#! /usr/bin/python3

import sys, re
import html_gen as h
from process_funcs import bash
import html_report_funcs as hr 

last_edit = "Last edited on 2025-11-08 17:34:00 by stolfi"

def main():

  global last_edit
  

  title = "The VMS Restoration Hypothesis"
  st = h.new_doc(title, "#eeffdd")
  thumb_width = 80*st['text_width']//100 # Width for image thumbnails.
  
  h.section(st, 2, "Summary")

  h.parags(st, """There is evidence that substantial parts of the text
  and figure outlines of Voynich Manuscript (VMS) were retraced over the
  original versions a long time after the books's creation, because they
  these traces faded to the point of near invisibility, or even beyond.
  Indeed, this restoration activity seems to have occurred in two or
  more separate epochs. In this webpage we specify this Restoration
  Hipothesis (RH) in detail, and present the evidence that it in fact
  occurred.
  
  These restorations would have changed a few symbols into other
  symbols, valid or invalid, and modified or added many details of the
  illustrations. Therefore, the RH must be taken into account when
  transcribing the text and computing word and glyph statistics. While
  the transcription errors caused by the restorations are presumed to be
  modest compared to those from other known and conjectured sources,
  they may seriously affect the study of rare glyphs and so-called
  "weirdos".
  
  Two major examples of the latter are the 4x17 sequence on page f57,
  which probably was perfectly periodic before the "restorations"
  changed some of its glyphs; and the "michiton" text on f116v, which
  probably was a Voynichese text originally but was "restored" as a
  nonsensical jumble of Latin-like letters.
  
  The RH could also have significant impact on the interpretation of
  figures, since certain puzzling details -- like the crown on the Libra
  page, or the barrels at the top of Sagittarius -- appear to have been
  wholly created in one of the "restoration" passes.""")

  h.section(st, 2, "Evidence for the restoration hypothesis")

  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f057v1/4x17-weirdos-r6", "clip", link_text = "Glyphs from the 4x17 sequence of f57v")

  h.parags(st, """Concrete evidence for restoration includes:""")

  h.begin_enum(st, "ol")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Characters or parts of character that
  were visibly traced twice, with a lighter trace still visible under 
  darker ones because the latter did not follow exactly the same 
  path as the former.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Parts of glyphs, such as the plumes of r and
  s, that were traced slowly in the wrong direction.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Strokes with sudden changes of weight and/or
  width along their length.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Sudden variations in ink color and stroke
  weight that cannot be explained by ink flow and recharging
  dynamics. In particular, single strokes, characters, or groups of a
  few characters that are darker than their neighbors on both sides.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Traces with fuzzy edges and traces with
  sharp edges on the same page, in the same word or character.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Glyphs with unusual stroke shapes or
  placement, of which are malformed in other ways ways that make sense
  only as having been misread and mangled by a Restorer who (unlike
  the original Scribe) did not know the alphabet and had no feeling
  for the structure of Voynichese words. For example a squarish @o or
  a @t where the transversal flourish seems to have been drawn as two
  separate strokes.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Figure details that are
  particularly incongruous and coincidentally were drawn in darker ink.""")

  h.end_enum(st, "ol")

  h.parags(st, """Each of these features can have other explanations
  besides the global restoration. Trace weight variations could be
  cases of the writer going back after a re-inking, so they are only
  circumstantial evidence. They carry more weight if there is a clear
  difference in ink tone as well as strength. Traces with fuzzy edges
  could be due to differential wear (e.g. because of bumps and waves
  on the parch) or chemical/mechanical effects (e.g. loss of opaque
  pigment leaving behind a stain from the carrier fluid).

  However, the global restoration is the simplest explanation
  for the vast number of instances of these details, as a whole.""")

  h.section(st, 2, "Restoration was expected")

  h.parags(st, """There are many characters and drawings that have
  visibly faded to the point of near invisibility, and now can be read
  only with magnification and contrast-stretching. See for example
  details (B,C,D) in clip of f57v above. There is no reason to believe
  that those cases of fading are the worst possible. There must be
  strokes that have become completely invisible. Indeed, there are many
  places where only part of a glyph or figure detail is visible, even
  with those tools. Thus the missing part must have faded completely.

  It is very unlikely that the those cases of extreme and total fading
  happened only after Voynich bought the book. They probably happened
  many decades or centuries before that. In that period the VMS passed
  through dozens of owners and custodians, including Jacobus and four or
  five others before him, Baresch, Marci, Kircher, and the Jesuits at
  the Collegio Romano and other libraries.
  
  Many of those owners must have seen that the text was fading all over
  the book. If any of them prized the manuscript they would surely have
  wanted to restore those faded parts. Just as if they would have wanted
  to restore a prized painting that was showing the same level of
  degradation.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Could the 'original' be pencil sketches?")

  h.parags(st, """It has been suggested that the faint parts of figure
  outlines that were traced over were pencil sketches. This is a variant of the
  alternative "the Scribe himself went back and retraced parts that
  had come out faint or crooked".  Arguments against 
  this explanation include:""")

  h.begin_enum(st, "ol")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """The original traces often clearly look
  like they were drawn with a pen, namely with broad strokes whose
  width varies with orientation and apparent speed -- only faded
  in various degrees.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """The retracing is often limited to parts
  of single glyphs or parts of the figure outlines.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """The retraced parts of drawings are often
  grossly wrong, like on that nymph ???. The retraced text sometimes
  has glyphs that occur only once and do not fit the general model of
  normal glyphs. I don't see how these errors could happen if the
  artist who sketched the original in pencil was the same person as
  the scribe who retraced it in ink, or even if they were distinct
  persons working for the same Author.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """At least one of the Restorers had some
  specific obsessions, like the right breasts of the nymphs and
  the distinctive "showercap" diadems, that were not shared by the
  original Inker.""")

  h.end_enum(st, "ol")

  h.section(st, 2, "What is \"restoration\" and what is not")

  h.section(st, 3, "Writing weight variations")

  h.parags(st, """The writing on the VMS (and in many other manuscripts)
  shows great variations of /weight/, which includes both the width of
  strokes and the darkness of the ink. There are noticeable weight
  changes along a single stroke, between strokes of the same glyph,
  between words on the same line, between lines on the same page.
  There may be significant variations also from page to page, and from
  section to section.""")

  h.parags(st, """Stroke width depends on the size and shape of the pen's
  nib, the speed and direction of the pen's motion, the pressure
  applied by the Scribe, the stiffness of the pen's tines, and the
  finish of the parchment's surface.""")

  h.parags(st, """Stroke darkness too depends on a multitude of causes.
  The fators that affect the width of strokes also affect the thicknes
  of the ink film deposited by the pen, hence its darkness. Apart from
  that, the ink may be lighter in some strokes than in others because
  it was more aged or had a different formulation, or because it was
  applied more thinly, or because it became lighter after it was put
  down - by chemical decay, by being rubbed off, washed off, softened
  and wiped or blotted off, destroyed by spilled or intentionally
  applied chemicals, or eaten away by insects.""")

