Yet another fool claims to have decoded the Voynich manuscript, Veeky Forums.
the-tls.co.uk
This one claims it's a medieval medical text with lots of abbreviations that everyone educated in the field at the time would have understood no problem. This, of course, does not explain why we've never seen said abbreviations anywhere else, or why it's taken us this long to decipher the text.
So, let's discuss what the Voynich manuscript actually is.
Long-lost 7th edition of the popular medieval roleplaying game, Potions and Poultices.
Lucian of Samosata's True History makes me think about what other equivalents of modern stuff happened by accident in the past.
The theory that convinces me the most is that it's a pseudo-scientific herbal medicine book written in a now dead Romani language.
Some of its astronomical diagrams preserve features that are unique to Indian astronomical diagrams, for example.
already been debunked.
Harvard's Houghton Library curator of early modern books John Overholt posted about it on Twitter about a day later, with "We're not buying this Voynich thing, right?"
Medievalist Kate Wiles, editor at History Today, replied, "I've yet to see a medievalist who does. Personally I object to his interpretation of abbreviations."
and most importantly, the article was published without the approval of the Beinecke Library
wtf does this have to do with Veeky Forums>
an entertainingly elaborate troll
Grimiores are the original traditional game
Seriously it's just extensive notes on herbology, which is completely useless compared to our current knowledge of medicine
Seens to be a herbology and/or alchemy book.
While the general consensus among medievalists is that it indeed is a medical text of some sort, the mystery doesn't concern it's actual content, but rather it's origin. Who wrote it? In what language? Where? When? Why have we no other written records of the language? And so on.
Also that it's the most effective cypher known to man, since no ones cracked it yet.
I've seen one theory that it's just spybook that describe how one city works.
This is elaborate troll.
Of particularly bored medieval monks.
In the Dresden Files game I'm in right now it's a potent artifact meant to tear open the Outer Gate. My Dr. Wizard currently has it tucked under his coat, running down the streets of Seattle.
>Also that it's the most effective cypher known to man, since no ones cracked it yet.
Well, yes and no. If it was actually just a cipher, that would be true, since by definition any cipher can be brute-forced. Traditionally, that is not true of "codes", because they resist frequency analysis and similar techniques. Classic example would be the WW2 "wind talkers" using their native tongue with which the enemy was completely unfamiliar.
There is some evidence in other writing from the same time period of trades preserving secrets using esoteric codes and even, in a few cases, entire proprietary languages. Among groups like alchemists, where secrecy of their techniques was everything, this became pretty important. So this is the most likely explanation of Voynich - a reference book written for only a small audience, all of whom know the secret language, or possible the encoded journal of a single author intended for his use only.
cryptographists have apparently found out that it's randomly-generated gibberish
If it is a troll then it's truly elaborate. The distribution of letters is entirely consistent with that of a natural language. We just don't know which language.
The biggest argument against it being a code, I think, is that whoever wrote must have been extremely familiar with using it since the writing is very fluid and show little to no signs of whoever writing it needing to stop and look how to actually write a word or letter, which, if it is a code, would imply that it was very commonly used and yet this is the only record we have of it ever being used.
Much like I find it much more probable that the text is of Indic origin. I have heard compelling arguments that the script is a combination of different Indo-Aryan writing systems meant to be read by only select members within a small family, and was likely brought to Europe by either Romani (or a closely related group) immigrants or merchants from what is today Pakistan.
>There is some evidence in other writing from the same time period of trades preserving secrets using esoteric codes and even, in a few cases, entire proprietary languages. Among groups like alchemists, where secrecy of their techniques was everything, this became pretty important. So this is the most likely explanation of Voynich - a reference book written for only a small audience, all of whom know the secret language, or possible the encoded journal of a single author intended for his use only.
Likely this. A secret language. Either that or a hoax.
That is the only way to explain why, for instance, there would be the same word appearing three times in a row (with no punctuation at that) in some places.
>That is the only way to explain why, for instance, there would be the same word appearing three times in a row (with no punctuation at that) in some places.
It's not. If the author considered the text sacred in some way, it's possible that he'd write down a word, realize he's made a mistake, and rather than attempting to correct the spelling or strike out the incorrect word simply write it down again the correct way.
>source: my dad, who works at Nintendo
Or it's some sort of sacred mantra or something similar. You look at old Hebrew prayerbooks, you'll see certain words repeated twice or three times in places.
