Further investigations into the Universal Template outlined several posts ago:
Voynichese is highly positional. The permitted combinations of glyphs is highly restrained.
Our Universal Template, however, is utterly promiscuous. No combinations are taboo.
Accordingly, we could make more non-Voynich words than extant Voynich words, including words with taboo combinations.
Evidently, then, we need to impose order upon this matrix of possibilities.
* * *
We can make three types of words from the template:
1. Words found in the Voynich text
2. Words that are not found in the Voynich text but are not forbidden.
3. Words that are forbidden, containing forbidden combinations.
We will call them:
Extant words (Attested)
Hypothetical words (Possible but unattested)
Forbidden words (Impossible)
An example of a forbidden word: [iinqeeadk] (from Patrick Feaster). We know this is not a permitted combination of glyphs, even though it fits the template.
An example of a hypothetical word (from Patrick Feaster): [qokeeokeedy]
This unattested word seems quite possible, being consistent with typical patterns.
A template with universal application makes no distinctions. All three types of configurations are equally possible.
The template is not Voynichese. It is only the matrix of Voynichese. Voynichese is a set of rules, structures, patterns, imposed upon this field of possibilities.
To use an analogy: a chessboard is not chess. We need to understand the powers and capabilities, and restrictions, of the pieces.
* * *
A simple solution would be to have a set of overlaying grilles ("overlays"), one for each glyph. These show the permitted combinations but obscure the taboo combinations.
The grille for the glyph [q] is perfectly straightforward. It can only combine with [o] as [qo].
Similarly, an overlay for [iin] is unnecessary because it is always final. Nothing follows it.
In other cases, there are multiple options, but some possibilities are verboten.
Here we run into the fact that some combinations are celebrated but others are rare. Actually,there are few combinations entirely unattested, but some are so rare we might think they result from errors or some other liberty that creates minor and occassional deviations.
There is often a huge difference between these two categories.
K is followed by E over 4000 times. K can also be followed by D sometimes, but there are only eleven cases of it. That is a marked preference for E compared to D.
In effect, K is not followed by D. It is not a natural combination in Voynichese. There is no ready explanation for the eleven exceptions, but the proportions are overwhelming and the preferred pattern is clear.
With this in view, we can easily construct a set of grilles to be imposed (overlaid) upon the template, one for each glyph. These dictate which glyphs can follow which and eliminate those that cannot.
* * *
For this purpose I will arrange the template into alternating bigrams: 6 x 2 = 12.
We could arrange the template in other ways, but here we will use alternating bigrams after the pattern of QO + KEE + DY. On appearances, there is a marked tendency for Voynichese to gather into bigrams - apparently CV bigrams - and so we will use that order. Other orders might be revealing, but we start with this one.
The overlays for each glyph are depicted below. The method is:
1. Select any glyph from the top line of the template.
2. Impose the corresponding overlay.
3. Select a permitted (preferred) glyph from the overlay.
4. Now change to the corresponding overlay for that glyph.
5. And so on.
A bit cumbersome, but you get the idea...
I have no doubt made some mistakes here, and these overlays need refining, but they are useful prototypes.
* * *
With this device - twelve overlays to impose one by one on the template - we can at least eliminate forbidden words. We narrow the range of configurations to the natural limits of Voynichese. We impose the natural habits of Voynichese upon the template of possibilities. We impose a filter.
The thing that comes to mind is the Sieve of Erotosthenes.
Note that we have not given an account of the substitution glyphs [sh], [s], [r] and the like, nor of the benched gallows.
(I refer to the substitution glyphs as a "counter-cycle" because they are characterized by leftward turning plumes, counter to the flow of the script.)
Nor have we explained the rare and comparatively rare cases - typically a dozen words or so in the total text for each glyph, sometimes more - that defy these otherwise strong patterns. (The nature of Voynichese is that there are almost always exceptions to rules, even though the rules are abundantly clear.)
We can still make unattested combinations but, in theory, they are valid Voynichese, legitimate extensions of the existing vocabulary, neologisms. Or, in theory, they could have appeared on missing pages of the text.
* * *
As an alternative strategy, we can identify a limited number of preferred overlapping bigrams, such as the following:
QO
CHO
CHE
CHD
CHY
OL
OD
OK
KE
KA
KCH
KO
ED
EY
EO
DO
DY
AIIN
AL
LD
LA
LY
LCH
LO
LK
Thus a word like [pcheody] is [kch] + [che] + [eo] + [od] + [dy].
If selections from the Universal Template are restricted to these bigrams, or perhaps a looser set, we have effectively imposed the natural habits of Voynichese upon the matrix of possibilities.
* * *
As a philosophical aside, in that stupendous oration at the fountainhead of the Western tradition, Parmenides poem On Nature, there is an account of the metaphysical experience of ultimate identity. Parmenides describes it as, "everything passing through everything." It is the point where all distinctions disappear. It is the ground of coinciding opposites, the bedrock of thought itself.
This very much characterizes this template. Everything passes through everything. All glyphs can go anywhere. Everything is interchangeable. There are no distinctions. There is only the matrix, the field.
In subsequent Platonic geometry this field - the Form of Forms - is the dodecahedron (the "fifth element" containing all the other four. By extension it is the "zodiac" - Plato describes the dodecahedron as "decorated in animal figures.")
As an idle thought, it would be possible - on the basis of these studies - to operate Voynichese with a set of appropriately marked dodecahedra, twelve-sided dice.
R.B.
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