  h.parags(st, """In this report we discuss three other causes of weight
  variations: /recharging/, /backtracing/, and /restoration/.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Normal ink dynamics")

  h.parags(st, """A common pattern of weight variation observed in
  running text (multi-line patagraphs) occurs because the pen must be
  periodically dipped in ink. This action creates a small reservoir of
  ink in the lower part of the quill, above the sculpted pen proper,
  and also wets the tip of the pen. After such re-inking, the first
  couple of words comes out heavier than usual, because of ink that
  has adhered to the pen's tip. Then follow half a dozen or more words
  with relatively uniform weight, as the ink is drained from the quill
  reservoir by the opening and closing of the tines. When that
  reservoir is exhausted, the weight starts to quickly decrease again.
  In some case, this decay may continue until the glyphs become almost
  invisible. Ideally, before reaching that state, the scribe should
  pause and re-ink again the pen. Thus we should see this /normal ink
  dynamics/ pattern repeat along the text with an irregular period.""")

  hr.image_parag(st, "images/hand-tests/normal-weight-pattern.png", thumb_width, "Normal weight variation")

  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f113v1/lines-33-37-all", "clip", link_text = "Examples of normal ink dynamics")
  
  h.parags(st, """??? Sometimes the pen and ink are such thta the
  thickness and darkness of the trace will suddenly change 
  as the pressure the is reduced while writing plumes, 
  tails, and serifs.  See this example.""")
  
  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "x-003-st-galen", "clip", link_text = "Thin light tails")

  h.section(st, 3, "Backtracing")

  h.parags(st, """However, we often see in VMS text some isolated glyphs
  or short glyph sequences that are noticeably heavier than both the
  preceding and succeeding ones. The most likely explanation for these
  anomalies is that the Scribe, some time after doing that part of the
  text, went back and wrote or re-wrote those glyphs with a pen that
  was more loaded with ink. I will say that those glyphs have been
  /backtraced/ (not "backtrac<b>k</b>ed")
  
  The Scribe may have decided to backtraced those glyphs for several
  possible reasons, such as they coming out too weak in the
  first pass.  Here is a posible example of this, from page f1r""")

  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f001r1/lines-12-16-beg", "clip",  thumb = True)
  
  h.parags(st, """On the word @daiin, item (O), one can clearly see the
  fainter version poking out from under the retraced one.
  
  Another reason why the original Scribe himself may have decided to
  retrace a glyphis that it may have come out incomplete, malformed, or
  slightly incorrect. For instance, the pen may have skipped or ran out
  of ink halfway through what should have been an EVA @d, so that it
  came out as @s. Alternatively, what should have been an @r ended up
  with a curved body that made it look like an @s.
  
  Yet another possibilty is that the Scribe deliberately skipped over
  the glyph in a first pass, because he could not understand the draft
  and had to ask the Author what it should be. This may be the case for
  passages where multiple instances of the same glyph, like @d, were
  backtraced.
  
  Whatever the reason, the backtracing usually happened seconds,
  minutes, or maybe hours after the surounding text was written,
  presumably by the same Scribe with the same pen and same batch of ink.
  Thus, while a backtraced glyph may be darker and wider than usual, it
  will be in the same ink seen in the heavier parts of the normal ink
  dynamics; and the glyph shape and relative weight variation between
  its strokes will be the same.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Restoration")

  h.parags(st, """However, we sometimes see in the VMS glyphs, words, or
  entire lines of text whose heavier than normal appearance cannot be
  easily explained as backtracing. For instance, the ink of those glyphs
  may have a different hue or other properties that are unlike those
  that result from mere re-inking of the pen.
  
  Such ink differences often comes together with anomalies in glyph
  shape, or in the relative weight of the strokes that make up the
  glyph. The shape anomalies may be subtle, or so drastic that the glyph
  becomes unrecognizable, or results in quite unusual glyph
  combinations, like @'re' or @{Io}.
  
  The most likely explanation for those anomalies is that those glyphs
  or words were re-written at a much later time (decades or centuries)
  by a later owner of the manuscript, or a different Scribe hired for
  the task. The motivation for such action seems to be that the original
  writing had become so faint that it was hard to read and in danger or
  being lost completely. So it was natural, indeed expected, that the
  owner would try to stop and reverse the damage that way.
  
  I refer to this second type of re-writing as a /restoration/ event, a
  term that I define as distinct from the backtracing described above.
  The key difference is that the original Scribe must have been trained
  by the Author to write the alphabet, and eventually acquired a sense
  of its "orthography", even if he may not have known the language,
  encoding, or contents; whereas the person(s) who did this late
  restoration work, the /Restorer/(/s/), did not know the Voynichese
  alphabet, much less the ortography. Thus, while backtracing generally
  results in valid glyphs, restoration may create invalid ones; while
  bactracing generally corrects malformations, restoration may magnify
  them instead.
  
  Both backtracing and restoration can occur on figure outlines.
  Backtracing is harder to detect since there is usually no "normal"
  stroke weight that can serve as reference. Restoration however can
  still be spotted, since its telltale signs -- including ignorance of
  the nature of the illustration -- can occur in figures as well as in
  text.
  
  Hopefully someday there will be a way to determine whether the dark
  ink indeed has a different composition from the light ink and confirm
  the retracing. And it would also help a lot to have some microscope
  images of some of the most obviously "retraced" glyphs and figure
  outlines.""")

  #@@@

  h.section(st, 2, "The evidence in detail")

  h.parags(st, """Besides the ink color and occasional invalid glyphs and
  glyph combinations, there are other bits of evidece that point to
  restoration, rather than backtracing, as the cause of anomalous
  weight.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Double tracing")

  h.parags(st, """Sometimes one can see bits of the fainter original
  strokes poking out from under the restoration ones. Here are some
  examples (all from the Sagittarius page, with coordinates relative to
  the Beinecke "full jpeg" scan)""")

  h.parags(st, """??? [Image: examples-f73v.png] f73v Sagittarius 1600,1290 inner band nymph
  at 11:00 f73v Sagittarius 1280,1870 inner band nymph at 08:00

  In both cases, note that the original drawing had the left breast
  outline, and only half of it was retraced or completed in dark ink.
  f73v Sagittarius 1240,2300 outer band label at 07:30

  (This label is almost upside-down.) Note how the restoration converted two
  common glyphs, still visible in "normal" ink, into two invalid ones:
  an "e" into a reverse "i" with serif, and a "ch" into an incomplete
  infinity symbol. f73v Sagittarius 2000,1520 inner band label at 01:30

  Note how only the stem of the "r" was retraced in dark ink, while its
  very faint plume, still in "normal" ink, was apparently missed. f73v
  Sagittarius 1820,980 inner band label at 12:30

  here we have the opposite: a plume was retraced but not the glyph where
  it was originally attached to, leaving it floating in mid-air. (It is
  hard to tell what the original label was; perhaps "or y"?)

