The Book Nobody Can Translate | Voynich Manuscript

Ойын-сауық

The Voynich Manuscript is one of the most mysterious books ever written. It’s the book that nobody has been able to translate.
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If you’ve ever picked up a book, and found it’s full of surreal plants, unknown diagrams, zodiac rings, and a language which is completely undecipherable, you’re likely looking at a copy of the Voynich manuscript: the book that nobody can translate.
This medieval text, which has been dated to the early 15th century, is one of the most mysterious books ever written, as even after hundreds of years, no one has been able to definitively decode it…
So for this entry into the archive, we’ll take a look at this bizarre book, and see what we can learn about its history and possible meaning.
0:00 The Untranslatable Book
1:06 The Artwork
2:33 The Writing
3:35 The Author
4:39 Another Possibility…
5:31 Outro
Sources:
The Actual Manuscript: collections.library.yale.edu/...
The Mystery of the Voynich Manuscript - Reed Johnson: www.newyorker.com/books/page-...
History of the Voynich Manuscript - Yale: beinecke.library.yale.edu/col...
Copyright Disclaimer: Under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education, and research. All video/image content is edited under fair use rights for reasons of commentary. I do not own the images, music, or footage used in this video. All rights and credit goes to the original owners.
Images from Wikimedia Commons and Yale University Library (fair use)
♫ Music credit to Hooksounds ♫
#CuriousArchive #VoynichManuscript #Mystery

Пікірлер: 636

  • @dank_smirk2ndchannel200
    @dank_smirk2ndchannel2002 жыл бұрын

    If it is a joke, it reminds me of that time where scientists wanted to translate some Norse runes that were considered sacred. They eventually managed to get access to them which were high up on a wall. When they translated them they found out that the runes pretty much said "This is very tall." So yeah, I support the idea that the Voynich Manuscript is an example of ancient shitposting,

  • @Bullshitvol2

    @Bullshitvol2

    2 жыл бұрын

    Every language on this planet has a certain pattern. This is because our brain is wired a certain way. If the language in this manuscript has the same pattern than it is NOT gibberish but a real language. A few runes is also a different scope than a whole book written by several authors over a timespan of hundred years. There is no way this book is just a joke. People should have some common sense.

  • @hakimdiwan5101

    @hakimdiwan5101

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Bullshitvol2 What makes you think that it's written by several authors? What makes you think that there is actually a structured language?

  • @Phantom-bh5ru

    @Phantom-bh5ru

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@hakimdiwan5101 he has a idea in his head that will allow him to twist everything to fit into his own perverted world perspective

  • @hakimdiwan5101

    @hakimdiwan5101

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Phantom-bh5ru I would like to know if what he said is based on any source outside of this video or as you said it is typical human bias at work.

  • @Phantom-bh5ru

    @Phantom-bh5ru

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@hakimdiwan5101 read from another comment that the script literally does not follow the same formula as the rest of all languages so it’s safe to say it’s likely a shitpost if that comment is right.

  • @DraptorRonin
    @DraptorRonin2 жыл бұрын

    I like to think that this is a medieval-version of the Codex Sephranius.

  • @Kami-mk7tu

    @Kami-mk7tu

    2 жыл бұрын

    I think it might be

  • @CuriousArchive

    @CuriousArchive

    2 жыл бұрын

    That's how I think of it too

  • @damianstruiken5886

    @damianstruiken5886

    2 жыл бұрын

    Thats what i thought to

  • @kai_plays_khomus

    @kai_plays_khomus

    2 жыл бұрын

    That's exactly what I commented on the Codex Sephranius video - it's even more similar to the Voynich Manuscript than just the unreadable language, even the content shows parallels.

  • @AstralStgma

    @AstralStgma

    2 жыл бұрын

    History does repeat itself, so you might not be wrong

  • @angelnolasco9723
    @angelnolasco97232 жыл бұрын

    The ancient King of Comedy managed to create the ultimate everlasting joke

  • @nicholasstancel

    @nicholasstancel

    2 жыл бұрын

    Love your YT avatar... An "Eo-Sapien" from Expedition/Alien Planet. I do hope that Curious Archive will cover Alien Planet in the near future.

  • @angelnolasco9723

    @angelnolasco9723

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@nicholasstancel Thanks! Expedition is one of my favorite books and it'd be great if Curious Archive had a video about it. Especially because it has more creatures than Alien Planet

  • @nicholasstancel

    @nicholasstancel

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@angelnolasco9723 Absolutely. Which of Darwin IV's native fauna are your favourite? Mine are the "Skewers." 👍

  • @angelnolasco9723

    @angelnolasco9723

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@nicholasstancel Besides the Eosapiens? The Daggerwrists. Reading about Scar-chest's pregnancy was pretty shocking and scary!

  • @nicholasstancel

    @nicholasstancel

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@angelnolasco9723 Yes, I liked the Dagger-Wrists as well.

  • @jscotthatcher380
    @jscotthatcher3802 жыл бұрын

    i always found this book extremely interesting. it's almost like someone was trying to do world building for a fantasy/sci-fi world in that world's native language. sorta like a book about the klingon homeworld written and illustrated by a klingon.

