I proposed that Cusanus may have been the brains behind the manuscript and that the work concerns the traditions of the Ladin people, over whom Cusanus was made bishop. I drew on that historical circumstance.
The focus of my work has since shifted, but not very far.
I still maintain that the work comes from the intellectual milieu of Nicholas of Cusa – and is decidedly Cusanean in its cosmology and in other aspects – and that what I have called the Ladin herbal tradition is still the subject of the work.
To refine this, though:
As I have admitted from the outset – because it is obvious - Cusanus is a very unlikely author himself, and although he regularly engaged in non-theological projects involving lay people, it is a stretch to see him involved in such a work in any direct way.
And yet, two things strongly suggest him. As I see it, the work is Lullean – the evidence of combinatorics in the text points to the influence of Ramon Llull, and Cusanus was the foremost Llullian of his era.
And secondly, as I see it, the work is a demonstration of the doctrine of Coincidentia Oppositorum. And this was the very leifmotif of Cusanus’ entire ouvre.
A Llulian text based on the coincidentia oppositorum? In the period, this suggests Nicholas of Cusa.
Certainly, the work – especially the ‘language’ – is the work of a formidable intellect. And an intellect from within the quite limited pool of ‘Humanist scholars’ in the period.
It is inconceivable – or very unlikely – that such a mind would not be known to history. What formidable intellect of the period fits the bill?
Of course, my reading could be entirely wrong. There might not be any influence of Ramon Llull and the work might not be based upon the coincidentia oppositorum whatsoever.
But I am more confident about that than about the identity of the author.
If not Cusanus, who? If not the Cusanus-Ladin connection, then what?
The other character who emerges – as I have posted several times – is Giovanni Fontana. He is assuredly a very different character than Cusanus, yet they were of the same milieu. Specifically, both studied in Padua and both came under the influence of Spanish teachers there and both developed a deep interest in Ramon Llull.
Cusanus went into the Church. Fontana forged a much more colorful career.
Fontana, of course, is an old favorite among punters. Long ago he was proposed as the author. It was long ago observed that his known works do bear some points of resemblance to the Voynich, and what we know of his character makes him a possible candidate. Certainly, he was more likely to have had direct involvement in such a project than Cusanus.
The scenario that emerges from his biography is this: he was employed as the municipal physician of Udine in the region of Friulea. In this capacity he had oversight of apothecaries. And, importantly, the demotic tongue of the region is Friulean, also referred to as Eastern Ladin.
This places him in a position to have some direct connection to the folk herbalism of the Dolomites and the traditions of those people we now refer to as the Ladin.
To be sure, “Ladin” is in fact a modern invention. In reality there was (and is) a patchwork of dialects and isolated languages all loosely described as “Vulgar Latin” – remnant languages of remnant communities of Roman settlement.
In linguistics, this is a topic fraught with controversy and disagreement. There are matters with political implications.
Leaving that aside, though, it is agreed that “Ladin” (broadly defined) is a Latin remnant, mixed with Rhaetean elements at an early stage (and Germanic intrusions later.)
But it was (and is) very localized and splintered. Some dialects – some distinct languages – are confined to single mountain valleys.
Looking wider, there are types of “Ladin” - a Latin remnant, mixed with Rhaetean elements at an early stage (and Germanic intrusions later) – throughout the alpine regions of Italy. Roughly, there are eastern, central and western varieties.
Their exact connections are hotly disputed, and local variation is the rule. (I’m certainly not equipped to understand the intricacies of the linguistic debates.)
Nevertheless, Friulean is one of these Rhaeto-Romance tongues, called Eastern Ladin because it shares the same roots as (central) Ladin. For reasons of geography and history, though, it has been shaped somewhat by surrounding languages such as Venetian and Slovene, diverging from the main branch.
But it is not inaccurate to characterize it as a type of Ladin, an eastern version of the folk tongues of the Italian alpine regions.
The point being that Giovanni Fontana, during the period he was employed as municipal physician in Udine, necessarily had regular commerce with speakers of ‘Eastern Ladin’.
For my purposes, this places him in a position to be familiar with the herbal traditions of those people.
It emerges as a promising (plausible) scenario.
It is necessary to locate such a scenario in order to give the manuscript some context. Again, this scenario might be entirely wrong, in which case we are galloping off in the wrong direction – but this is true of any scenario, and this one is more plausible than most.
Nicholas remains an interesting character here, though. His connections with the Ladin (of the Val Badia) are almost too convenient, in the context I have been considering. He is the right person to read for philosophical background anyway. He is a major thinker of this period, and – I contend – the Voynich ms. participates in Cusanean themes and thinking.
Yet for sundry reasons, his colorful contemporary Giovanni Fontana is the better prospect.
I am happy to adjust my hypothesis accordingly. I am not married to any theory.
In any case, authorship is not the focus of my research. The object is to place the work in some viable (and not too inaccurate) context in order to make sense of it, text and illustrations both.
With much to-ing and fro-ing the objective is to advance (ever cautious) towards a watertight unity of context-text-subtext. That, in my view, is what constitutes a “solution”.
* * *
To clarify another point: I have never proposed that the Voynich text is any sort of straight transcription of any type of “Ladin”.
But the language that goes with the relevant alpine herbal traditions is, all the same, Ladin, and so I have proposed it as the “background language” of the work. This could mean many things and take many forms.
But it is obvious the Voynich text is not a straight rendering of any language.
Friulean – Eastern Ladin – is more promising, though, because – unlike the “vulgar Latin” of the Val Badia – it had already emerged as a written language. There are writings in Friulean from the 1300s.
So, in the relevant period – early 1400s – Friulean was at least emerging as a written language – whereas Ladin remained unwritten until much later. Friulean was the form of Ladin that first made the transition to writing.
Again: I am not suggesting the text is Friulean. But the text does emerge from a certain linguistic background, and I do suggest Friulean – Eastern Ladin – is worth consideration in that respect.
I do note a certain contingent of Voynicheroes who detect Slovean elements in Voynichese. Perhaps.
I am now more far more impressed by the extreme artificiality of Voynichese, in any case. It is constructed. But from what? From what linguistic resources?
A constructed language? A philosophical language demonstrating the coincidentia oppositorum? This raises the question: could Fontana have accomplished such a feat? Certainly, Cusanus had the intellectual capacity, and such a thing was arguably within his range of interests.
So too the East/West dimensions of the work. Who had a good acquaintance with Graeco-Arab astrology? Cusanus had been to the East and had been involved in a deep engagement with Eastern Orthodoxy. This is not true of Fontana, but Friulea is the most “oriental” region of Italy.
In either case, my position is that the work concerns the alpine herbal traditions of northern Italy, and so the languages of those traditions (forms of Ladin) must be languages of interest.
And the text, and much else, shows the hand of a very substantial intellect, a known intellectual from the period who had reason to be connected to, or exposed to, or familiar with those traditions of folk herbalism.
R.B.
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