  These cases are
  rare in the text, because the Restorer took pains to carefully
  follow the original strokes, whenever they were still visible, and
  completely cover them. But he often chose to restore only part of an
  original stroke; so one can often see what should have been a single
  stroke that has both heavy and light sections. These original
  "ghost" traces are more commonly seen on figures, since apparently
  the Restorer did not feell that it was necessary to reproduce the
  smallest kinks and squiggles of the original outline.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Retracing speed and direction")

  h.parags(st, """Another compelling evidence of restoration is the
  anomalous speed and direction of certain strokes. In the original
  writing, the tails of @y, @g, @m, and @l are supposed to be traced
  from the top down, in a single quick movement of the pen, while the
  pen is being gradually lifted. As a result, the width and darkness
  of the trace tapers gradually down to zero, creating a smooth trace
  with a faint but sharp needle-like point. The plumes of @r, @s, and
  @n, on the other hand, are supposed to be written from the bottom
  up. The original Scribe then would have to reduce the pressure on
  the way up, to reduce the chance of the pen snagging on the rough
  parch surface. This usually results in a very thin and light trace
  on the way up. The trace would become broader and heavier at the
  top, and then it would end in the same way as the tails above, with
  the pen being lifted out of the parch while still moving at normal
  speed -- creating the same faint but sharp point.

  The Restorer could not reproduce these stroke shapes,
  because he had to carefully and /slowly/ move the pen along the
  original path. But a slowly moving pen, no matter how sharp, will
  make a trace that is at least 0.2 mm wide, with normal darkness.
  Thus, whenever he tried to retrace a whole plume or tail, the
  resulting stroke became thicker and darker, with a blunt or round
  end instead of a sharp point. Moreover, the trace oftem became
  slightly jittery or even discontinous, instead of smooth and even.
  And the Restorer often visibly traced the plumes in the wrong
  direction, from the top down.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Ink color changes")

  h.parags(st, """One problem with attributing ink color changes to ink
  changes during the original scribing is that the darker ink is seen
  only in some pages, and then only some details. On the Zodiac pages,
  for instance, there are of course many "original" variations in stroke
  darkness and width that are apparently done in the standard
  yellowish-brown ink, and therefore can be attributed to ink-flow
  variations and immediate self-corrections by the Scribe. But there are
  scattered "new" strokes in a distinctive dark brown-black ink that was
  used only in the labels of two pages and applied to a bizarre
  selection of figure details.""")  

  h.section(st, 3, "Whitegrain")

  h.parags(st, """The strokes by the original Scribe, whether "first
  pass" and backtraced, are often peppered with tiny "white" spots, 0.05
  mm or less, which I call /whitegrain/. Another notable difference
  between original and retraced strokes is that there is no whitegrain
  in the latter.
  
  These dots are not really white, but just ink-free. Some of them nay
  be pockets in the vellum that did not get any ink because they were
  not touched by the nib of the Scribe's pen. However, if that were the
  case, they should show up in retraced strokes as well.
  
  Another possible explanation for whitegrain is that the spots are
  actualy little bumps in the parch; they were originally inked, but the
  ink was abraded in the following decades or centuries from rubbing
  against the facing folios.
  
  Another possible explanation is that the ink used by the original
  scribe included a binder, like gum arabic, that insects found edible;
  and the spots are pockets where there was enough ink for insects to
  chew it off. Either theory would seemingly explain why whitegrain is
  present only in the original strokes.)""")

  hr.image_parag(st, "images/M5he2he.png", thumb_width, "M5he2he")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f017r1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f17r/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f001r1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f1r/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f026r1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f26r/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f070v1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f70v1/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f071r1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f71r/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f073v1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f73v/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f008r1/example-100.png", thumb_width, "f8r/example")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/examples-chars/r-f58r.png", thumb_width, "examples-chars/r-f58r")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f047r1/bizarre-f-orig/f-plus-r.png", thumb_width, "f047r1/bizarre-f-orig/f-plus-r")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f047r1/bizarre-f-orig/just-the-r.png", thumb_width, "f047r1/bizarre-f-orig/just-the-r")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f047r1/bizarre-f/annotated-with-r.png", thumb_width, "f047r1/bizarre-f/annotated-with-r")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f116v1/lines-1-4-mid-ms/x10+11-y01-MB450RB1-ann.png", thumb_width, "f116v1/lines-1-4-mid-ms/x10+11-y01-MB450RB1-ann")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/hand-tests/hand-tracing.png", thumb_width, "hand-tests/hand-tracing")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-50x50mm/001v.png", thumb_width, "samples-50x50mm/001v")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-50x50mm/075r.png", thumb_width, "samples-50x50mm/075r")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-50x50mm/104r.png", thumb_width, "samples-50x50mm/104r")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-by-type/073v/all.png", thumb_width, "samples-by-type/073v/all")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-by-type/073v/normal-fade.png", thumb_width, "samples-by-type/073v/normal-fade")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-by-type/073v/normal-full.png", thumb_width, "samples-by-type/073v/normal-full")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-by-type/073v/normal-weak.png", thumb_width, "samples-by-type/073v/normal-weak")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-by-type/073v/retrac.png", thumb_width, "samples-by-type/073v/retrac")
  hr.image_parag(st, "images/samples-by-type/073v/vellum.png", thumb_width, "samples-by-type/073v/vellum")

  h.section(st, 2, "Restoration rounds")

  h.parags(st, """There appear to have been at least two rounds of
  restorarion well after the original scribing, by different people.
  The first one was more careful and used brown ink similar to the
  original. Subsequent ones were less careful and used ink that was
  darker and even different tone, but retraced only a few parts that
  the first one had skipped, and a few parts that had been restored
  but were again faded or damaged.

  As a working hypothesis, this report assumes three separate rounds
  of restoration -- Rt1, Rt2, Rt3. The result of these three passes
  and the original traces (Rt0) would be distinguished by weight and
  ink color, and by the nature of the "restorations" made. However,
  the assignment of a stroke to one of these rounds is subjective; and
  there may have been only two passes, or (less likely) only one.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "The first restoration round")

  h.parags(st, """The first round of restoration (Rt1) covered most of
  the text and varying fractions of the figures. It consisted of
  carefully retracing the faded parts of the text and figures with
  somewhat similar ink, as well as possible. For the most part, this
  retracing was quite careful and thorough on the text, somewhat less so
  on the figures.
  
  That first round of restoration (Rt1) was a "professional" restoration,
  presumably by a scribe who was used to do that kind of job. He seems
  to have tried his best to match the ink color and trace the text as
  accurately as a modern painting restorer would do. He was a bit less
  careful and less thorough on the drawings.
  
  We can see those severely faded original traces here and there. Those
  are ink strokes that, at the time of the first restoration, were still
  legible enough so that restoration was not seen necessary. Now imagine
  what the strokes that were restored would look like now. In some
  places it is clear that there was some ink stroke that is now
  completely invisible.
  
  ???The claim is that, a century or two after the VMS was created, its
  owner did what the owner of a badly degraded valuable painting would
  do. Namely, he handed over the book to a scribe, with the task of
  bringing the book back as close as possible to the original state. The
  scribe may even have been one who specialized in such restoration
  work. That goal implied matching the ink in color and appearance, and
  tracing over all the original traces that had significantly faded, as
  closely as possible.
  
  ???But the work could not be perfect. Some parts had already been
  irremediably lost. The new scribe (unlike the original one) did not
  know the alphabet not the "morphology" of the words, and thus could
  not tell whether a partly faded glyph was a q or an y or and l or some
  new weirdo. Many Ih and eiin may be the outcome of that confusion. And
  even if the scribe was hired for six months, the time he could spend
  on any page was limited.
  
