Text in the Centre Rosette

In the indecently brief study of the T & O symbol in the top corner of the Voynich map – the Rosette foldout – a few posts ago, I proposed that the “frills” surrounding the symbol were, in fact, sequences of glyphs or elements of the glyph system. 

There are countless interpretations of this symbol and its surrounds, most of them geographical or topological, given the context. 

Putting those aside, I have suggested that the symbol, and its presentation, concern the creation and inner workings of the Voynichese text. I detect depictions of textual cosmogony. They are paleographic.

As I see it, on the one side of this T/O there is a sequence of [o] glyphs, and on the other there is a sequence of what I am calling plumes (curves) such as we find in the glyph [s].

In both cases they are atop a ‘fringe’ of strokes.

Here is the fringe of what I call plumes - curved or crescent-like or feather-like leftward-folding strokes, like large apostrophe marks. 

These forms occur in the glyph-set attached as modifiers, or above glyphs like diacritical marks. There are several of them in practice, and we can make distinctions, but I am calling them all plumes. 

I proposed that this shows a sequence or series of such plumes, elevated on strokes or bars.

There is a clear, intended symmetry to this design:

There is a series of curves, in contrast to a series of circles. 

It is highly suggestive of the primal division of night and day, moon and sun. It follows the division of the T/O circle into two hemispheres.

I propose they are textual or paleographic elements: the circles are the glyph [o] and the curve is a plume (or cap, or flourish, or diacritic) such as found in the construction of various Voynich glyphs, but here free-standing.

By my analysis, these same plumes then appear in the words that feature inside the T/O symbol, specifically and conspicuously in the glyph [s]. 

I then propose that the entire T/O arrangement concerns such plumes, and plumed glyphs, in contrast to gallows and benched gallows glyphs. 

My conclusion, in short, was that this T/O symbol, on the Rosette foldout, is about the plume, compared to the gallows, or benched gallows.

All three forms are elevated above the head line of the base text. In this case, the T/O arrangement concerns glyphs where a plume is placed or reaches above the head line into a superscript position. 

To be clear about this: 

The blue line is the base line.

The red line is the head line.

Some glyphs reach above the head line.

Plumes are the curved sweeps that extend above the head line of the text, as opposed to the gallows glyphs (and the [d].)

* * * 

Looking beyond the T/O in the top corner, here is the text in the very centre of the Voynich Rosette foldout, the map:

Notice here the conspicuous sequence of PLUMES and plumed glyphs in the second line of text: [soshxor] [arar]

Here is exactly such a sequence of curved plumes as depicted around half the circumference of the T/O symbol, including the plume above the [ch] bench rendering it [sh] in EVA. 

Note that there is no differentiation between the plume that creates the [s] or the [r] and the plume above the bench ligature in [sh]. A plume is a plume, big or small, attached or unattached. 

I propose that these words are a demonstration of words with a series of plumes, and that demonstrating the plume is its purpose and meaning, in the first instance. 

The T/O symbol on the map illustrates a series of curves (plumes) and in the very centre of the map we find a word demonstrating such a series of curves (plumes) being used in text. 

And just as these plumed letters are contrasted to gallows forms in the T/O symbol, the same contrast is being made in this group of words. 

Note the prefixes: [ot-], [op-], and [yt-] is a variation on [ot-]. These are the hallmarks of what I have identified as the primitive paradigm, a pattern we find in ‘Labelese’ but not the running text. 

But in this case, the exception, the second line, is of interest. It is: [soshxor] [arar].

The feature of these words is the glyph [s] and the similar glyph [r], along with the plume above the [sh], making a clear sequence of such forms. 

It is conspicuous amidst the other words in this set. It stands out. There are no gallows glyphs in these words, compared to the others.

The textual configurations in the T/O glyph are mirrored, echoed, in the text in the centre of the central rosette. The same thing is being illustrated – the distinction between the plumed glyphs and the galllows glyphs among those glyphs that reach above the head line of the text.

R.B.