|
|
| f67r, right. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. |
f67r RIGHT
|
|
| f67r, right. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. |
The right hand side of f67r possibly shows a calendar of the year 1054 AD. The moons may depict full or half months, and the exhibit a similar odd light/dark sequence as found in the Aries and Taurus zodiac pages is seen.
|
|
| f67r, right. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Overlay by P. Han showing the similarity with light/dark Aries/Taurus in the zodiac section. |
If the different colour moons represent half months, i.e., new or full moons then this would cover half a year. If it follows the exact pattern of the zodiac then each moon would be a full month, except for Aries and Taurus which would show two moons. This would account for the full months as shown in the zodiac (it is only speculation that the missing folios after Sagittarius are indeed Aquarius and Capricorn and do not cover some other subject matter). In the half year calendar option, dark-light is the correct sequence and Taurus is the odd month. In the full zodiac calendar light–dark is the correct sequence and although Aries and Taurus are the only signs with two moons, Taurus again is out of step. In either case Taurus (April) is the unusual month, which although not the generally accepted month of the appearance of supernova of SN 1054 AD, there are possible indications and records that suggest it did appear earlier. It is also the zodiac constellation in which it appeared and as such to stand out from the other months is not out of place, possibly indicating the unusual brightness of the new star in the sky lighting the night “like a moon” when the sky was moonless, then fading. It is difficult to speculate whether this folio and the zodiac are exactly coordinated or not as zodiac months, Chinese year months and conventional year months do not run in step. The zodiac pages I speculate run from Feb 1st with the New year 10th Feb being indicated by a change of direction of the figures, the calculations for this folio are based on Pisces being the correct starting point of the year.
|
|
|
| f67r, right. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Overlay by P. Han showing the image as a half year Voynich Zodiac calendar, each month contains a dark and light moon. | f67r, right. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Overlay by P. Han showing the image as the full Voynich Zodiac calendar, each month contains one moon, except for Aries and Taurus. |
The lunar months run as shown below indicating the half year calendar option fits the events best, running from the start of the new year to the event of SN 1054. The label above the dark moon at the top of the circle may be interpreted as Kalendae, among other things, suggesting the dark (new) moon was the start of the month, or as calendar which was used in the traditional sense since medieval times. Both options would sit well with the half year calendar option and mark this dark moon as the start of the sequence.
|
|
| f67r, right. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Overlay by P. Han showing the lunar months coordinated with the new (dark) and full (light) Moons. |
The figure in the middle I suggest is a depiction of the supernova its self, described by the Chinese as having “pointed rays in all directions”. It has a pointer to the left which on the half year calendar points to month 5 of the lunar year (the supernova appeared in month 5 of the Chinese calendar), between 9th June and 8th July (best considered date for supernova is the 4th July), the 4th July is just contained in the Voynich Leo folio which I have suggested is July in the Voynich zodiac depiction. The label next to 8th July in the above image I would translate as “stella nova +?”, indicating that it appeared at this point. Alternatively the pointer may indicate the summer solstice. A comparison of the label in Leo with the one on f68r which I also translated as “stella nova” and originally assigned as SN 1054, shows that they contain identical glyphs, with an additional unclear one on the f67r label, the differing order due to the suggested anagramming of words within the Voynich manuscript.
|
|
|
| F67r, right, cropped. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Label=stella nova? |
F68r, cropped. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Label=stella nova? |
The image below shows an example of month structure, in this case Pisces.
|
|
| f67r, right, cropped. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Overlay by P. Han showing suggested details of Pisces on the calendar. |
Pisces contains a new (dark) and a
full (bright) moon and generally represents the month of February. It mostly
covers month 1 but also the end part of month 12 from the previous year. The
new moon is on the 10th February but the month marker starts before this
point and ends before the next new moon, indicating a possible attempt to
reconcile the lunar calendar of China and solar calendar of Europe for the
purpose of pinpointing SN 1054 in the European calendar.
Below is the example for Leo.
|
|
| f67r, right, cropped. Voynich Manuscript. Credit: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Overlay by P. Han showing suggested details of Leo on the calendar. |
Leo contains a new (dark) and a full (bright) moon and
generally represents the month of July. It mostly covers month 6 but also
the end part of month 5. The new moon is on the 8th July but the month
marker starts before this, somewhere after 23rd June which is the full moon
for month 5, this period would contain the 4th July which is the best
considered date for the supernova. The marker from the central image points
to month 5.
The markers on this page are partly hidden due to the way the image has been
made and would be difficult to draw any conclusions from what can be seen,
they may indicate positions of important events over the half year.
The wording around the central areas may indicate that the supernova
appeared briefly during the total eclipse near Taurus in May, and reappeared
later in the year in the horns of Taurus. The labels in Aries/Taurus may
describe a comet/meteorites. The label in June may describe Gemini in an
attempt to reconcile the Chinese and European calendar in terms of the year
start being one month out, this is consistent with the month of Cancer in
the Voynich Zodiac actually corresponding to
June rather than July, which would be Gemini. Thus SN 1054 appearing in
the Voynich Leo as I have suggested rather than cancer as would be expected
for an event in July. The new Moon of April 11th in Taurus is also
significant as it is close to the date of the earliest possible recorded
sighting of SN 1054 by Ibn Butan and two European manuscripts (Flemish and
Roman linking the death of Pope Leo with a bright light in the sky).
Some sources are said to place the star in Gemini rather than Taurus, but
this may be a slight difference to an object observed in the sky at the feet
of Gemini or above the horns of Taurus, both parts bordering the Milky Way.
And in Constantinople on 11th April by the time the sky was dark Taurus was
setting below the horizon and Gemini was the first complete constellation
above the horizon. Below is a map of the evening sky from
Constantinople on 11th April 1054 AD.
|
|
| Credit Radshift6. Evening sky from Constantinople, 11/4/1054. Overlay by P. Han showing location of SN 1054 in relation to Taurus, Gemini, the horizon and the Milky Way. |
With regard to reconciling the
astronomical nature of this theory with the vast botany images in the
manuscript here and in other places, I suggest that it is a matter of "as
above, so below" and the interdependency of the universe, the heavens and
the earth as a whole particularly in relation to medicine and the
significance of astronomical events in causing pestilence and disease on
earth. The report on this matter by Ibn Butan (Butlan) is recorded in
a later publication in around 1242 AD and suggests that a large epidemic in
the Autumn that year which killed vast numbers of people, 14, 000 people
were buried in one church after all the cemeteries in Constantinople had
been filled. The new star was not only linked by him to the epidemic
but said to have caused it.
LINKS:
Copyright © 2010 P. Han