  ???Again, the Restorer(s) obviously did not know the alphabet, and the
  Author must have been long gone to Higher Spheres. And the first
  Restorer was recruited precisely because many parts of the book had
  become almost unreadable, or worse.
  
  ???Even so, the first Restorer did a good job overall. Thus, for most
  meaningful analyses, this General Restoration Hypothesis can be ignored.
  The restoration added some errors -- switching some r for s or
  vice-versa, changing some Sh into Ch and some Ch into ee, etc. But any
  meaningful analysis must allow for a certain percentage of errors by the
  Author, by the original Scribe, and by the Transcribers. (My readings
  disagree with Rene's at the rate of one glyph every ~10-20 lines, even
  though we both use the same high-resolution 2014 images.)""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Subsequent restoration rounds")

  h.parags(st, """There is evidence of at least two subsequent rounds of
  restoration. Restorer Rt2 was a bit less careful than Rt1 (not
  "professional" but still seemed to care about preserving the
  appearance) and limited his work to parts that either had been skipped
  by Rt1 or had faded again after being retraced, from wear or spill
  damage. Thus it too was probably decades or centuries after Rt1.
  
  Restorer Rt3 was quite careless; fortunately he retouched only a few
  characters here and there. But he seems to have enjoyed "enhancing"
  the drawings, especially the nymphs.
  
  The original Scribe apparently knew the alphabet but could not read
  the text. The Restorers did not know the alphabet (although Rt1 may
  have inferred it as he worked through the book). Thus they often
  "restored" a normal but faded glyph into a bizarre weirdo.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Timeline of restoration")

  h.parags(st, """The first round of restoration occurred when a
  substantial part of the original text and drawings had already faded
  to near invisibility. Therefore, that must have been at least several
  decades after the book was written. By that time the Restorer no
  longer had access to the Author or his draft. That would provide a
  motivation for the restoration and explain his many mistakes.
  
  The timeline of subsequent rounds of restoration is more uncertain.  They may have 
  been motivated by the faint original traces that had escaped the 
  first round.  Thus it is possible that they occurred only a few decades after 
  the first round.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Case study: f73v")

  h.parags(st, """Evidence of restoration is pervasive on page f73v.  For example:""")

  hr.image_parag(st, "images/examples-100/example-f73v.png", thumb_width, link_text = "Details from f73v (Sagittarius)")

  h.parags(st, """(Note that the label is almost upside down here.)

  In this image, the dark strokes create two invalid glyphs, a reversed
  "i" with serif and an incomplete infinity symbol. I don't see how those
  symbols could be interpreted as valid glyphs with some parts missing.
  Whoever drew the dark strokes definitely drew them in the wrong place
  and with the wrong shape. I can make sense of the "infinity" only by
  assuming that the original was a "ch" (whose ligature I think I can see
  poking out in the middle of the "infinity") that was retraced by someone
  who mistook the two "e" strokes for two joined circles. And the reversed
  "i" before it was perhaps an "e" whose bottom half was too faint, and
  was mistook for a straight stroke with a serif.

  In example #4, the "i" stroke after the "a"/"o" would be a valid glyph,
  but the word endings "oi" and "ai" are very rare, if they occur at all.
  On the other hand "or" and "ar" are very common words; and indeed I
  think I can see a very faint "r"-plume that starts at that "i" stroke,
  glances off the nymph's hand, and curls above the gap between that "i"
  and the next glyph. I am sure that anyone who was familiar with the
  Voynichese alphabet (like the Scribe who wrote most of the VMs) and with
  "typical" word patterns would have guessed an "r" there.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Case study: f80r")

  # hr.image_parag(st, "f57???")

  h.parags(st, """The figures show clear signs of restoration, and in a pattern similar to
  that seen in the Zodiac pages. Namely, emphasis on hair and body outline
  of the nymphs, and addition of the characteristic "lobed shower-caps" on
  the two nymphs on the left margin. The retouching is most visible on the
  "satyr" and nymph at the upper right corner -- whose original outlines
  are considerably faded, whereas the retraced parts show no sign of
  fading. It seems clear those darker strokes are either retracing faded
  original outlines, or adding spurious details like the showercaps.

  On the text, I see three things

  "normal" strokes with ink that gradually varies in color from dark
  yellowish brown to light yellowish brown, then suddenly back to dark
  when the pen is re-loaded with ink, as in the second qotal on line 3

  retracings by the Scribe him/herself going back a few words and
  correcting or reinforcing a few glyphs, like the first "l" and "o" on
  line 2, and second "d" on lines 5 and 6;

  very rare restorations by the Retracer.

  Distinguishing between (2) and (3) is hard because the original text on
  this page is not faded, except on the row of labels at the top, and uses
  a relatively dark (but still yellowish) ink. For this reason,
  presumably, the Restorer saw no need to retouch the text. However, on
  that same word that you mention, I would say that the darker strokes
  (which are visibly retraced over lighter strokes) are the work of the
  Restorer, not of the original Scribe.

  By coincidence, that word is right next to a nymph that clearly had her
  outline retraced in part (from the cheek down to the groin at left, from
  the armpit to the waist at right), random wisps drawn over her hair, and
  a "lobed showercap" added.

  Another possible example of (3) are the words qok and qokan, 4 and 5
  lines down from that word. It seems that there is a defect on the vellum
  at that spot that interfered with the writing. On the first word, note
  how the bottom half of the "o" and the top loop of the "k" are in
  "normal" ink, and the latter is rather faint. As I see it, the Restorer
  (not the original Scribe) clumsily tried to enhance those glyphs. Ditto
  for the second word, on the next line, where the original plume of the
  "n" was no longer visible, and the Restorer provided a misshaped one,
  straight up with a round corner at the bottom. The ink in both
  corrections is visibly darker than the darkest parts of the original
  writing, just around those words.

  There is also a vertical stroke above the "o" of the first word, also in
  the very dark Restorer ink. It may be an accident, but may also be some
  noise that the Restorer mistook for a faded vertical plume, and decided
  to "enhance" it -- again revealing his/her ignorance of the Voynichese
  alphabet.""")

  h.section(st, 2, "Why are the last Zodiac pages so faint?")

  h.parags(st, """The last few Zodiac pages are quite faint.
  One possible explanation is that, for several years after it was written, the VMs was
  kept as a stack of separate quires; each quire being either unbound, or
  bound all by itself, as a booklet.

  In the Zodiac section, each bifolio presumably was a quire by itself, as
  it is now. In that case, when folio f70 was folded in, Aries Dark
  (f70v1) was the last page of quire 10; Aries Light (f71r) was the first
  page of quire 11; when folio f72 was folded, Libra (f72v1) was the last
  page of quire 11; and Scorpio (f73r) was the first page of quire 12. The
  last page of quire 12 would have been on folio f74, which is missing
  (and appears to have been cut off after the book was bound; it may be
  the sample that Georg Baresh sent to Athanasius Kircher).