  • @aleksandarradivojevic6091

    @aleksandarradivojevic6091

    2 жыл бұрын

    The book is weird i think i know this language

  • @Eowyn3Pride

    @Eowyn3Pride

    2 жыл бұрын

    🥰🍻

  • @Eowyn3Pride

    @Eowyn3Pride

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@aleksandarradivojevic6091 whhaatt??!! Super cool!!!😳🤗😂😁🍻

  • @jjba3571

    @jjba3571

    2 жыл бұрын

    Looks like elves languaje

  • @aleksandarradivojevic6091

    @aleksandarradivojevic6091

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@jjba3571 yes with half of latin and a little bit of acient english

  • @adrianfernandez7930
    @adrianfernandez79302 жыл бұрын

    This book has fictional plants, elaborate tables and diagrams, and elaborate chemical equipment? All in a fictional language? They were truly playing DnD before it was cool.

  • @the_big_har

    @the_big_har

    2 жыл бұрын

    It was never "cool" lol.

  • @guikoi3101

    @guikoi3101

    2 жыл бұрын

    "Critical Role" proves you wrong. Bunch of mainstream celebrities playing DnD? Yeah, DnD is accepted and is cool now. Has been for a while.

  • @GlossArt

    @GlossArt

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@guikoi3101 not that I agree or disagree that dnd is cool but it's worth pointing out that something can be fairly widely accepted and still not considered "cool" specifically

  • @slimetank394

    @slimetank394

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@GlossArt shouldn't "being cool" be Subjective?

  • @sethaquauis

    @sethaquauis

    Жыл бұрын

    @@the_big_har okay "deadlypants"

  • @LunDruid
    @LunDruid2 жыл бұрын

    "We sometimes think of past societies as being perpetually serious." Only by people who haven't read Canterbury Tales. XDD

  • @franciscodetonne4797

    @franciscodetonne4797

    2 жыл бұрын

    But human nature doesn't change much, and it's possible that the author of this book made it for the lolz.

  • @marielaaguirre2794

    @marielaaguirre2794

    2 жыл бұрын

    Maybe was just a big meme

  • @hakimdiwan5101

    @hakimdiwan5101

    2 жыл бұрын

    What tales again?

  • @usgishimuracruises5710

    @usgishimuracruises5710

    2 жыл бұрын

    Roman soldiers used to carve phallus into walls when they were bored, not much has changed with modern day military tbh.

  • @ekosubandie2094

    @ekosubandie2094

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@usgishimuracruises5710 dick joke is a universal concept amongst humankind that trascends time and space

  • @joellamm5266
    @joellamm52662 жыл бұрын

    Imagine the author telling his friend why he wrote it like: "For the memes"

  • @Heli-draws

    @Heli-draws

    2 жыл бұрын

    And his friend was like: "What is a meme?"

  • @JarlFrank

    @JarlFrank

    2 жыл бұрын

    "Dude can you imagine how confused people will be hundreds, even thousands of years from now?" "Haha yeah, it's gonna be hilarious!"

  • @lyndsaybrown8471

    @lyndsaybrown8471

    2 жыл бұрын

    Book of the Lols

  • @icedriver2207

    @icedriver2207

    2 жыл бұрын

    Even worse finding he was just practicing his skills.

  • @Testosterooster
    @Testosterooster2 жыл бұрын

    The creator was probably laughing his ass off as he was writing this book.

  • @Eowyn3Pride

    @Eowyn3Pride

    2 жыл бұрын

    Everyone thinks it's a guy! It could have been a very clever woman who worked with apothecary herbs and was the equivalent of a Doctor of Botany and Women's health.

  • @Testosterooster

    @Testosterooster

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Eowyn3Pride that's true, hell of a troll

  • @thalassaer4137

    @thalassaer4137

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Eowyn3Pride doubt women could even write at the time.

  • @TheChum51

    @TheChum51

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@thalassaer4137 exactly lol

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Eowyn3Pride that’s fair, but sadly highly unlikely. While women at that time & period worked sometimes around medicinal herbs and healing stuff, they VERY RARELY were given the chance to be able to learn how to read and write. So, while not impossible, it’s extremely unlikely.

  • @ursidae97
    @ursidae972 жыл бұрын

    There are three untranslatable books that I know of. One was a purposeful art project, the other has been demonstrated to have some translation and may in fact be an encoded prayer book. The third is this enigma, the Voynich Manuscript.

  • @Heli-draws

    @Heli-draws

    2 жыл бұрын

    What are the other two untranslatable books you're talking about?

  • @voidwyrm6149

    @voidwyrm6149

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Heli-draws the first one is probably Codex Seraphinianus

  • @FroyourHistory

    @FroyourHistory

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Heli-draws the Second might be the Rodonc Codex

  • @bradameerbeg2154

    @bradameerbeg2154

    2 жыл бұрын

    This book was written in Turkic. There are guys working on translating it right now.

  • @laurelsilberman5705
    @laurelsilberman57052 жыл бұрын

    I’m 90% in the category that either an individual or a group of individuals created this incredibly bizarre art piece as a source of entertainment or humor-we too often give little credit to artists of history for their humor. I’m so glad that on your channel you’ve highlighted a few of these hilarious instances, and have done so again here. Your channel really is one-of-a-kind! Edit: I have nothing to do with the nonsense in the replies. I just think this book is obviously a one of a kind mystery and I like thinking about it as an artpiece/literary artifact, and that CA provided some plausible theories. Good lord did people get in a heated debate *unrelated* to my actual comment. Lol.

  • @iv7796

    @iv7796

    2 жыл бұрын

    its a farmers almanac and has been translated im pretty sure it was ancient turkish... Dont belive in everything u read on the net

  • @user-iq2rn5jz5m

    @user-iq2rn5jz5m

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@iv7796 correct. It is simply medieval turkish.

