Cipher Mysteries

Ethel Voynich's story (1864 - 1960) is quite fascinating: while the young Ethel ('Lily') Boole was studying music in Berlin, she became inspired by Stepniak's revolutionary writings. As a result, she became closely involved with Russian dissidents living in London, and in 1893 married the very charming Wilfrid Voynich. Voynich himself often travelled around as part of the ...

Diane O'Donovan has asked if Cipher Mysteries can help make researchers aware of her recent work on the Voynich Manuscript. Rather than just host her paper here, I've split it up into a number of individual blog posts so that you can leave feedback on each individual section; and have added a commentary connecting each part with existing research. This first tranche relates to her herbal / ...

Do I have a problem with the fact that the Internet appears to have a machine continuously cranking out second-rate stories about the Voynich Manuscript? No, not really - an "unreadable historical manuscript" presses many of the cultural buttons left exposed by large numbers of mainstream Netizens. What does annoy me, however, is that virtually every VMs account ever written fails to come ...

Why, lookie here. An eBay trader is selling a $999 crystal ball allegedly from a boarded-up Voodoo family estate. It says here that the ball was manufactured according to the "alchemic recipe" given in "Apocalypsis spiritus secreti" (by the Venetian Giovanni Battista Agnelli, a book best known from its 1623 printed edition, but John Dee owned a copy too). And ...

I know, I did indeed say that I wasn't going to post anything for a while... but then this wonderful translation (from the Russian) of Evgeniya Taratuta's (1957) "Our Friend Ethel Lilian Boole" popped up, made by Séamus Ó Coigligh (who retired as Curator of Cork Public Museum as long ago as 1981). Uhhh... whatever keep-going-forever potion he's using, I think ...

Here's a quick research note: a list of Wilfrid Voynich's archives... The Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library not only has the Voynich Manuscript itself ("Beinecke MS 408"), but also various other WMV- and VMs-related materials in accompanying boxes (marked A to N). This includes various photographs (in box D), which are also accessible on the Beinecke main site. The Grolier ...