"It was easy!"

It would be hard to keep count of the number of people who have appeared out of nowhere and proclaimed that after a few weeks' rumination they had “cracked” the Voynich ms. and that they found it “surprisingly easy!” They are often boggled by the inability of people to “crack” it before them. They say: "If I can see that it’s John Dee’s secret plans for a time-machine, then why hasn’t anyone before me?"

The pages of Voynichalia are littered with such cases – claims of the stunningly easy breakthrough!

But such people do have a point. They have a sense that it is not as hard as it looks. Above all, they sense that we have, in fact, an abundance of evidence, and always have had, but we just have not looked at it correctly. It was right in front of us all along.

This might be true. The problem is not a lack of data, but too much, and what we are lacking is insight. Our difficulties are conceptual. We have data: we lack the ability to understand and interpret it.

I must say, I don’t think that getting a general historical sense of the work is too difficult.

As a first step, it is as easy as this:

1. We have a Renaissance alchemical herbal in a Latinate script

2. We are supplied with a map with mountains and swallowtail merlons on the architecture.

Conclusion: We are very likely in alpine northern Italy.

Then there is the question:

The manuscript is very folkish. Is there a tradition of herbal folk medicine in alpine northern Italy?

Answer: Yes there is.

These are steps that lead, very simply, and without any fancy moves or outlandish leaps, towards a useful and plausible hypothesis about the origins and content of the work. It’s not hard.

Undoubtedly, this simple procedure runs into complications but nothing to dislodge it as the most obvious framework for study in the first instance. Where to search? Northern Italy.

One of the mysteries of the Voynich ms. is why people want to excessively mystify it. It is assuredly a strange work, but not that strange. It is puzzling, but it is not the Riddle of Ages. In some respects it is transparent and straightforward... up to a point. There is no need to be paralyzed with uncertainty from the outset. There are some strong likelihoods. I base my studies on those; they are surprisingly easy to establish. It takes little investigation to conclude that the work is probably from alpine northern Italy and that that would be the best place to delve.

It may be wrong, of course, but that is true of every starting point.

R. B.