  • @ThrottleKitty

    @ThrottleKitty

    2 жыл бұрын

    I've seen studies performed on the book that indicate the text contained within it has no viable information. While the characters are very similar to existing languages (ancient Turkish, as mentioned here) this does not actually translate the book. It is as if someone who did not speak this language used words and characters without the context of their meaning. No successful translation of the book exists still, even with the clue of the texts relation to ancient Turkish. So it's more like... a fabrication of a Turkish farming almanac?

  • @iv7796

    @iv7796

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@ThrottleKitty total nonsense, I dont know where u people get these tales... It literally describes each plant, its effects medicinally and when and how to harvest. Plus a few descriptions of fertility rituals.

  • @ThrottleKitty

    @ThrottleKitty

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@iv7796 No one has ever seen these translations, you are silly for believing everything you hear online.

  • @robert2german
    @robert2german2 жыл бұрын

    Imagine if in the far future aliens find the ruins of our society and see a book about memes. That might be their equivalent of the Voynich Manuscript.

  • @Heli-draws

    @Heli-draws

    2 жыл бұрын

    Imagine aliens trying to understand what Doge is and why he is so common in the depictions of this ancient civilization

  • @artichokethejoke1563

    @artichokethejoke1563

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Heli-draws clearly these primates made godly pilgrimages to a place known as "Internet" here they managed their many cults, chief among them a man with some pole that seems to be singing. Another far greater deity of there's was the being known simply as "Doge" it is unknown of why such worship occurred. Perhaps another alien species populated these lands to become God's to these lesser class 2 inteligente species.

  • @tommythecat4961
    @tommythecat49612 жыл бұрын

    The mystery was partially solved thanks to mathematics, they did a frequential analysis of the symbols, how often they appear, and in what strings, order, those kinds of things. Turns out, it's probably gibberish, as it lacks the structure of a real language (things that even isolated languages or very distant ones have in common, no matter what). This means that it's either a fake, invented by someone to fool a buyer, a noble, etc, or a unique language with a syntax, a grammar and a structure like no other. Statistically, it's much more likely the former is the correct explanation!

  • @Ringleader17

    @Ringleader17

    2 жыл бұрын

    It's ancient Turkish, a group has already cracked one of the page.

  • @TubususCZ

    @TubususCZ

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Ringleader17 I very much doubt that, as Tommy said, the text just doesn't have a structure of _any_ real language. So, either a gibberish, or some complex (i.e. not just substitution) cypher. Besides, there are plenty of people who claim to have decoded it as a certain language, but so far nobody has been able to provide a complete translation that would make sense. Like, there is this guy whose name I forgot, who already came up with several attempts, one of which claims that it's a lost transitional romance language from 9th century, but in his translation it uses grammar atypical of any other romance language, together with loanwords from languages like high german or even arabic and hebrew and even then it often contradicts itself, so the result doesn't really make any sense. So unless someone shows me a complete translation that makes sense and can consistently explain _how_did they get it, I'll remain skeptical.

  • @oryxantilope591

    @oryxantilope591

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@TubususCZ kzread.info/dash/bejne/omqfx6-gfNCsdc4.html

  • @tommythecat4961

    @tommythecat4961

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@TubususCZ yeah I agree, ancient Turkish is well studied and understood, even if it were a cypher they had nothing this sophisticated in the 1500s... Also the fact that the pictures represent things that don't exist lends credence to the hypothesis of a forgery made by a book dealer or an alchemist, in a time when the "occult" was very much in fashion.

  • @ThrottleKitty

    @ThrottleKitty

    2 жыл бұрын

    I've seen a number of things on this book, the fake language within it is clearly based closely on ancient Turkish, but the attempted translation is widely accepted as a hoax or a failure, as no cipher or key as been provided by the team who supposedly figure it out. No successful translation of this book has actually been provided, it is only claimed to exist. As mentioned by the OP, the text is believed to be statistical gibberish based on advanced analysis, which means you could strong arm a "code break" out of a single page that would rapidly fall apart as applied to other pages where the same characters are used over and over in ways that can not be reconciled with the "translated" page. Simply put, it if was as simple as being written in ancient Turkish, the moment that clue was out the book would be translated a dozen times over. The fact that it's not shows that it is clearly not written in a straight forward, fairly well understood existing language without an additional code or cipher applied on top of it.

  • @triggerfish9967
    @triggerfish99672 жыл бұрын

    "We sometimes think of past societies as serious." Yeah, tell that to all the art enthusiasts & literature buffs. I mean, Mozart wrote a composition about licking butts & Mona Lisa could've been a guy who decided to pose as a woman just for laughs.

  • @samsonsoturian6013
    @samsonsoturian60132 жыл бұрын

    Someone should totally write a Lovecraftian tale using this book.

  • @scavorthespacecowboy2096

    @scavorthespacecowboy2096

    2 жыл бұрын

    racism manuscript

  • @matg2329

    @matg2329

    2 жыл бұрын

    I think Peter Clines

  • @samsonsoturian6013

    @samsonsoturian6013

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@scavorthespacecowboy2096 Lovecraft was many things, but he certainly wasn't racist on purpose or due to any loathing of peoples. I'd recommend Finn John's brief bio he wrote in his Complete Omnibus collection.

