Voynich Reconsidered

In this book, Dr. Robert Edwards brings a fresh, mathematical perspective to the Voynich manuscript and sets out a strategy whereby the interested reader could extract meaning from the seemingly impenetrable symbols . . . if meaning is there to be found. The Voynich manuscript has been described as the most mysterious document in the world. In 1637, a Bohemian scholar sent a mysterious manuscript to the celebrated professor Athanasius Kircher in Rome. Kircher promised to decipher it when the mood took him. He never did. Later, antiquarian bookseller Wilfrid Voynich claimed that he had discovered it in 1912 in a castle in Europe. It contains hundreds of bizarre illustrations that seem to represent plants, stars, animals, zodiac signs, strange receptacles, and naked women in pools and streams of green water. Throughout its over 200 pages are strings of glyphs or symbols that look like words, but the symbols do not belong to any known living or extinct languages. No one knows what these symbols mean-or even whether they mean anything, though hundreds of scholars have tried to decipher them for 500 years. Today, all that we know for sure is that the parchment probably dates from the early 15th century. AUTHOR: Robert Edwards studied mathematics at Cambridge University and earned his MSc and PhD from the London School of Economics. He is also the author of D. B. Cooper and Flight 305: Reexamining the Hijacking and Disappearance. He lives in both England and Romania. 140 colour and b/w photos, tables, and charts