibly pakistan or afghanistan

2. That the mappings of characters are largely correct

3.  I expect that page 5v can be translated in six weeks rather that six months

4. A lot less if a speaker/ reader of the language identified, with the ability to  speak, read, or write more than one language gets involved!


Assuming at least the first part of the VM is written in the same language then the same would apply to those as well.

Of course it will soon be possible to translate the VM in milliseconds using a simple computer program and assuming the appropriate digitised dictionary can be found.

evidence for make this assumption should be apparent to anyone who carefully studies the information supplied on this blog.

I ways to  optimise your search techniques when using a search engine
when trying to find evidence for a TRANSLITERATED VOYNICH word that
you think you have identified

If you are tying to lookup a candidate search word online

basically if your results are BEST you are there
GOOD keep going try and refine your search terms
BAD probably not going anywhere or possibly it is a real word but just hasnt been put online
  try moving on to something else for the moment or reconsider your assumptions


how to evaluate search results.

BEST if the words you are finding are from the same Place geographically or thereabouts
AND
A Dictionary Definition in a Scanned (OCR) Book or Document
THEN it is a possible candidate word for your translation
REMEMBER a word can have many meanings in many different languages
or even in the same language


OCR scanned document - try to find a scan of the original, or visit a library to see
   th original source as OCR (Optical Character Recocnition) often does not work
  very well and can garble wgfws

GOOD if they are from closely related languages/ places

eg.Travels of people from your country in foreign lands writing about the native flora and fauna.

Names of places - Think about the region the place is in, How did it get that name?

Role Playing Game(RPG), World Of Warcraft, Dungeons and Dragons (D&D), JRR Tolkien
  Laugh - think about how they came up with that world


BAD If the words you are from all over the place

If the words you find are from all over the place
Words not in any human language
A list of Anagrams on a word puzzle site or similar.

I will be writing more about how to refine your search terms
here are some I found useful
W = the word you are looking up
L = the language you are investigating

searches to try

W means
W means in L

Search engines ignore small common words like in the and etc.
if you want them included use +W (put a plus sign before the word
if you want to search for  an exact phrase put it within quote marks ""
combine search terms with AND in capitals

PLEASE TRY AND FALSIFY MY CLAIMS - I WELCOME ANY CRITICISM