  So, if the quires were kept unbounded, those pages above would have
  suffered more from rubbing and exposure to sunlight than the pages
  inside the quires. That may explain why some Zodiac pages are more faded
  than, say, the Biology pages.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Case study: f73v")

  # hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f073v1/???", "clip",  "f73v inner ring???")

  h.parags(st, """f73v inner ring, In the last three examples, the original (valid) glyphs
  can be seen under the (invalid) retraced ones. They are very faint (and
  that would explain why they were retraced), but are definitely there.

  In each of the first two examples, the original trace cannot be seen
  under the darker stroke, but it is there before and after it. Whether
  the original had a gap there or not, it it is obvious that the dark
  stroke was penned only after the whole nymph was outlined.

  The Rt2 Restorer was very careful when
  retracing the labels, although he/she apparently did not know the
  alphabet. He was less careful when retouching the figures, and had fun
  adding details like the "showercaps", crowns, and right breasts. Perhaps
  because he guessed that (as in European astrological diagrams of the
  time) the drawings were only ornamentation, and the only important parts
  were the labels?

  I would say that the Restorer was very careful when restoration the
  labels, although he/she apparently did not know the alphabet. He was
  less careful when retouching the figures, and had fun adding details
  like the "showercaps", crowns, and right breasts. Perhaps because he
  guessed that (as in European astrological diagrams of the time) the
  drawings were only ornamentation, and the only important parts were the
  labels?
  https://www.ic.unicamp.br/~stolfi/voynich/Notes/075/examples-f73v.png

  [S Wirtz:] What is certain is that the font was not finished with the old ink. This
  only came later with the new, darker ink. Whether the ink was new, or
  just stirred or thickened, I leave open. What is certain is that the
  words were finished afterwards. I assume that the other corrections were
  also made at the same time. The same ink can also be found on other
  pages in the text.""")


  h.parags(st, """changes in darkness due to mere variations
  of ink flow. Like suddenly darker after dipping the pen in ink, then
  gradually lighter as the pen runs out of ink. Or when the Scribe
  him/herself goes back and corrects some mistakes. Or when he/she
  presumably mixes a new batch of ink halfway through a page. But those
  are easy to spot because (1) the hue of the ink does not change, and (2)
  the sequence makes sense considering the way he/she must have operated.

  [OSHFDK] I'm not sure the change in hue necessarily means a different kind of
  ink, if the ink is not mixed very well and there is some layering in the
  inkwell. And I'm not even sure there is a change in hue.

  [OSHFDK] If I understood correctly which ok/tedal you are referring to, here it
  is from the TIFF. I sampled the hue from the dark label and from the
  faint nymph outline, and it looks like the hue component is practically
  the same (30 vs 31).

  One problem with this explanation 
  is that the darker ink is seen only in
  some pages, and then only some details.""")

  h.section(st, 2, "Summary of restoration on the Zodiac") 

  h.parags(st, """On the Zodiac pages, for
  instance, there are of course many "original" variations in stroke
  darkness and width that are apparently done in the standard
  yellowish-brown ink, and therefore can be attributed to ink-flow
  variations and immediate self-corrections by the Scribe. But there are
  scattered "new" strokes in a distinctive dark brown-black ink that was
  used only in the labels of two pages and applied to a bizarre selection
  of figure details.

  Here is a list of the instances I can see, with RB =
  right breast, LB = left breast, L+RB = both breasts, SSC = "scallopped
  showercap": """)

  h.begin_enum(st, "ul")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Pisces (f70v2): No "new" strokes.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Aries Dark (f70v1): Outer
  band nymph at 07:00 (RB, right groin), 08:00 (RB, hairline, collar, left
  wristband, left elbow), 09:00 (RB, left eye), 10:30 (hair, star, second
  star tail, LB? back? chest?), 12:00 (RB, hair, belly?) 01:00 (LB, hair,
  collar?), 02:30 (RB, hair), 05:30 (hair, wristbands? hands? collar?);
  inner band nymphs at 12:00 (left face, neck, torso), 07:30 (hair? hat?
  collar?), and 10:45 (fat striped star tail). Also the word otodal on the
  middle text ring, except the "a" glyph.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Aries Light (f71r): The nymph in
  the outer band at 02:00 (SSC).""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Taurus Light (f71v): Outer band nymphs
  08:30 (hair), 11:00 (hair), 03:30 (chin, RB) and 06:00 (hair, RB, left
  arm); inner band nymphs at 05:30 (hair), 07:00 (hat, cheek, belt), 08:00
  (hair), 10:30 (hairline), 12:00 (hair and "arches" on barrel). Also a
  weird "dog nose" on the bull.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Taurus Dark (f72r1): Outer band nymphs at
  03:30 (RB), 09:15 (RB) and 10:30 (RB). Note that the bull has a fairly
  realistic nose, unlike that of Taurus Light.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Gemini (f72r2): Top nymph,
  outside circles, at 11:00 (RB); outer band nymphs at 10:45 (RB), 01:30
  (RB), 03:30 (RB), 04:00 (RB), 05:00 (RB), and 06:00 (RB); inner band
  nymphs at 10:30 (RB), 12:30 (RB), 01:30 (RB), 07:00 (RB, hair, belly).""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Cancer (f72r3): outer band nymphs at 02:00, 03:30, 05:00, and 08:00 (all
  RBs); middle band at 03:15 (RB), 06:30 (RB and face), 08:00 (RB) and
  11:00 (RB), 12:00 (nose and eyebrows); inner band at 12:00 (middle
  breast(!)), 03:15 (RB, crown, groin), 07:00 (RB), 10:15 (L+RB). Also the
  month name strokes are darker and wider than those of other text and
  drawings, including the lobsters'.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Leo (f72v3): outer band nymphs at
  07:15 (hair, chest), 08:45 (RB), 09:00 (RB), 09:30 (RB), 10:45 (RB),
  11:15 (RB), 12:00 (RB, nape, thigh?), 01:15 (RB), 02:30 (L+RB), 03:00
  (RB, SSC?), 03:30 (RB), 04:30 (RB), and 06:00 (RB); inner band nymphs at
  06:30 (RB, front), 07:45 (RB), 09:15 (RB, left leg, right foot), 10:45
  (RB), 11:45 (RB), 12:30 (right thigh), 02:00 (RB), 03:00 (RB), 04:30
  (RB), and 05:00 (RB). Also maybe the month's name.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Virgo (f72v2): outer
  band nymphs at 11:30 (RB, SSC), 12:15 (RB), 13:00 (RB), 13:45 (RB),
  04:00 (RB), right leg), 05:00 (L+RB, left hand, right armpit, SSC),
  06:00 (RB, hair, upper right arm, right thigh), 06:30 (RB, SSC, hair,
  right groin), 07:00 (RB), 07:30 (RB, SSC), 08:15 (RB), 09:00 (RB, hair),
  10:00 (RB), and 10:45 (top of hat?); inner band nymphs at 12:30 (RB),
  13:15 (RB), 03:00 (RB, SSC, belly, groin), 04:00 (L+RB), 05:00 (RB),
  06:15 (RB, nose? groin?), 07:15 (RB, SSC), 08:00 (RB, hairline), 09:15
  (RB), and 11:30 (RB). Also perhaps the month's name.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Libra (f72v1):
  outer band nymphs at 12:00 (RB), 12:30 (RB, right thigh and pubis, eyes,
  crown), 01:00 (RB, hair, eyes), 01:30 (RB), 02:30 (RB), 03:00 (RB),
  03:30 (RB), 04:00 (L+RB), 04:45 (RB, left knee?, left arm?, pubis?)
  05:00 (RB, hair), 5:45 (RB), 06:15 (RB), 07:00 (RB), 07:30 (RB, SSC?)
  08:00 (RB, SSC), 09:15 (RB), 10:15 (L+RB, nose tip) 10:45 (L+RB, left
  eye), and 11:30 (RB, hair?); inner band nymphs at 12>15 (RB?) 01:15 (RB,
  left thigh), 04:15 (RB, hair, SSC), 05:30 (RB, hair), 06:30 (RB, SSC),
  07:30 (RB), 09:00 (RB, hair), and 08:15 (RB). Also perhaps the month's
  name.""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Scorpio (f73r): top nymphs, outside circles, at 11:00 (RB, hair,
  SSC), 11:30 (RB, hair), 12:30 (L+RB, hair, SSC), and 01:00 (L+RB, hair,
  right thigh); outer band at 12:00 (RB, left eye), 01:00 (hair, L+RB,
  eyes), 01:30 (RB, hair), 02:00 (RB, right thigh), 03:00 (RB, left arm?)
  03:45 (L+RB), 04:45 (RB), 05:30 (RB, SSC, left thigh), 06:30 (RB, left
  eyebrow), 07:15 (RB), 07:45 (RB, right thigh), 08:30 (RB), 09:30 (LB,
  eyes), 10:30 (L+RB), 11:00 (RB), and 11:30 (L+RB, hair, right thigh);
  inner band nymphs at 12:30 (L+RB, hair), 01:30 (L+RB), 03:30 (RB), 05:00
  (RB), 06:30 (RB), 07:00 (RB) 08:30 (RB), 09:30 (L+RB, eyes), 10:30 (RB),
  and 11:30 (RB, right arm). Also all labels outside the circles, all
  outer labels from 03:15 and 11:00, and all inner labels from 04:00 to
  10:45. And the month's name. (Note that the top half of the first "e" is
  in the standard ink.)""")
  h.enum_item_parags(st, """Sagittarius (f73v): top nymphs, outside circles,
  at 11:00 (RB, barrel), 11:30 (RB, hairline, right eye), 12:00 (RB, top
  of LB, hair, eyes), and 12:30 (RB, armpit, right eye); outer band nymphs
  at 12:00 (RB), 12:30 (RB, hair, SSC), 01:00 (right eye), 01:30 (RB),
  02:15 (RB, SSC, hair), 03:15 (RB), 04:00 (RB), 05:00 (RB), 06:00 (RB),
  07:00 (RB, bottom or nose, eyes), 07:30 (RB, eyes), 08:15 (RB, eyes),
  09:00 (RB, partial SSC), 10:00 (RB), 10:45 (RB), and 11:30 (L+RB, SSC,
  hair); inner band nymphs at 01:15 (L+RB), 02:30 (RB), 04:30 (RB), 06:00
  (L+RB), 07:00 (RB), 08:00 (L+RB), 09:30 (RB), and 11:30 (RB). Also maybe
  the month's name. And all the labels (but not the text rings).""")

