<p>We don’t know. It is written in an unknown script, by an unknown author. We don’t even know whether it is even in any language at all, or just random scribbles. Any attempts to connect it to a known language (such as Latin) have failed thus far.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-06T22:40:24.623Z
You're absolutely right, but this answer would benefit from some citations or links to further reading, just so that it can be easily verified.
Rand al'Thor
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-06T22:39:29.500Z
2018-02-06T22:39:29.500Z
Sascha Baer
<p>Hope springs eternal. <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-may-have-finally-decoded-the-bizarre-mysterious-voynich-manuscript" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><strong><em>This article</em></strong></a> points to one recent lead in computational linguistics. <a href="https://transacl.org/ojs/index.php/tacl/article/view/821/174" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>original article here</em></a></p>

<p>I've read that some work has been done on the script, indicating that there are patterns, even if we don't know what they are referring to.</p>

<p>I have a copy of V.M. (a book èvery glossopoet should have!). I'm frankly of the opinion that, considering the size of the book and the cost of the materials in it and the cost in time to produce the work, it can't just be 240some pages of random nonsense. It's too expensive and would be an incredible, inconceivable waste of resources if it were just a meaningless &amp; private toy of some overly rich maker.</p>

<p>Each page of vellum requires a relatively labour intensive process to make. Inks have to be made. Each page has to be hand written and hand drawn. Some pages are really large fold-outs.  Almost every page is decorated in some way. That's a lot of work for it be nothing at all but a pretty conversation piece!</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-04-04T12:08:24.193Z
Interesting source, but the article itself notes that "according to a native speaker of the language, this is not quite a coherent sentence." It really says something more like *and the priest made for her man to him to his house and upon me his men the commandments* (which is unsalvageable gibberish). The methodology is also flawed since it relies on a "hypothetical non-standard orthography of Hebrew" which has never existed.
b a
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-04-04T15:27:39.077Z
Heh. Yep, but one more halting step along the road towards figuring out what this thing actually is!
elemtilas
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-28T06:53:13.633Z
@elemtilas, have you ever seen some of the ridiculous things rich people will do just because they can? Spending an inordinate amount of resources on something that is in any practical sense useless or pointless, is a standard method of bragging about how rich you are. You're making an argument from incredulity to dismiss the possibility.
Keith Morrison
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-28T15:28:11.113Z
@KeithMorrison I am not dismissing the possibility, but it is an extremely remote position to hang one's hat on given the realities of creating such a thing in that time.  In the 21st century, even a not so wealthy person can do as well. And we have at least two modern examples to look up to! (Book from the Sky & Codex Seraphinianus)
elemtilas
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-07T17:58:19.650Z
This doesn't really address the question of whether the manuscript is written in a constructed language or a natural language.
HDE 226868
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-07T19:56:12.280Z
The linked article indicates that it's Hebrew. Clarified links.
elemtilas
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-08T17:19:59.920Z
In fact, the link indicates that the manuscript is written in an anagram cypher that they claim to have decrypted into Hebrew. But they only give some short text bites, no longer passages yet.
Sir Cornflakes
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-08T17:44:48.283Z
BTW, I have some experience with the kind of statistical methods they use, and those methods tend to produce seemingly good text from utter gibberish, e.g., doing OCR correction of French texts into English.
Sir Cornflakes
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-14T15:06:42.960Z
Real fun is their decryption of the first sentence (after some spelling correction and Google translate into English): *She made recommendations to the priest, man of the house and me and people.*
Sir Cornflakes
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-07T02:16:50.797Z
2018-02-07T19:56:35.027Z
2018-02-07T19:56:35.027Z
elemtilas
<h2>There's no evidence to say that it is a constructed language.</h2>
<p>The idea was investigated in detail by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Tiltman" rel="noreferrer">John Tiltman</a>, a British army officer who specialized in cryptography. The possibility of the Voynich manuscript being a constructed language was brought to his attention by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F._Friedman" rel="noreferrer">William Friedman</a>, an expert on the manuscript. Friedman confided to Tiltman, after decades of work on it, that he thought the writing could be a form of &quot;synthetic universal language&quot;, and so the cryptographer expanded his investigation in that direction, <a href="https://www.nsa.gov/news-features/declassified-documents/tech-journals/assets/files/voynich-manuscript-mysterious.pdf" rel="noreferrer">writing a paper on the theory</a>.</p>
<p>The basic premise behind a &quot;synthetic universal language&quot; is to use characters to represent certain logical ideas; by chaining together letters, you can create &quot;words&quot; that describe more complicated principles. By adding the appropriate prefixes and suffixes, characters can be quite powerful. Tiltman noticed that some of the patterns in the words fit this type of design. However, the evidence for this sort of construction was not strong enough, and Tiltman's analysis of the frequency of the occurrence of certain letters did not support Friedman's hypothesis.</p>
<p>Tiltman also traced the historical origin of a &quot;universal language&quot;, to determine if such an idea had been bounced around early enough. However, this proved difficult, and Tiltman found no concrete examples prior to the mid-17th century. This is two centuries after the Voynich manuscript was written - sometime in the 15th century - and so <em>if</em> the manuscript was indeed written in a universal language, it would predate these universal languages by two centuries.</p>
<p>Tiltman noted</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It was clear that the productions of these two men [Wilkins and Dalgarno, two early proponents of universal languages] were much too systematic, and anything of the kind would have been almost instantly recognisable. My analysis seemed to me to reveal a cumbersome mixture of different kinds of substitution. When I was
attempting to trace back the idea of universal language, I came upon a printed book entitled The Universal Character by Cave Beck, London 1657 (also printed in French in the same year). Cave Beck was one of the original members of the British Royal Society and his system was certainly a cumbersome mixture.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Beck's writing claims that the idea of a universal language goes back to the 16th century, but this still places it many years after the manuscript's origin.  The idea of synthetic universal languages, though perhaps relatively widespread in the 17th century, simply was unknown in the 15th. This was a strike against Friedman's theory. If the Voynich manuscript was a synthetic universal language, it would have borne no relation - in time of conception of structure - to later examples.</p>
<p>The universal language route is of course not the only possibility; constructed languages can take many forms. However, it was possible the most promising option, and research into it went nowhere. Friedman's claim remains unsupported, and, to my knowledge, no further academic analyses have been done. We certainly can't rule out the theory that the Voynich manuscript is written in a constructed language, but we have no reason to believe that it is.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-07T22:48:14.803Z
2018-02-07T22:48:14.803Z
2020-06-18T08:37:27.510Z
HDE 226868
<p><a href="http://www.voynich.nu/intro.html" rel="noreferrer">The Voynich manuscript</a> is dated to the early 15th century.</p>