  • @rehansajid1106

    @rehansajid1106

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@samsonsoturian6013 search the cat

  • @justacrow5990

    @justacrow5990

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@rehansajid1106 His dad name the cat

  • @kai_plays_khomus
    @kai_plays_khomus2 жыл бұрын

    The one thing which might speak against a prank most is the sheer effort. The ressources for making the codex alone would be very expensive at the time it was made, and somebody able and willing to write a whole manuscript would probably use it rather for something more substantial, not to speak about the time put into writing it. In my eyes the ratio of investment and result doesn't fit the prank idea - but I'm not an expert and had to use the often times misleading institution called "common sense", so I could be totally wrong.

  • @TheDMG45

    @TheDMG45

    2 жыл бұрын

    Doesn't have to be a 'prank' per se. Could have been made as a work of art as a gift; an esoteric nonsense book as an amusement for a king for instance.

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    I often imagine that a secret mediaeval sect, that wanted to keep it’s knowledge secret, just made up a language, and then payed to have books translated into that language that only they knew. 🤷

  • @kai_plays_khomus

    @kai_plays_khomus

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@TheDMG45 That's a reasonable idea, although I would expect the illuminations and miniatures to be of higher quality in this case. But again - one shouldn't infer oneself from other people, especially not when they lived centuries ago. People loved curiosities back in the day (and probably as long as humans exist), so I wouldn't be totally surprised if your idea was right. 👍

  • @allanredhill8682

    @allanredhill8682

    17 күн бұрын

    im late to the party but the book could be a hoax - imagine some talented conartist cooking up smt like this and then selling it as a rare book oddity or esoteric text. Making shit like this for niche audiences wouldnt be unreasonable (just look at modern cults or scams related to spiritual movements). Also maybe the author was providing remedies and esoteric services themselves and used the book as proof for their knowledge xd They could make up any shit thats written in there since no one else could disprove it because the book is not legible. It would also make them look smart and mysterious if no one else is able to read the book but them lmao

  • @neurosect1983
    @neurosect19832 жыл бұрын

    Imagine it’s actually just really old polish that nobody has been able to translate

  • @lepusistlich6930

    @lepusistlich6930

    2 жыл бұрын

    Interesting theory! Latin used to be popular among "the wise ones" like scientists or priests so I guess a book like this would be written in Latin as well. Polish (both Old and modern) is written with Latin alphabet (+few extra dots and lines above some letters which make them sound different, it's our way to detect spies) so if it's really some unknown pre-Old Polish (Old Polish is actually X-XV century Polish) then it was written before the Christianisation (pre-X century). The book itself cannot be that old so it's possible that the author found once some old manuscripts and decided to rewrite them. But personally I think the author was just a troll and done that for fun. E: okay, I've done some research and now I'm almost sure it cannot be any of the Slavic languages. They just "work" in a different way, they have for example many one- or two-letter words and some really long ones which appear from time to time (proto-Slavic was probably similar). The text in Wojnicz's book is written with only mid-length words. It also doesn't look like Latin-with-non-Latin-letters for me. It could be one of the Asian or African languages written with an experimental transcription.

  • @Ringleader17

    @Ringleader17

    2 жыл бұрын

    Close, but it's actually ancient Turkish. A group already translated a page from the book.

  • @neurosect1983

    @neurosect1983

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Ringleader17 thanks for the info! I’m so excited to see how this gets translated!

  • @Eowyn3Pride

    @Eowyn3Pride

    2 жыл бұрын

    I've thought of that too...🤔

  • @Wecoc1
    @Wecoc12 жыл бұрын

    Maybe it's an artist's imagination book of that era, a bit like the very old equivalent of "Encyclopedia Of A World That Doesn't Exist"

  • @andreamenicatti1029
    @andreamenicatti10292 жыл бұрын

    Imagine a situation like this: Some archeologists find a manuscript and can't understand what its' written After months they finally able to decipher the manuscript They find out that it literally spells "never gonna give you up"

  • @luciellawliet

    @luciellawliet

    2 жыл бұрын

    You’ve just given me a brilliant idea

  • @MrMman30
    @MrMman302 жыл бұрын

    I think it was a scribe's attempt to baffle a printer. A Gutenberge Print Press was reliant on molds and had an advantage dealing with typical writing or drawing with Roman Letters and Typical florishes. So a scribe must have wanted to draw something to test the limits of printing or perhaps to prove scribing superior. I have no idea if his plan worked as expected or the printers were able to be ingenious and creative enough to replicate the manuscript as expected. All in all such a manuscript would be an oddity and collector item, since it was not made to replicate reality, but to test a technology ending a profession that was quickly becoming irrelevant.

  • @IMidgetManI

    @IMidgetManI

    2 жыл бұрын

    Thats a really unique and interesting theory. I like it.

  • @MrMman30

    @MrMman30

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@IMidgetManI Thanks. I thought of it when I first heard about how an attempt was made by a Venetian printer to copy the Qura'an to sell it to the Ottomans, but the copy was rejected because it was full of errors and Qura'an as the Muslims holiest book and the word of Allah (God) shouldn't contain any errors at all (Arabic scribes were extremely scrupulous with the writing and a copy with a misplaced line or curve was burned). This resulted in the print press not entering into Arabic language writting nations (not only Arab nations, but Turkish, Farsi and Urdu) until centuries later and to which was attributed the backwardness of these nations in sciences and literature after this point. More about the only remaining copy of "that" Qura'an to miraculously survive (probably by the Venetian printer) can be found here "Paganino & Alessandro Paganini Issue the First Printed Edition of the Qur'an in Arabic, of Which One Copy Survived : History of Information" www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?entryid=405 So from there it is easy to conclude that other European scribes either tried or suceeded in doing the same (suceed at baffling a printer), but instead of the Qura'an they used a latin lettered manuscript to prove their accuracy and that Printing is a flawed technique of copying (obviously this was due to the permanent nature of the molds and the skill of its maker more than it is with the process that has proven with time to be effective at meeting and exceeding all challanges).

