I was reading up about an early composer a few weeks back and something struck me. The composer was Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179). She was the daughter of a knight and a tenth child and so was tithed to the Church. She became a nun at age 18. Her teacher was a woman named Jutta who taught her to read and write but Hildegard had a major intellect and began to study everything from art to music to science to philosophy. She is, in fact, the West's first known composer who also wrote the West's first known morality play. She was a physician and had the reputation of being a great healer. She knew a great deal about herbalism and was an early botanist.
She founded two convents, both with running water--something unheard of in Europe for several centuries afterward. She encouraged her nuns to bathe in warm water every day at a time when most Europeans bathed only a few times a year. While the water was fine for bathing, she worried it might be unsafe for drinking and so had her nuns make beer instead (the pilgrims of New England wisely did the same thing). Hildegard was so highly regarded that she shared correspondences with popes, archbishops, kings and emperors. She also corresponded with low ranking members of the Church because she didn't discriminate over social standing. She also spoke out against executions for heresy or witchcraft.
Hildegard suffered from migraines throughout her long life and had visions which she described often in song. This gained her the reputation of seer and prophet although she claimed to be neither. Even in her day, Hildegard was regarded as a polymath and intellectual giant and because popes often read her writings in public she had papal favoritism making it hard for critics and detractors to censure her.
I bring this up because while I was looking at the Voynich Manuscript pages that wrote about on the previous page, it occurred to me that the original author of the work might be, in fact, Hildegard.
For example, I've never seen a full manuscript but I have seen a great many pages. I don't recall any that depicted a male figure. If there are any, they are certainly outnumbered greatly by depictions of women (oftimes nude). This would make sense if we entertain that the author is, in fact, a woman. One illustration shows women bathing and that was one of Hildegard's rules. There are a great many illustrations of plants and flowers which would indicate that the author is well-versed on this topic. So if we deduce the author to be a woman who knows a lot about botany, the only person who fits that description in our histories is Hildegard von Bingen.
I read some bios on her and Wiki has encapsulated the main points I wish to bring up:
"The definition of viriditas or ‘greenness’ is an earthly expression of the heavenly in an integrity that overcomes dualisms. This ‘greenness’ or power of life appears frequently in Hildegard’s works.[47]"
Green seems to be the predominant color in the illustrations of the Voynich Manuscript as well.
"Recent scholars have asserted that Hildegard made a close association between music and the female body in her musical compositions.[48] The poetry and music of Hildegard’s Symphonia is concerned with the anatomy of female desire thus described as Sapphonic, or pertaining to Sappho, connecting her to a history of female rhetoricians.[49]"
The illustrations in the manuscript that depict the human body are overwhelmingly, if not entirely, female. Many of those depictions depict nude women. Since Hildegard spent her life since age 8 within the Church living only with women, it would not be a stretch to suppose she had Sapphic desires. In fact, we should be surprised if this were not the case.
"Hildegard also wrote
Physica, a text on the natural sciences, as well as
Causae et Curae. Hildegard of Bingen was well known for her healing powers involving practical application of tinctures, herbs, and precious stones.[50] In both texts Hildegard describes the natural world around her, including the cosmos, animals, plants, stones, and minerals.
She combined these elements with a theological notion ultimately derived from Genesis: all things put on earth are for the use of humans.[51] She is particularly interested in the healing properties of plants, animals, and stones, though she also questions God's effect on man's health.[52] One example of her healing powers was curing the blind with the use of Rhine water.[53]"
This appears to be largely the subject matter covered in the Voynich Manuscript. Other illustrations are completely baffling and we don't know what they depict. Let us remember that Hildegard suffered from migraines that caused her to have visions which she talked about a good deal and wrote compositions about them. One source even states that her descriptions of said visions are "enigmatic" and that certainly describes many of the illustrations in the manuscript as well.
"Hildegard also invented an alternative alphabet. The text of her writing and compositions reveals Hildegard's use of this form of modified medieval Latin, encompassing many invented, conflated and abridged words.[6] Due to her inventions of words for her lyrics and use of a constructed script, many conlangers look upon her as a medieval precursor. Scholars believe that Hildegard used her Lingua Ignota to increase solidarity among her nuns.[54]"
Finally, the Voynich Manuscript is written in a code that no one has yet broken.
An example of Hildegard's Lingua Ignota. while it looks nothing like the code in the Voynich Manuscript, who is to say that Hildegard only had one such alphabet? A person of her intellect would likely invent several. I may, for example, invent an alphabet to communicate to persons 1-12 but suppose that I then only want to communicate certain matters to persons 1-4 without 5-12 knowing what said communication was; then, I invent another alphabet that only 1-4 know how to read.
Now some may point out that the paper of the manuscript was analyzed and found to be from the early 1400s, long after Hildegard's death. That only means that the manuscript could be a copy or a copy of a copy. After all, Hildegard was an accomplished artist while the illustrations are somewhat amateurish so the original work may have been copied by someone with modest artistic talent. Some of the plants do not appear to have been copied faithfully depicting plants with leaves too far down the stem and so on. But that would be better than losing the work altogether.
I'm sure I'm not the only person to suspect Hildegard as the ultimate author of the Voynich Manuscript but even if I hit on the idea independently of others, it only adds weight to the idea that she is, in fact, the author.