<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/cQ53y.jpg" rel="noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/cQ53y.jpg" alt="The Voynich manuscript (MS)"></a></p>

<blockquote>
  <p>It is a medieval handwritten book of almost 250 pages, and even today the text cannot be understood. It has become quite famous, and it is recognised as one of the main unsolved problems in the history of cryptography.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Can we tell whether it is written in a natural or constructed language?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-02-08T17:24:50.060Z
There are other possibilities: It can be a cyphertext, or it can be no language at all (being an elaborate hoax).
Sir Cornflakes
<voynich-manuscript>
Is the Voynich manuscript written in a natural or constructed language?
# Is the Voynich manuscript written in a natural or constructed language?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-02-06)

[The Voynich manuscript](http://www.voynich.nu/intro.html) is dated to the early 15th century.

[![The Voynich manuscript (MS)](https://i.sstatic.net/cQ53y.jpg)](https://i.sstatic.net/cQ53y.jpg)

> It is a medieval handwritten book of almost 250 pages, and even today the text cannot be understood. It has become quite famous, and it is recognised as one of the main unsolved problems in the history of cryptography.

Can we tell whether it is written in a natural or constructed language?

**Tags:** voynich-manuscript
> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: There are other possibilities: It can be a cyphertext, or it can be no language at all (being an elaborate hoax).  

---

## 3 answers

### Answer by username_7 on 2018-02-07. Score: 6 | Accepted answer

## There's no evidence to say that it is a constructed language.

The idea was investigated in detail by [John Tiltman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Tiltman), a British army officer who specialized in cryptography. The possibility of the Voynich manuscript being a constructed language was brought to his attention by [William Friedman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F._Friedman), an expert on the manuscript. Friedman confided to Tiltman, after decades of work on it, that he thought the writing could be a form of "synthetic universal language", and so the cryptographer expanded his investigation in that direction, [writing a paper on the theory](https://www.nsa.gov/news-features/declassified-documents/tech-journals/assets/files/voynich-manuscript-mysterious.pdf).

The basic premise behind a "synthetic universal language" is to use characters to represent certain logical ideas; by chaining together letters, you can create "words" that describe more complicated principles. By adding the appropriate prefixes and suffixes, characters can be quite powerful. Tiltman noticed that some of the patterns in the words fit this type of design. However, the evidence for this sort of construction was not strong enough, and Tiltman's analysis of the frequency of the occurrence of certain letters did not support Friedman's hypothesis.