  h.end_enum(st, "ul")

  h.parags(st, """The dark ink strokes may also include many nipples and eye pupils, but
  since these are mere dots it is hard to tell. I would guess that dots
  tend to be darker than traces in any case because of thew way ink flows
  on a quill pen.

  So, whoever applied those distinctively dark strokes was obsessed with
  female hair and breasts; an obsession which does not seem to have been
  so strong in the original Scribe. (Could it be that the original Scribe
  was a 12-year-old boy, and the Restorer was the same boy but a couple of
  years older? Hmmm...)

  On Pisces, there is somewhat darker ink in the are around the fold at
  07:00: some glyphs of the words okey, chtoldy, and otees in the outer
  text ring, the outer nymph just under those words, and her star and
  tail; but they seem to be "original", due to ink flow and sequence
  effects. Also, on the Beinecke images, the darker color of the ink on
  those strokes there seems to be due to tiny black spots, that may be
  large ink particles in "expired" ink, or pockets on the vellum where the
  ink pooled.""")

  # hr.cip_fg_parag(st, f73r outer 05:30)

  h.parags(st, """A particularly interesting example is the outer band nymph at 05:30 on
  Scorpio (f73r). A dark stroke (B) was applied apparently to complete the
  lower outline of the left thigh; but that part of the outline had
  already been drawn in normal ink (A). It would seem that the Restorer
  (whoever applied B) did not see A, or mistook it for something else, or
  (less likely) thought that A was wrong and corrected it.

  (By the way, if you are looking at that part of the image with good
  resolution, note that the tail of the "l" glyph in the shekal label of
  the preceding nymph is much fainter than the body. I would say that only
  the body was restored, leaving the tail as it was.)""")

  # hr.cip_fg_parag(st, f73v top nymphs)

  h.parags(st, """An even more interesting example is on the Sagittarius page (f73v), in
  the rather misshaped "barrels" of the first two nymphs at the top of
  diagram. I propose that those barrels were not drawn by the original
  Scribe and were added by the Restorer, who misinterpreted the lower
  outline of the left thighs of those two nymphs as the top outlines of
  two "barrels" -- and thus decided to complete the drawing with the rest
  of the "barrels", which he/she assumed had been worn off. Namely, he/she
  drew the "lips" at the end of each "barrel", and the horizontal traces
  attached to those "lips" -- neither of which were there before.

  By the way, on that same page, note that the label on the outer band at
  07:30 seems to have been originally ykechdy, but the retracing turned
  the "e" into an invalid glyph like a flipped "i" with a serif, and the
  "ch" into another invalid glyph, like an incomplete infinity symbol.
  Futher evidence that the Restorer did not even know the Voynichese
  alphabet.

  I take these two examples, and other details, as evidence that the
  Restorer (who made the "new" strokes) and the original Scribe (who wrote
  and drew everything else) were different persons; and also that the
  Restorer had no clue about the nature and meaning of these diagrams.""")

  h.section(st, 2, "On the number of scribes")

  h.parags(st, """One could in principle objectively establish that there are multiple
  handwritings, by statistical analysis of glyph shapes. However, whether
  those handwritings belonged to distinct people is a separate theory,
  that needs its own evidence. My own hadwriting has changed an awful lot
  over the years, and still varies a lot depending on my state of mind and
  rest, posture, writing instrument and medium, etc. The variations are
  much bigger than what we see in the VMS. The "splitters" who saw
  multiple handwritings may have succumbed to "confirmation bias". Namely,
  once they got the hunch that there were multiple Scribes, they set out
  to find evidence confirming it -- differences in glyph shapes -- while
  ignoring the much stronger evidence that contradictd it -- the
  similarities in glyph shapes. And one similarity, in particular, is the
  range of variation of glyph shapes within the same page, or even the
  same line. That is, the writing everywhere is very similar because it is
  similarly variable. Surely there was some Author who decided to write
  this book, decided what would be in it, and invented the script. The
  Author must have drafted the text and sketched the figures on paper
  first; it would be insanity to write everything directly from his head
  onto vellum. Then he/she gave the draft and sketches to a Scribe who
  clean-copied them to the vellum. If there was only one Scribe, he/she
  may have been the same as the Author. If the Scribe was a different
  person, the Author had to teach him/her the Voynichese alphabet, and had
  him/her train writing it until the Author was satisfied with the result.
  If there was a single Scribe, he/she could be an Author's secretary,
  apprentice, relative, etc. But if there were five or six Scribes, the
  Author had to recruit, teach, and train all of them; which makes the
  idea quite a bit less likely. Moreover, these multiple Scribes also had
  to conspire and train to write in similarly sloppy ways -- so similar
  that at least one handwriting expert and many amateur ones would swear
  that there was just one Scribe.

