Editing 593: Voynich Manuscript

{{comic
| number    = 593
| date      = June 5, 2009
| title     = Voynich Manuscript
| image     = voynich_manuscript.png
| titletext = Wait, is that the ORIGINAL voynich manuscript? Where did you GET that? Wanna try playing a round of Druids and Dicotyledons?
}}

==Explanation==
The {{w|Voynich manuscript}} is a very detailed book written in an unknown script, describing plants and recipes, most of which lack a real-world analogue. Over the past few decades, linguists and cryptographers have unsuccessfully attempted to decode the book. A cut out from the book is depicted in the first frame (real or similar).

{{w|Tabletop role-playing game|Tabletop role-playing games}} (such as {{w|Dungeons and Dragons}}) are fantasy games with extremely detailed descriptions of fantastical worlds. The invented language is probably a reference to {{w|The Lord of the Rings}} in which author {{w|J. R. R. Tolkien}} invented several languages of which the Grey-elvish, {{w|Sindarin}}, and the elvish, {{w|Quenya}}, are the most famous.

After being shown the manuscript for the first time by [[Megan]], [[Cueball]] argues that it should be obvious that it's just an ancient role-playing-game rulebook, since the human tendency to invent fantastical worlds must have also existed in the past. That it is this obvious was again stated when the manuscript was referenced in [[1501: Mysteries]].

In the last panel the book is used, 500 years ago, to play a game  similar to Dungeons and Dragons. They speak in a somewhat outdated English. The reference to {{w|Aconitum|Wolfsbane}} could be a reference to another invented world as it is mentioned in the first book of the {{w|Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone|Harry Potter}} series.

After concluding this, a shocked Cueball then asks in the title text how Megan got her hands on the original manuscript (which is in the Yale University's ''{{w|Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library}}''). He then unexpectedly goes on to suggests the prosaic activity of playing {{w|Druid|Druids}} and {{w|Dicotyledon|Dicotyledons}}, assuming such a game could be defined by the manuscript.

Note:
*In the third panel, [[Randall]] may have meant ''{{w|glossolalia}}'' rather than ''glossolatia''.
*The use of the pronoun "your" in the last frame is anachronistic, as in early modern English it was used as a plural pronoun, or as a singular pronoun only to a superior; the proper pronoun would be "thy": "Thy Druid doth lose two points."

==Transcript==
:[Weird root vegetables surround a strange script.]

:[Megan holding up book to Cueball.]
:Megan: This is the Voynich manuscript— a book, allegedly 500 years old, written in an unrecognized script. It's some kind of visual encyclopedia of imaginary plants and undeciphered "recipes".

:[Megan points while Cueball opens the book.]
:Megan: It could be a hoax, a lost language, a cipher, an alien text, glossolatia — no one knows.
:Cueball: No one? But it's obvious.

:[Megan continues to talk. Cueball holds the now closed book.]
:Megan: ... Obvious? Linguists and cryptographers have been stumped for decades.
:Cueball: They forget. Human nature doesn't change.

:[Close up of Megan and Cueball - the book is off panel.]
:Cueball: Just imagine someone found a book from <u>our</u> time, full of lists, illustrations, tables, and long, dry descriptions of nonexistent worlds written in an invented language. What have they found?
:Megan: ...Dear Lord. It ''is'' obvious.


:[Three people are standing around pawns and a die. One is holding a sheet of paper, another is holding a book, the third is holding a scythe. At the top of the panel there is a frame with the following text:]
:500 Years Earlier:
:Person #1: Forsooth! I concoct an elixir of courage.
:Person #2: Nae! The source booke sayeth that requires some wolfsbane!
:Person #3: Your druid doth lose two points.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Cryptography‏‎]]