  • @MrMman30

    @MrMman30

    2 жыл бұрын

    @Catholicus sum Christianus. You mean the Qura'an? It is not in ancient Turkish, its in Arabic. The Ottoman empire chose Arabic Alphabet as the written language of the court 700 years ago (when Islam was chosen as the official religion). The founder of Modern Turkey Mustafa Kamal Ataturk Romenized the Turkish Alphabet in attempt to "modernize" the country and to sever the country's links to its Ottoman roots. I see how the confusion occured; if you were Greek then you will be exposed to Arabic only, through Ottoman texts, but be aware that Arabic was adopted as the language by Ottomans not the other way around.

  • @IMidgetManI

    @IMidgetManI

    2 жыл бұрын

    @Catholicus sum Christianus. you seem certain that this is the case. What makes you so convinced that this theory is correct?

  • @MrMman30

    @MrMman30

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@IMidgetManI Are you asking me?! Occam's Razor, what is more likely:- A) This Manuscript was written in a lost language and is describing lost science and knowledge? OR B) This is a made-up document created to serve a purpose, the best of which is to haze printers? You decide.

  • @redfeatheredreptile
    @redfeatheredreptile2 жыл бұрын

    Imagine having your headworld journal with your own language so perplex collectors that its legendary hundreds of years in the future. Writer goals

  • @cramorantisgod4533
    @cramorantisgod45332 жыл бұрын

    I wanna write a book specifically to troll anyone who tries to read it.

  • @Heli-draws

    @Heli-draws

    2 жыл бұрын

    The problem is finding a place in which it will be lost to time only to be found by future archeologists

  • @musicalintentions
    @musicalintentions2 жыл бұрын

    This is a fascinating subject. I would love to hear about developments with AI translation in the future.

  • @ThrottleKitty
    @ThrottleKitty2 жыл бұрын

    The most popular running theory is that it was fabricated by an artist who knew a particular rich merchant liked to pass through the town keen to overpay for weird rare books. So he makes the weirdest, rarest book the merchant has ever seen and claims to have acquired it form someone else. That's why it has so much effort has been painstakingly put into it, yet it is so incomprehensible, and also has a vague feeling of the characters in the book mocking the person attempting to read the book.

  • @Boodikii
    @Boodikii2 жыл бұрын

    In the 1500's books were incredibly expensive to make. Doesn't make sense for it to be a joke. Realistically it's probably somebody's Alchemical journal. They use to do everything they could to hide their notes. They would use a ton of codes and implement their Alchemical recipes into like, regular ole baking recipes or story books. Wouldn't push it past one of them to just make up their own language. Plus the signs that it's Alchemy related are there.

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    Exactly!!

  • @jeffbrownstain

    @jeffbrownstain

    2 жыл бұрын

    Not enough occultists in this comment section...

  • @maud3444
    @maud34442 жыл бұрын

    If this is a prank it's one of the most expensive pranks ever. Making a book in the 14th or early 15th century - before Gutenberg - took a loooooot of time and pages, ink, etc costs money aswell. I think it's written in a now extict non-IndoEuropean language. I don't know.. Illyrian or a central Asian Turkic language. But a dialect with its own alphabet is possible/plausible too

  • @grzegorzw424

    @grzegorzw424

    2 жыл бұрын

    So how you explein the surreal ilustrations?

  • @Alejojojo6

    @Alejojojo6

    2 жыл бұрын

    Definitely not Turkic or Illyrian. For sure. Specially at the 14th century.

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    It could also perfectly be a constructed language, made for example for a secret sect, and they wanted something that only them could understand.

  • @panda4247

    @panda4247

    2 ай бұрын

    depends on whom you want to prank. I doubt the guy who wrote it wanted to prank us in the future. I would say it is more of a prank (or rather, a scam) towards somebody like the emperor Rudolf II... Basically "I am an alchemist and I have this super rare book that only I can read; employ me into your services". Sure, making the book would take some time, but the lifelong tenure on Rudolf's castle would be worth it, probably

  • @Lady_Chalk
    @Lady_Chalk2 жыл бұрын

    I like to think it’s just very early “trolling”.

  • @jakubpociecha8819

    @jakubpociecha8819

    2 жыл бұрын

    It's called we do a little trolling

  • @ok1025

    @ok1025

    2 жыл бұрын

    trolling in medieval be like:

  • @jakubpociecha8819

    @jakubpociecha8819

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@ok1025 People trolled themselves using literal trolls

  • @sagesarrazine6270
    @sagesarrazine62702 жыл бұрын

    You are rapidly becoming one of my favorite channels on youtube

  • @maud3444

    @maud3444

    2 жыл бұрын

    Same here! Stumbled unto it just a few days ago and can't stop watching these videos

  • @ivy4360
    @ivy43602 жыл бұрын

    This is the only channel of this type I actually subscribed to. (Monotone guy talks about sciencey stuff.)

  • @animatorshub7448
    @animatorshub74482 жыл бұрын

    Congrats on 100k! Your videos are great, my personal favourite are your fictional biology videos and your history videos. Keep doing what your doing because it is great!