Tiltman also traced the historical origin of a "universal language", to determine if such an idea had been bounced around early enough. However, this proved difficult, and Tiltman found no concrete examples prior to the mid-17th century. This is two centuries after the Voynich manuscript was written - sometime in the 15th century - and so *if* the manuscript was indeed written in a universal language, it would predate these universal languages by two centuries.

Tiltman noted

> It was clear that the productions of these two men [Wilkins and Dalgarno, two early proponents of universal languages] were much too systematic, and anything of the kind would have been almost instantly recognisable. My analysis seemed to me to reveal a cumbersome mixture of different kinds of substitution. When I was
> attempting to trace back the idea of universal language, I came upon a printed book entitled The Universal Character by Cave Beck, London 1657 (also printed in French in the same year). Cave Beck was one of the original members of the British Royal Society and his system was certainly a cumbersome mixture.

Beck's writing claims that the idea of a universal language goes back to the 16th century, but this still places it many years after the manuscript's origin. The idea of synthetic universal languages, though perhaps relatively widespread in the 17th century, simply was unknown in the 15th. This was a strike against Friedman's theory. If the Voynich manuscript was a synthetic universal language, it would have borne no relation - in time of conception of structure - to later examples.

The universal language route is of course not the only possibility; constructed languages can take many forms. However, it was possible the most promising option, and research into it went nowhere. Friedman's claim remains unsupported, and, to my knowledge, no further academic analyses have been done. We certainly can't rule out the theory that the Voynich manuscript is written in a constructed language, but we have no reason to believe that it is.


---

### Answer by username_2 on 2018-02-06. Score: 9

We don’t know. It is written in an unknown script, by an unknown author. We don’t even know whether it is even in any language at all, or just random scribbles. Any attempts to connect it to a known language (such as Latin) have failed thus far.

> **Comments:**
> **username_3**: You're absolutely right, but this answer would benefit from some citations or links to further reading, just so that it can be easily verified.  

---

### Answer by username_4 on 2018-02-07. Score: 3

Hope springs eternal. [***This article***](https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-may-have-finally-decoded-the-bizarre-mysterious-voynich-manuscript) points to one recent lead in computational linguistics. [*original article here*](https://transacl.org/ojs/index.php/tacl/article/view/821/174)

I've read that some work has been done on the script, indicating that there are patterns, even if we don't know what they are referring to.

I have a copy of V.M. (a book èvery glossopoet should have!). I'm frankly of the opinion that, considering the size of the book and the cost of the materials in it and the cost in time to produce the work, it can't just be 240some pages of random nonsense. It's too expensive and would be an incredible, inconceivable waste of resources if it were just a meaningless & private toy of some overly rich maker.

Each page of vellum requires a relatively labour intensive process to make. Inks have to be made. Each page has to be hand written and hand drawn. Some pages are really large fold-outs. Almost every page is decorated in some way. That's a lot of work for it be nothing at all but a pretty conversation piece!

> **Comments:**
> **username_7**: This doesn't really address the question of whether the manuscript is written in a constructed language or a natural language.  
> **username_4**: The linked article indicates that it's Hebrew. Clarified links.  
> **username_1**: In fact, the link indicates that the manuscript is written in an anagram cypher that they claim to have decrypted into Hebrew. But they only give some short text bites, no longer passages yet.  
> **username_1**: BTW, I have some experience with the kind of statistical methods they use, and those methods tend to produce seemingly good text from utter gibberish, e.g., doing OCR correction of French texts into English.  
> **username_1**: Real fun is their decryption of the first sentence (after some spelling correction and Google translate into English): *She made recommendations to the priest, man of the house and me and people.*  
> **username_5**: Interesting source, but the article itself notes that "according to a native speaker of the language, this is not quite a coherent sentence." It really says something more like *and the priest made for her man to him to his house and upon me his men the commandments* (which is unsalvageable gibberish). The methodology is also flawed since it relies on a "hypothetical non-standard orthography of Hebrew" which has never existed.  
> **username_4**: Heh. Yep, but one more halting step along the road towards figuring out what this thing actually is!  
> **username_6**: @elemtilas, have you ever seen some of the ridiculous things rich people will do just because they can? Spending an inordinate amount of resources on something that is in any practical sense useless or pointless, is a standard method of bragging about how rich you are. You're making an argument from incredulity to dismiss the possibility.  
> **username_4**: @KeithMorrison I am not dismissing the possibility, but it is an extremely remote position to hang one's hat on given the realities of creating such a thing in that time.  In the 21st century, even a not so wealthy person can do as well. And we have at least two modern examples to look up to! (Book from the Sky & Codex Seraphinianus)  

---

