To continue with an analogy I adopted several posts ago, let us suppose we are trying to work out the game of chess, having known nothing about it at the outset.
Our predicament in studying the riddle of Voynichese, I propose, is very similar.
Let us imagine we are confronted with a mysterious text - a book of chess scoresheets written in an algebraic notation (such as is used for recording games of chess.)
There are many theories as to what this text might be, but we have established the hypothesis that it is the record of some sort of game.
Through trial and error, we have now established the playing space. We have worked out the board. From the notation we have established that the game is played on a board of 8 x 8 with alternating light and dark squares.
And we have also established the pieces, and the fact there are two different sets of them.
We can also discern something about the nature of the playing pieces. For example, one of them (the King) is taller than the rest. Some pieces are short.
It is clear that there is a hierarchy among pieces and that different pieces have different powers.
They are also restricted to particular places on the board. Some are under heavy restrictions. Others move around the board at more liberty.
The King can only move one square in any direction. The pawns can only move one square forward - but there seem to be exceptions to this otherwise firm rule.
In the notation we can discern patterns and recurring combinations, although rarely are they repeated exactly. Some combinations are more common than others.
Each page of notation unfolds in a similar but different way each time and moves towards one of several predictable outcomes.
By the careful study of the text we can try to discern the powers of each of the pieces.
But then there must be rules. What rules are creating the patterns we see in the algebraic notation?
Sometimes, the King and the Rook change places! What bizarre rule intervenes to allow this? Why? (One theory is that it is to move the tall piece into the corner to protect it and corresponds to the notation O-O, but that's just a theory...)
Slowly, in this way, we start to reconstruct the rules of chess.
The task of disassembling and understanding the text of the Voynich ms., I suggest, is analogous to trying to work out the rules of a long lost game.
As I noted previously, there was an interesting variant of chess played in the court of Alfonso of Castile on a board of 12 x 12.
* * *
The Universal Template outlined several posts ago has many implications, but in the first instance it confirms that QOKEEDY and CHOLDAIIN are our paradigms. The entire text, the whole language, is based upon these two words, or rather cycles.
Moreover, the Template tells us that Voynichese is a closed system (like a boardgame): we can give a full account of the text as the manifestation of just two words and some simple, consistent additional rules.
In the end, the question must become: What then are the two paradigms? What are QOKEEDY and CHOLDAIIN?
Throughout posts over the last few months I have provided an answer to this question. Namely, they are two different measures (divisions) of the ecliptic.
In QOKEEDY the ecliptic is divided into 30˚units - the zodiac signs. The word itself represents the quarter from solstice to equinox and is tripartite (or triune) in nature, QO + KEE + DY. 90 = 3 x 30.
In CHOLDAIIN the ecliptic is divided into 45˚ units - marking the half-quarter cycle. The word also represents the quarter from solstice to equinox but is bipartite in nature, CHOL + DAIIN, readily bifurcating into two words. 90 = 2 x 45˚.
The Universal Template, therefore, is the continuous flow of the Sun - the flow of years, the flow of time - the ecliptic - divided up in these two ways.
That is, the Template, the matrix, is a representation of the structures of the ecliptic. In the two paradigms we find the conventional divisions of the ecliptic into twelve and into eight.
As I have observed, noting basic astrological symbolism, this is the distinction between celestial and terrestrial. The twelvefold division is celestial and archetypal in nature, while the eightfold cycle manifests the four elements and qualities such as hot and dry.
On sober reflection, and reviewing the steps I made to arrive at such conclusions, I am confident my proposal is correct.
The Universal Template speaks for itself. It is the matrix of the text and QOKEEDY and CHOLDAIIN are demonstrably the paradigmatic forms.
It is another step to say what these paradigms are, but on this I am just as certain I am correct.
This means that I can proceed with this line of research with confidence.
The text must be some form of astrological notation - presumably relevant to botany.
Voynichese is some expression, or encoding, of the Voynich astrology, which is essentially soli-stellar. The divisions of the ecliptic are, in the end, collections of paranatellonta, groupings of the individual 360 degrees (which in the Voynich astrology are 360 stars - and nymphs.)
Voynichese is not a linguistic text about this, but rather a system of notation made from this.
I appreciate that without compelling evidence, resisting all falsification, this remains an hypothesis, and one which other researchers will find underwhelming.
The task then, is to explicate the system of notation and reveal its contents.
In some respects the Universal Template is so universal it is useless. Any glyph can go anywhere. It is merely the field of possibilities. (Metaphysically, it depicts the state of All-Possibility.)
How is the system of notation applied to this matrix? What are the rules? What exactly is being noted? How does it work?
We are not clueless about the rules at this stage but we are still a long way from defining them.
R.B.
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