  • @DaRUde117
    @DaRUde1172 жыл бұрын

    One thing is for certain: It is worldly. Everything in this book is something that we can comprehend, meaning we can see that there are plants, and people and stars. Another theory suggests that there was a translation script provided by the author but that got lost or destroyed somewhere. It could also be a story book of some kind.

  • @spartanfoxie
    @spartanfoxie2 жыл бұрын

    this was the book I thought the codex thing was and the whole reason I watched this channel, so I'm glad it finally got a video on it

  • @Caenef
    @Caenef2 жыл бұрын

    It might be a Turkish dialect; there's been some research into that avenue that looks promising.

  • @brianbatey9281

    @brianbatey9281

    2 жыл бұрын

    It isa medevil Turkish dialect. It was translated. Its a medical text

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@brianbatey9281 except it literally wasn’t translated lol. Only 1 guy on youtube claims to have translated it from old turkish, and literally every other scholar working on the book disagrees, like with every other person that has claimed to have translated it. It hasn’t been translated.

  • @Aaron-mj9ie
    @Aaron-mj9ie2 жыл бұрын

    My theory is that some medieval monk or "Enlightened person of science" make the Voynich manuscript in an attempt to look busy for long periods of time.

  • @cjharshman9234
    @cjharshman92342 жыл бұрын

    I find the idea that this could be an example of speculative biology/alternative reality world building just so charming. Its an interest that's seen as particularly modern but the notion that people have always been inquisitive, curious and artistic in that way is just really heartwarming to me for some reason.

  • @PolarBear-rc4ks
    @PolarBear-rc4ks2 жыл бұрын

    I watched a short documentary on KZread that it's just an old Turkish plant book, lots of the symbols and diagrams are used for mapping the seasons for different plants etc. It's not a hoax or magic whatever, just some old book about plants that's a bit weird...

  • @brianbatey9281

    @brianbatey9281

    2 жыл бұрын

    I saw that too.

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    Yah but sadly, like with every other person that claims to have translated it, it ended up not standing as a theory. That’s why it is still unstanslated and why every other scholar working on the script has denied the validity of that dude on KZread

  • @dialog_box
    @dialog_box2 жыл бұрын

    i 100% believe this was a medieval nerd who was just super into wordbuilding and decided to make a whole book about their alien planet using a conlang they made for it imagine being that person, and learning that 500 years from now a bunch of the worlds top minds would be obsessively trying to understand your goofy passion project because they thought it had some deeper meaning

  • @daddy6757
    @daddy67572 жыл бұрын

    Trolling that surpass time

  • @yellowbearanimations
    @yellowbearanimations2 жыл бұрын

    I’ve been waiting for you to make this!

  • @SomeOtherBots
    @SomeOtherBots2 жыл бұрын

    I do like these “highlights of oddities” videos! Keep em up!

  • @nin29Q
    @nin29Q2 жыл бұрын

    Maybe it was some form of world-building project. It's not impossible that someone from the past had a wild imagination and thought they'd document the world they are creating in their head.

  • @lunaz3698
    @lunaz36982 жыл бұрын

    amazing video, you NEEEEED new background music, the entire time i kept turning it off and on thinking someone's phone was ringing, and if you picked it for engagement or whatever shame on you LoL

  • @daruween1398
    @daruween13982 жыл бұрын

    "lol let's just draw wierd plants with made up language to troll future human"

  • @rustyshackleford8390
    @rustyshackleford83902 жыл бұрын

    I was waiting for you to make a video about this book

  • @sesquipedalianloquaciousne4035
    @sesquipedalianloquaciousne40352 жыл бұрын

    The book is written with many different Medieval Latinic shorthand characters of the & (et) type, and in a heavily stylized manner. Several of those symbols (not so stylized, of course) have been repurposed into various letters, although them and the ampersand are the only currently used ones.

  • @deithlan

    @deithlan

    2 жыл бұрын

    That’s a very bold claim. Any translations to back it up?

  • @anonview
    @anonview2 жыл бұрын

    Plot twist: These were leftover materials and defective pages/pages with errors brought together after the scribes had finished their book orders. Instead of throwing them away or recycling, they thought they'd make something fun out of the stuff. I know I would. 😁

  • @ExTess

    @ExTess

    2 жыл бұрын

    I actually really like this idea, like a medieval version of a concept art book for stuff that was never put in a movie or game. That could also explain some of the writing, where it maybe isn't actual words but some kind of set of repeatable patterned letters that someone would have used to keep their pen sharp and their hand steady when writing them over and over and over again

  • @DMXIII
    @DMXIII2 жыл бұрын

    Love when you bring books or things that human cannot compreend or translate. It's so cool and mysterious! Please make more videos like that!

  • @theamazingmaxtacular
    @theamazingmaxtacular2 жыл бұрын

    I was hoping you'd cover this!

  • @dracish123456789
    @dracish1234567892 жыл бұрын

    It could be someone ancient rpg setting

  • @muserweaver
    @muserweaver2 жыл бұрын

    "At how many layers of shitposting are you right now?" "Yes"

  • @kateaveryavery1342
    @kateaveryavery13422 жыл бұрын

    Congrats with 100k+ subsribers, I really enjoy the content.

  • @CuriousArchive

    @CuriousArchive

    2 жыл бұрын

    Thank you!