  The nymphs in the balneological section were 
  drawn by the same person who drew the Zodiac ones, but 
  the latter may look different because they
  were affected differntly by retracing.  IN general, the style 
  of the drawings seems to exhibit a continuous evolution,
  although the order of quires and folios is still not certain.

  It is uncertain whether Restorer Rt2 merely restored the original 
  "dark" breasts, or added them.  Some nyphs have 
  only one breast that is part of the outline.""")

  h.section(st, 2, "Case studies")

  h.section(st, 3, "82r, big green pool at bottom")

  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f082r1/pond-SW", "clip", link_text = "f82r, bottom pond, west")
  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f082r1/pond-SE", "clip", link_text = "f82r, bottom pond, east")

  h.section(st, 2, "Examples pages with multispectral images")

  h.begin_enum(st, "ul")

  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f001r1/lines-1-2-mid", "clip", link_text = "f1r, lines 1-2, middle")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f001r1/lines-1-5-mid", "clip", link_text = "f1r, lines 1-5, middle")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f001r1/lines-12-16-beg", "clip", link_text = "f1r, lines 12-16, left")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f001r1/lines-13-17-mid", "clip", link_text = "f1r, lines 13-17, middle")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f001r1/lines-18-19-mid", "clip", link_text = "f1r, lines 18-19, middle")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """<a href="f001r1/folio.html">f1r</a>""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f8r: Plenty of restorations, but apparently all by
  the Scribe him/herself, in order to reinforce glyphs that came ut too
  fint because of ID, or not quite right, or wrong. Many of the
  restorations are @d glyphs. In some, the top loop is unusually large
  and/or traced in the "wrong" sense. """) 

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f17r: Plenty of restorations, but apparently all by
  the Scribe him/herself, in order to reinforce glyphs that came ut too
  fint because of ID, or not quite right, or wrong. In clip 2, for
  instance, he/she wrote @'aiir.{Ch}ok' with the pen almost dry,
  re-inked, went back to restore the @r and the @c, then continued from
  the @y onwards. But in clip ?? there is a misshaped glyph that could
  be an @m with truncated tail, or an @r with plume that intersected
  itself. That could be an explanation for the isolated glyphs with
  darker strokes: the Scribe was not sure whether the @ds in the draft
  were @ds or @ms or @gs, so he/she skipped over them; later she asked
  the Author, went back to the page, and drew all the @ds, with a full
  pen. """)

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f26r: Examples of gallows with loop traced in the
  wrong way. Example of a @'{Ch}e' turned into @'see'.  ???""")

  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f047r1/bizarre-f", "clip", link_text = "f47r, bizarre @f gallows")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f047r1/bizarre-f-orig", "clip", link_text = "f47r, bizarre @f gallows (orig)")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f47r: ???""")


  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f070v1/ctext-i-0300", "clip", link_text = "f70v1, inner text ring at 03:00")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f070v1/ctext-i-0900", "clip", link_text = "f70v1, inner text ring at 09:00")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f070v1/nymph-o-0900", "clip", link_text = "f70v1, outer nymph at 09:00")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f070v1/nymph-o-1030", "clip", link_text = "f70v1, outer nymph at 10:30")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f70v1: All text and labels seem to be in the
  "normal" ink, only perhaps darker than usual. There are large
  variations of stroke color in them but they all seem to be consistent
  with recharging. The word @'otodal' at 12:00 on the middle text ring
  is darker than surrounding ones, so it may have been written out of
  sequence. The darker strokes that could be attributed to the Restorer
  are on a few nymphs, follwing the usual pattern -- hair and har,
  breasts, body outline. There are no obvious cases of double-tracing,
  but some of the dark strokes on the nymph outlines (e. g. on the left
  breasts) trabsitions abruptly to lighter strokes, as if they had
  precisely covered part of the latter.[Image: examples-f70v1.png]""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f71r: The Restorer apparently did very
  little on this page. Only three of the nymphs have details in
  significantly darker ink: hair details on two, a "scalloped
  shower-cap" on the other. Two glyphs in the middle text ring are
  somewhat darker than the surrounding ones: an @l in the word
  @'l{Sh}eotey' and an isolated @o next to the "notched square"
  delimiter. Several other words appear to be restored, and several
  glyphs are misshaped to some extent (as in the outer label at 04:45).
  However, these are all in "normal-looking" ink. Moreover, I believe
  that this page was one of the first to be produced by the original
  Scribe; so those mis-shaped glyphs and restorations could be due to
  him/her, no to the Restorer. [Image: examples-f71r.png]""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f93r: The Restorer does not seem to have worked
  on this page. All the text and drawings appear to be in the "normal"
  ink; and quite legible, with no sign of fading -- not even where some
  liquid spilled and ran over the page. Thus there would be no reason to
  retrace any of it. The only glyphs that /may/ have been restored in a
  darker ink is the @l at the beginning of line 8, which may be darker
  than the rest; but it seems still compatible with recharging effects.""")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f102v1: The Restorer does not seem to have worked
  on this page. All the text and drawings appear to be in the "normal"
  ink; and quite legible, with little fading -- except for the first
  letter on lines 5, 6, and 8, and the final @'Cy' of the label row at
  top. There are many variations in ink density. Some are consistent
  with recharging, but there are several abrupt transitions from dark to
  light -- the opposite of what one expects from recharging effects.
  These characters are well-formed and generally in the same handwriting
  as the rest. This anomlay occurs mostly in glyphs @o, @r, and @d. My
  explanation for those is that the original Scribe him/herself went
  back and retraced some glyphs that had come out too faint, slightly
  misshaped, or mistaken (such as writing @e or @a instead of @o, @s
  instead of @d).""")

  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f116v1/lines-1-4-mid-ms", "clip", link_text = "f116v, lines 1-4, mid MS")
  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f116v1/stain", "clip", link_text = "f116v, big water stain")

  h.enum_item_parags(st, """f116v: ???""")

  h.end_enum(st, "ul")

  h.parags(st, """ f70:

  A more interesting example would be my sample 6 from f70. The hairline
  of the nymph is clearly restored, and the ink colors are very different.
  That sample also has some of the light golden-yellow paint (distinct
  from the "normal" ink) that was widely used through the VMs, in
  particular on the hair of nymphs and and inside the stars. It would be
  interesting to see what multispectral imaging shows about it.""")


  h.section(st, 3, "f70v1 (Dark Aries, Aries 1)")

  h.parags(st, """The most dramatic case that I can see with my pareidolioscope is the
  inner band nymph at 10:30. The "robot tentacle" arm that she is holding
  her star with is clearly spurious. One can see the original outline of
  the left arm making a smooth 180 degree arc under that tentacle.

