In the News: Mysterious Manuscript Still Puzzles Researchers

Reader Contribution by Katie Priebe
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The Voynich Manuscript is an ancient book that has puzzled experts and scientists for years. It’s filled with cryptic writings and drawings that no one has been able to make any sense of. Some say it appears to be written in “alien” language, which continues to riddle experts since it was found outside of Rome in 1912. But despite its unknown author and mysterious text, an even bigger mystery remains.

When was the book created?


The language in the mysterious Voynich Manuscript is still unknown.
Photo by uair01/Courtesy of Flickr.

Researchers at the University of Arizona have cracked what seems to be an important part of this complicated puzzle. Using radiocarbon data the department of physics at the University has discovered that the pages date back to the 15th century. (They estimate somewhere in between 1404 and 1438.) With this knowledge, the book is about a century older than the researchers and experts originally thought.

Drawings in this mysterious manuscript depict plants, astronomical charts and human figures bathing in what is perceived as the fountain of youth. The book was written on animal skin, which helped researchers narrow the book’s century.

Some characters resemble Latin letters, but others are unlike any language today or throughout history.

This unexplained book was discovered in the Villa Mondragone near Rome in 1912. An antique book dealer by the name of Wilfrid Voynich found this mysterious work shifting through a collection of books that were for sale by the Society of Jesus. Currently, the book is owned by Beinecke Rare Book and the Manuscript Library of Yale University.

Whoever created the book seemed to be interested in plants because there were many drawings of unknown plants throughout the book. If the creators were aliens some experts suggest they were simply drawing self-portraits.

What do you think about the mysterious Voynich Manuscripts? What plants do you think they depict? Please leave me a comment and let me know.

Read More:Voynich Manuscript Dated: Makes ‘DaVinci Code’ Look Lackluster – The Huffington Post
UA Experts Determine Age of Book ‘Nobody Can Read – UANews

Second photo by Schlomo Rabinowitz/Courtesy of Flickr

  • Published on Feb 14, 2011
Tagged with: Reader Contributions
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