Voynich manuscript
The fifteenth century codex written in an undeciphered script and an unknown language. Author, purpose, and meaning all remain unidentified.
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- Original byline
- Anonymous
- Published
- Date not recorded
- Form
- Other works
- Authorship
- Still unknown
- Reason for anonymity
- Unrecorded
- Copyright
- Public domain
- Reference
- Wikipedia · Wikidata
The authorship story
The Voynich manuscript, carbon-dated to the early fifteenth century, is some 240 vellum pages of looping, unread script accompanied by paintings of unidentifiable plants, astronomical wheels, and bathing figures. Since the book cannot be read, its author cannot even be characterized: every question that normally frames an attribution, language, subject, genre, remains open, and proposed solutions from ciphers to hoaxes to invented languages have all failed to convince the field. Named for the dealer who bought it in 1912, it is the limit case of anonymous literature: a book whose author kept not only a name but a meaning to themselves.
Questions readers ask
Who wrote Voynich manuscript?
Nobody knows. No author for Voynich manuscript has been identified in the documented record.
Can I read Voynich manuscript for free?
Yes. Voynich manuscript is in the public domain and the full text is free to read at the Internet Archive.
Related works
- Still unknown
Amduat
An ancient Egyptian netherworld book describing the sun god's journey through the twelve hours of night. Like all Egyptian funerary literature, it names no author.
- Still unknown
Book of Caverns
An ancient Egyptian netherworld book depicting the sun god's passage over six caverns of the underworld. No author is recorded in the tradition.
- Still unknown
Book of the Dead
The ancient Egyptian collection of funerary spells guiding the dead through the afterlife. Tradition associates such texts with the god Thoth; no historical author exists in the record.
- Still unknown
Book of the Earth
An ancient Egyptian funerary composition showing the sun's night journey through the earth god Aker. Anonymous, like all Egyptian netherworld books.