Another Possible Voynich Breakthrough

bmearns writes "Over the past few weeks we've been hearing a lot about a possible breakthrough in decoding the infamous Voynich manuscript, made by a team of botanists who suggested that the plants depicted in the manuscript may have been from the New World and the mysterious writing could be a form of an Aztec language. But the latest development comes from linguist Stephen Bax, of Bedfordshire University, who believes he has identified some proper names (including of the constellation 'Taurus') in the manuscript and is using these as a crib to begin deciphering the rest of the text, which he believes comes from the near east or Asia."

EUREKA!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

It says "Be Sure to Drink Your Ovaltine"...

in other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

...yet another researcher reports their findings that one of the Rorschach inkblots may definitely be a picture of a face...

finally

[slashmydots]

Anyone else get the feeling that this is pretty much the only ongoing legendary Discovery Channel special mystery that actually got solved. Atlantis? Who knows? Stone henge? Not really solved. Nostradamus? Super debatable. But finally, what seems like yet another impossible eternal mystery is FINALLY being solved! And in my lifetime! I can't even think of any other comparison similar to this.

No progress at all...

[evilviper]

This guy just looked at the pictures, found a few he thinks he knows, and assumed the text with some similarity MUST BE IT.

"He said he had managed to find the word for Taurus, alongside a picture of seven stars (seen as part of the zodiac constellation of Taurus)"

Up next he'll find the word "leaf" next to a picture of a leaf, and the word "copyright" on the last page...

Simpler answer: It was a con

[Calavar]

I remember reading an article long ago that said that the Voynich manuscript was made by a con man that wanted to make some quick cash by writing down some gibberish in a book, claiming that it had mystical origins, and selling it off to someone with more money than common sense. (In this case, that person would be Emperor Rudolf II.) Some linguists have said that the statistical patterns of the text match what would be expected of a natural language, but the article that I read suggested that it is possible to create a random text that looks like a natural language by randomly choosing syllables with a special table. This table of syllables is constructed in such a way that the probability of a certain syllable occurring depends on the syllable that precedes it. To me, this seems like a much more reasonable explanation than the idea that New World lanuages somehow made it into a book that was (according to Wikipedia) was written in Europe between 1404 and 1438.

Re:full/original poublicaiton:

[Anonymous Coward]

Is the an edit fucktion on slashdot? No, sorry, there i snot.

RTFM

[FullBandwidth]

Anyone who's ever read documentation written by an engineer should immediately realize that the Voynich Manuscript is the user's guide for the Antikythera Mechansim.

I've got it...

[Anonymous Coward]

...based on the illustrations (plants, herbs, astrological symbols, and MANY butt-ugly naked women), this was the medieval version of "How to Seduce Women and Add Inches to Your Penis"

Re:Get cheap publicity fast, spout of a theory!!

[Guy Harris]

So, you have a theory, right, and it has a spout?

I'm a little theory Short and stout Here's my handle Here's my spout.