  • @animalsaroundustv5410
    @animalsaroundustv54102 жыл бұрын

    it's interesting, I saw your channel, I subscribed to your channel, the video is great, thank you for taking the time to make the video, I support you ❤️❤️❤️👍

  • @aerosma5021
    @aerosma50212 жыл бұрын

    Love it! very much inspiring

  • @clone_69
    @clone_692 жыл бұрын

    I remember reading an article about it being at least partially deciphered, something about a drawing that resembled pepper, had a set of symbols that, when a cypher was applied, returned the numeric code that when translated back to English said "pepper"

  • @greggeverman5578
    @greggeverman55782 жыл бұрын

    Another well placed together recap of a mysterious book.

  • @rashardabarquez2183
    @rashardabarquez21832 жыл бұрын

    Keep making this amazing videos

  • @alextoons6899
    @alextoons68992 жыл бұрын

    The guy who wrote this was probably some primordial stoner who wanted to draw what he saw.

  • @Apollo-333
    @Apollo-3332 жыл бұрын

    Interesting channel. Subbed

  • @100sketchbooktoursflipthro6
    @100sketchbooktoursflipthro6 Жыл бұрын

    I did a video response to your video, Curious Archive. I believe the alphabet's letters are made up from the artist combining Astrology Symbols. The plant pictures probably have to do with alchemy, whereas the sun and star charts are astrology, even with the sun being represented that way. He or she was probably an artist who really loved astrology and alchemy, two subjects which have a lot of links, and they made a fake encyclopedia and just added their "artistic taste" to what they drew.

  • @bluestrife28
    @bluestrife282 жыл бұрын

    I like to think the creative fantastical things I draw and write will someday be found and pondered over as much as this amazing work of art. :)

  • @the5thghostbuster
    @the5thghostbuster2 жыл бұрын

    i always love these

  • @v_zach
    @v_zach2 жыл бұрын

    I knew you would cover this. 👍

  • @zakyjauhariel7804
    @zakyjauhariel78042 жыл бұрын

    I first heard of this book from a novel called "Time Riders". The manuscript is very interesting

  • @headlessguitarman8770
    @headlessguitarman87702 жыл бұрын

    What if it's some sort of Speculative Encyclopedia?

  • @r.b.m2370
    @r.b.m23702 жыл бұрын

    C'mon guys, do a little searching and you'll find out that it has been translated.

  • @plasmazulu6643
    @plasmazulu66432 жыл бұрын

    “It’s just a prank, bro.” The prank:

  • @federalauditsabatordetecte8607
    @federalauditsabatordetecte86072 жыл бұрын

    Thank you I only needed a few pics

  • @medea7957
    @medea79572 жыл бұрын

    There's a theory on this I read somewhere that, a woman had written the voynich manuscript. Hence why the language is undecipherable: The woman used a language they had learned in secrecy from the men, as well as why it depicts many pictures of woman and medicinal plants. Maybe the plants were beneficial to the woman, and their health as well as to their issues.

  • @Eagle-od1im
    @Eagle-od1im2 жыл бұрын

    I like to imagine it was just someone making speculative biology deciding to take it to the next level by writing it in a new language

  • @BarnabyJones07
    @BarnabyJones072 жыл бұрын

    It's almost like the *All* *Tomorrows* of its day

  • @alecbarker955
    @alecbarker9552 жыл бұрын

    Love ur vids, do you know if there is any speculative evo stuff written about if the Permian Extinction never happened?

  • @v_zach
    @v_zach2 жыл бұрын

    Hoping "The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glandeco-Angelinian War Storm Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion" is on your to-do list.

  • @ShreyaRao
    @ShreyaRao5 ай бұрын

    I would love it if everyone could find such books from their own childhood where they might have drawn from their kiddish imagination and written in absolute gibberish that only their kid self understood, then all posted it online for us all to crack one another's code. Imagine there being 1000s of such "untranslated" "mysterious" books that are just blank pages filled with by creative minds.

  • @aimlesspointlessentity5744
    @aimlesspointlessentity57442 жыл бұрын

    My assumption is its probably a codded alchemic text. In Europe during the medieval era, alchemists and their practices where considered forbidden by the Catholic church, so makes sense why it would be written in a codded language, full of symbiology, filled with depictions of plants, and charts of celestial bodies. Alchemy was incredibly wide-spread during the era with varying symbiology and depictions depending on the region of origin and era. Alchemy was based on experimentation. Due to this, there was no clear and concise way to practice it.

  • @xidyl200
    @xidyl2002 жыл бұрын

    I've always felt like this was just some worldbuilding project by some medieval writer and illustrator with a made up language that they hadn't really shared with thar many people, somehow it survived for centuries Like, it isn't some alien artifact that some people like to claim. I think it's literally just an ancient creative work

  • @DJ-kp7mf

    @DJ-kp7mf

    2 жыл бұрын

    That honestly seems like the most likely answer.

  • @Nachtness
    @Nachtness2 жыл бұрын

    ah yes, the ancient meme it's been translated tho

  • @Deuronius
    @Deuronius2 жыл бұрын

    I find this fascinating.

  • @stevepowell1389
    @stevepowell13892 жыл бұрын

    There are manuscripts in India and Egypt that to this day have not been studied or translated that depict ancient technology that is unknown to the modern world

  • @RukoHanaji
    @RukoHanaji2 жыл бұрын

    I first heard of this book because of the video game Koudelka and its sequel series Shadow Hearts; in the games was a book based on the Voynich Manuscript called the Emigre Document, which WAS written by Roger Bacon, still alive and well in the turn of the century setting..

