In 2017, historical researcher and television writer Nicholas Gibbs submitted an article to the Times Literary Supplement. In it, he said that he had decoded two lines of the Voynich Manuscript and solved the mystery — and that it was a women’s health manual.
- Gibbs claimed that the Voynich Manuscript was written in a kind of medieval Latin shorthand. Each alphabet or character of the language represented an abbreviation, or short form, of a Latin word.
- He said that the Latin abbreviations aligned with words that were found in medical books about herbs. Since the Voynich Manuscript contained so many plant illustrations, this would make sense!
- He also wrote that the Voynich Manuscript was not an original. According to him, much of the Voynich’s text seemed to be taken from two commonly copied Latin medical books, the Trotula and De Balneis Puteolanis.
- Since the Manuscript seemed to be a medical book, the illustrations of women in baths likely pointed to it being a women’s health book.
Unfortunately, Gibbs’ theory was quickly debunked. For one thing, his so-called ground-breaking article spent a lot of time boasting about his expertise, and said very little about the Manuscript itself. Secondly, experts pointed out that his Latin translation of the two sentences sounded ungrammatical, which poked holes in his theory.
Still — until a better theory is found, Gibbs’ idea is as good as any.
Sources: Ars Technica, Atlantic