Traditional Games???
Yes, that's the place. Welcome!
Someone post the xkcd comic already
...
I used to run RPGs for strangers on Omegle. As soon as a conversation would start I'd paste my pitch and send it, basically offering to run a freeform RPG on the subject of their choosing. One of the best was about the Voynich manuscript; the person gave me that as a prompt, I did a few minutes of research, and we began
She was a researcher doing a getaway with a group of other researchers; they were trying to decipher the manuscript. After some conversation and banter, finally one of them had a breakthrough. He took some honey in his hand and uttered an incantation- and the floor turned to water underneath them. They fell through the floor and one of the researchers went power mad, trying to cast another spell. The player ran off with the book, but he chased her and knocked down the bathroom door. She threw it at him and he ran out to try something else. Another researcher tried to stop him, but the honey-handed one knocked him out. The k.o.'d one fell into the water and started to drown, but the player rolled well and resuscitated him. Finally, the honey-handed one cast another spell and in a flash of light became a humanoid pillar of crystal. The player ran, and heard something stomping after her
A magical grimoire of course.
We can't understand it because it's written in the Language of Birds.
>Codex Gigas
>Voynich manuscript
What other books have weird tales about them?
>This, of course, does not explain why we've never seen said abbreviations anywhere else
The missing link is because doctor's handwriting has, and always will be, basically indecipherable.
>That is the only way to explain why, for instance, there would be the same word appearing three times in a row (with no punctuation at that) in some places.
Not necessarily. Repeated words can have significance within limited contexts. There's the suggestion by , for instance, and if (as in many hebrew texts), there is some kind of numerology component in addition to the literal meaning, it could explain duplications.
There's also the possibility that it's part of some sort of categorization system, if you go with the Herbalism Manual theory. I mean, we use some double names when describing families and species as it is, eg Rattus rattus. It's not that much of a stretch.
>What other books have weird tales about them?
Well, there was the more recent Codex Saraphinianus. That was intended as an art project, but it's still a pretty interesting read (and chances are your players won't be familiar with it).
I fucking hate birds
Attempted to build an AKV using MgT1e, based on the fact that the fact the 30 dton hull can hit the highest acceleration, at 16g.
Did all the math, filled all cargo space with lead, and... At one turn of thrust, it hits with over 915 kg of TNT per kg of ship weight.. At over a million kg it comes out to 763.9 million kg of C-4, the plastic explosive listed in the core book.
At this point, damage is irrelevant, but if I did the math right, about 160 million points on average.
Jeez, that's just 10 minutes of acceleration. Imagine if it went for the full hour of fuel I gave it...
Whoops, wring thread. Damn tablet.
>We can't understand it because it's written in the Language of Birds.
Hold my spear.
Not as weird or exciting as some others, but I think the Vinje Book is pretty fun.
It's Norway's oldest cyprianus (or "black book"), a Scandinavian term for a tradition of grimoires.
There's been found over 100 of these grimoires in Norway, but they're mostly from the period of 1650-1850. The Vinje Book however dated to around 1480-1520, and was found under the floorboards of the Vinje stave church in 1796. Since it's the only grimoire from before the Reformation, a lot of the religious stuff in it is unlike what's found in later grimoires, and it generally just has a good deal of things that seem to be unique to it, or at the very least rarely found in other books.
Interestingly, the book was in an outstanding condition when it was found, with no water damage, despite the church being in such a state of decay that it was being town down. The likely explanation for this is that the book was placed there only shortly before it was discovered.
It contains 12 distinct styles of handwriting, and contains 106 pages, although two have been torn out.
I really like the implication of all the different handwriting. At some point, in a small village in Norway, a group of people wrote their own magical/religious/medical book, likely in secrecy. It's a nice little story element to add to a world.
Like a small, rural secret society.
It's not the most unique or strange book, but it's still a nice little story.
One time pads are just as unbreakable without a cipher.
Just saying.
>appearing three times in a row
>I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true.
-The Hunting of the Snark
Nonetheless, tell me more.
Obviously this is a dyslexic person's college notebook. Said person also had ADD, so spends more time doodling in the margins than taking notes.
>An autonomous kill vehicle that hits like 800 million kilos of C4
(desire to know more intensifies)
See
It's the working notes for TAoCP vol. 5