  • @caroline6218
    @caroline62182 жыл бұрын

    Maybe it was a small group of friends who wrote the book with a made-up language. As an inside joke to poke fun at alchemy. It’s a bit far fetched but any organ is really possible with this book. I remember me and my friends did something similar by make our own language.

  • @les_frozt
    @les_frozt2 жыл бұрын

    It's funny to think that people can be so clueless, in the Philippines we have ancient writing sequences written by vocalized expression of a word, they're practically the same symbols being used varied by tone and often accented with punctuations to create another word. Literally look up Baybayin and how it's structured.... If they tried to match the alphabetical sequencing of Baybayin, I bet they could decode at least a word or sentence. It's definitely coded, nobody has the time to put that much effort and detail just to be funny, the design of the figures alone was meant to make it stand out, like a combination of Da Vinci and the greatest artists of that Era, Van Gogh, etc. At the very least this was an artistic piece and at best an ancient medicinal almanac or scientific information interpreted through art, keep in mind that it wasn't unusual for plants as well as animals to go extinct during those times of exploration, conquest and colonization.

  • @SurrealKangaroo12
    @SurrealKangaroo122 жыл бұрын

    One of my favorite things!

  • @pisacenere
    @pisacenere2 жыл бұрын

    I'm a total nobody but I have a theory of my about it, for me the book is like a presentation of an amanuensis the was outside the church, and to not be blasphemous did not write bible but a collection of what he could do, so strange plant, strange writing and fonts and strange symbols that looked like something familiar to the people. He was trying to make a living for me, maybe he wrote many other books or he spent all his money on the book. I wrote everything in Male for simplicity I'm not English

  • @brandonellison3873
    @brandonellison38732 жыл бұрын

    ♥️ your videos

  • @Holyduck777
    @Holyduck7772 жыл бұрын

    not even going to lie, if I was a prior back in the medieval era and I had nothing better to do I would 100% do something like this. Make an untranslatable 500 year old shitpost that frustrates the power nerds of the future. God bless you whoever wrote this.

  • @sierramcbroome5541
    @sierramcbroome55412 жыл бұрын

    I think it could be from a school for writers and artists and this was an assignment or a project that got added to by each student over the years to show skill. Could be a person with a specific neurological Condition who had an elaborate world in their head and just wanted to jot it down over their life time with the help of an institute or family. Or maybe someone on springbreak from another world dropped their textbook on their way back to the portal.

  • @mathieuleader8601
    @mathieuleader86012 жыл бұрын

    Very surreal illustrations

  • @berndbernd3464
    @berndbernd34642 жыл бұрын

    Somebody had to pay a lot for this book to be made. So.... Who spend a fortune on a joke?

  • @GemCandy
    @GemCandy Жыл бұрын

    I bought a copy of this book cause it's facinating as frick! I want a copy of the Codex Seraphinianus as well, but for now, I have found a PDF of it, which is just as cool~

  • @thekingofthesneks1857
    @thekingofthesneks18572 жыл бұрын

    I bet in a couple thousand years my text conversations will be as decipherable as this

  • @azaram8133
    @azaram81332 жыл бұрын

    Watch this just be some medieval dude just zonked out of his mind on shrooms

  • @jaysilverhood1264
    @jaysilverhood1264 Жыл бұрын

    this reminds me of that one video where a dude sealed a bag of cheetos in a coffin and inscribed the recipe for it on the lid to mess with future civilizations.

  • @Going1outof10
    @Going1outof102 жыл бұрын

    At first I was skeptical but now I'm certain this is the greatest troll in history

  • @ambientlightofdarknesss4245
    @ambientlightofdarknesss42452 жыл бұрын

    You've covered speculative works like the recent bird planet. Could this be the same? Some random monk or artist created their own plants and species and stars and animals and even their own language.

  • @jocelynhealy6998
    @jocelynhealy69982 жыл бұрын

    Some monk just sat down one day and said “I’m going to mess with so many people.”

  • @rachelbockrath6276
    @rachelbockrath62762 жыл бұрын

    I honestly hope this is a centuries-old prank.

  • @thestrangegod3173
    @thestrangegod31732 жыл бұрын

    I swear I watched a video recently where some experts finally figured out the manual. It's written in short hand and it's mostly about medicine

  • @KougarManx468
    @KougarManx4682 жыл бұрын

    This reminds me alot of of ''Codex Seraphinianus''

  • @DJ-kp7mf
    @DJ-kp7mf2 жыл бұрын

    I for one think it's a fictional medical text for a fictional world, Written in a conlang. Just an elaborate exercise of creativity. It really does explain all The Oddities about the book.

  • @kookyyt3957
    @kookyyt39572 жыл бұрын

    In my opinion though, the book may be an early form of 1.Speculative Evolution focusing on botany;or 2.speculation of the future judging the fact that the plants illustrated in the book were Made up or "impossible hybrids of existing plants" and it is written also in an unknown language, maybe the author is speculating the way how (We) the people of the future would document the plants that the author thinks we would have now, and also maybe the author wants to give the readers an immersive feeling as if they're in the future, or he just wants to leave the readers puzzled and let them dicipher it... I don't know it's just my opinion.

  • @lyndsaybrown8471
    @lyndsaybrown84712 жыл бұрын

    Ancient person: oh boy, I can't wait to debut as a manuscript maker! I should practice! Let me whip something up to practice diagrams and calligraphy! Modern day person: how the hell do I read this!?!?

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