Stratification Model

A useful way to present my model of the Voynich language is as follows:

This is only a working model, but accurate enough. 

This gives emphasis to the notion that the text UNFOLDS. 

“Evolves” is exactly the wrong word. 

The proper word is unfolds. It is the language of the emanationist cosmologies typical of Neoplatonism and thus in keeping with the period. 

The primal glyph, in my account, is the [o] glyph, which I like to call an omicron. 

To this is added the primal consonant, the gallows glyph [t], establishing CV alternation. 

The text is generated by processes of division. 

It unfolds from a bedrock of omicrons and a primitive paradigm of a primal vowel and a primal consonant: OTOTOTO…

unfolds

unpacks

expands

de-velops

We could supply an appropriately botanical terminology: 

blossoms

blooms 

grows

opens

burgeons

Simple to complex.

Unity to multiplicity.

In any case, in this model the language has been created in this way: by emanation. 

It is a cosmogonic model. 

The entire text is implicit in the primal omicron. 

* * *

At the high level of the text are the two paradigms, the two verbum potentiae, or more properly cycles:

QOKEEDY

CHOLDAIIN

They are clarified in the above illustration by the horizontal lines. 

To recap:

This model proposes that the text, and all Voynich words, are formed from two keywords (that run in cycles): QOKEEDY and CHOLDAIIN. 

(I describe QOKEEDY as the celestial paradigm, and CHOLDAIIN as the terrestrial.) 

It is the difference between Currier A and Currier B. 

The B text is based upon the QOKEEDY cycle. The A text is based upon the CHOLDAIIN cycle. 

There is, however, an underlying paradigm, or foundation text: what I have called the PRIMITIVE paradigm, or primitive cycle: OTOPO.

Deeper still is the primal consonant/vowel alternation: OTOTOTO

So-called Labelese is based upon the primitive paradigm. 

In addition, there is what I characterize as a COUNTER CYCLE, thus: OSARO.

The two paradigms, QOKEEDY and CHOLDAIIN, meet and overlap in the benched gallows: [ch] + [k]. 

The distinction between QOKEEDY and CHOLDAIIN introduces the distinction between c-curves and backslashes (Brian Cham’s Curve-and-Line system.) 

There are no backslash glyphs in QOKEEDY. They are an inherent feature of CHOLDAIIN.

We accommodate the counter-cycle by attributing [s] to the QOKEEDY paradigm and [r] to the CHOLDAIIN paradigm. 

QOKEEDY – [s] = c-curve

CHOLDAIIN – [r] = backslash

The text unfolds by a process of divisions. 

At the top level the system settles into the QOKEEDY / CHOLDAIIN distinction.

The primitive cycles are underlying. 

The cycles with backslashes and benched gallows are after the QOKEEDY / CHOLDAIIN distinction. 

Below everything is the bedrock text, an undifferentiated cycle of [o] glyphs: OOOOOO.

* * *

Analysis of Voynich words and text, by this model, is a process of stratification. 

Words are not to be parsed: they are to be stratified. 

Thus, in a word like [okeedy] we can clearly see it is based on the QOKEEDY paradigm, but the [q] is lacking. 

The initial [o] without the [q] is from a more primitive strata. 

Similarly, in a word like [qoteedy] it is the QOKEEDY paradigm but the [t] comes from an underlying strata. 

In a word like [chotaiin] we recognize the CHOLDAIIN paradigm but, again, the [t] intrudes from a deeper layer. 

R.B.