How Many Glyphs and How Many Scribes? Digital Paleography and the Voynich Manuscript

Abstract

here is no medieval manuscript that has been seen, studied, analyzed, and debated more than the mysterious and as-yet-unread Voynich Manuscript (Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library MS 408). 1 The manuscript is so infamous that medievalists and other scholars have been conditioned to roll their eyes when the very name is mentioned. It is easy to forget that underneath the media buzz and unsubstantiated theories lies an actual medieval object well worthy of study, six hundred years old, with a lengthy and fascinating recorded history. 2

Character Entropy in Modern and Historical Texts: Comparison Metrics for an Undeciphered Manuscript

“…Ten of the folios fold out to reveal additional diagrams and text, the largest of which is the "Rose," a complex six-page foldout. See Davis (2020) for a discussion of manuscript hands and foliation.…”

“…The recent analysis of Davis (2020) demonstrates evidence for five different scribal hands based on variations in the formation of several glyphs. She finds that Language A is written entirely by Hand 1 (with the exception of 58r), while the other hands write in Language B.…”

“…The Voynich Manuscript (e.g. Figure 1) is an early 15th Century illustrated manuscript written by multiple unknown scribes (Davis 2020) in an unknown cipher or language. It contains about 38,000 words of text.…”