  That curve is anatomically absurd but consistent with the anatomical
  absurdities in the other nymphs, such as the double elbow of the outer
  nymph at 07:30. That "original" left arm, like the left arms of 10 of
  the other 14 nymphs on this page, is tucked inside the tub.

  Moreover, all the other nymphs on this page (which I think it is the
  earliest one with nymphs in the whole VMS) still have their Trump
  signature pubic area prudely hidden inside the tubs. I conclude that the
  details of that nymphs below her belly, whatever they were supposed to
  be, are bogus "enhancements" by the Restorer, too. The original drawing
  probably had just the (contorted and ungainly) torso emerging from the
  tub.

  What I see here:

  A "Robot tentacle" added by Restorer B Original lower/left outline of
  left arm C Original upper/right outline of left arm D Spurious nymph
  outline added by Restorer E Spurious details added by Restorer""")

  h.section(st, 3, "f31r")

  h.parags(st, """Again, as a working hypothesis I have been assuming three separate
  rounds of restoration -- Rt1, Rt2, Rt3. The last two passes would have
  been necessary because the parts that had not been retraced in Rt1, as
  well as the result of Rt1 itself, kept fading over time.

  The three passes would be distinguished by weight and ink color, and by
  the last two being less careful than the first one. In the case of this
  page, Rt2 used a much broader pen than Rt1 or the original Scribe.
  however, the assignment of a stroke to one of these rounds is
  subjective, and there may have been only two passes, or (less likely)
  only one. As seen on the plant, on this page the original strokes have
  clearly faded to the point of almost complete invisibility, or beyond.

  [BLUETOES101] I think there's lower hanging fruit for unsureness on scribe or
  restorer's part, such as below from f115v. To me there's no where this
  swish can go and still make a grammatically correct (by usual
  preference) word. It's also unclear if it was intended to be an "n" with
  an "o" in the way, or "r" and they put it in the wrong place. Obviously
  1 example can be explained away in various ways but I could pull 10
  examples each page from the "recipes" section that don't really make
  much sense. On this same page there's a word that starts with "i" and a
  backwards "e" shape to start a bench, fully looped "r" like a capital
  "P", black (actually black) ink splodge above the top star and in the
  same ink (to my eye) a "retracing" of "r".

  Right. But the b glyph itself is quite rare.

  I went through all occurrences of b in Rene's IVT transcription. There
  are 17 of them, of which 13 in the Herbal section, one in Bio, two in
  Cosmo, and one in Stars. The last two are transcription errors. All the
  others are in endings eeeb or eeb, which may have been mistakes by the
  Scribe or the Restorer, and could have been eees or ees.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "f47r")

  hr.enum_item_sub_link_parag(st, "f047r1/mccrone-6a", "clip", link_text = "f47r, microscope image from McCrone report")

  h.parags(st, """I understand that people may be very reluctant to accept this claim. But
  can it be denied? Please check my previous post. Can you deny points
  1-4? Could they have not triggered such a global restoration?

  Unfortunately, matching the original ink meant that the restored text
  and drawings were themselves vulnerable to wear, humidity, insects,
  spills, etc. And the parts that the first Restorer skipped, because they
  were still good enough, continued to fade away.

  So eventually there were other more limited "restoration" rounds -- but
  clearly not as skillful and careful as the first one. On some pages
  these later Restorers had fun embellishing the drawings, adding breasts
  and hats to the nymphs, more fantastic details to the plants. And then
  there was the Dark Painter...

  ???

  The restoration must be
  much slower and more careful than the original writing. And that is why
  a handwriting expert can often detect forgery in a signature at first
  glance, unless the forger himself is an expert. The slower speed results
  in broader and more jittery traces.

  And that is why we can detect retracing of plumes and tails on the VMS.
  Retracing causes the plume to become thicker, with a blunt end, instead
  of the smooth tapering "mousetail" created by a quick swish of the pen.
  And it helps when a Restorer who does not know the alphabet chooses to
  trace a plume or a gallows loop in the wrong direction.

  ???

  stroke weight varies while one is writing -- darker
  right after the pen is dipped, normal for a while, then fainter as the
  pen runs out of ink. And that the Scribe himself may go back to text
  that he wrote previously, to correct mistakes, redo characters that cane
  out fainter, etc.

  But stroke weight is not the only criterion I use to decide whether some
  glyph, word, or page was restored. Crooked plumes is only one of several
  clues that can add up to make the conclusion unavoidable.

  the original Scribe was obviously an experienced "quil
  driver", since he could write neat text only 1.5 mm tall or less. He was
  poor only at drawing figures.

  This happens throughout the book, because the first round of restoration was applied to the whole book.

  Consider this:

  Rounds Rt2 and/or Rt3 may have been cases of what I call "back-tracing",
  when a scribe goes back and retraces some stuff that he recently traced
  himself. The back-traced glyphs then may come out darker only because
  the pen is more loaded with ink. But restoration and back-tracing are
  distinct processes from variations of darkness along the same trace, due
  to variations of pressure, ink flow, speed, etc. The distinctions
  between Rt1, Rt2, and Rt3 cannot be explained by such variations.

  Between Rt0 and Rt1 enough time passed for the Rt0 traces become so
  faint that the owner decided to commission a full restoration of the
  manuscript. The intervals between Rt1, Rt2, and Rt3 are less certain,
  but at least one of them was so long that the leftover Rt0 traces, and
  possibly the Rt1 traces themselves, had faded substantially.

  Specifically:

  (A1,A2,A3) Surviving original traces (Rt0): very faint, with fuzzy
  edges, low saturation (more like gray than brown). Visible not only as
  extensions of the other stages (like on the left leg of the k and at the
  top of the left half of the o), but also by the side of those later
  traces (like in the "armpits" of the horizontal arm of the k, its right
  foot, the bottom of the o, and the start of the r plume).

  The extreme fading of this ink is puzzling. Could it have been an
  organic (plant) dye? To bad that the lab did not analyze this faded ink
  and did not even comment on this striking difference.

  (B1,B3) The global restoration round Rt1 included the o and the plume of
  the r. The ink is light brown with only a few darker (but not black)
  spots, apparently where the ink pooled into cavities of the parchment.
  Unlike the original Rt0 ink, the Rt1 traces have sharp borders.

  The lower half of the left leg of the k and its right foot may be Rt1
  too, but faded a bit more than the other Rt1 traces; or they may be
  original Rt0, that survived better than other Rt0 traces. The Rt1
  Restorer was very careful and mostly followed what was left of the
  original traces, but he surely made some mistakes. One of them probably
  was at the top of the right half of the o (flagged X2), which should
  have been thinner, like the top of the left half.

  (C1) The partial restoration Rt2 here shows only in the lower half of the
  right leg of the k. It is darker than Rt1 and mottled with darker (but
  still not black) spots. It probably was used on other parts of the k,
  excluding the left leg; but the loop, for one, came out crooked (note
  Y1) and had to be restored or backtraced again.

  (D1,D3) Round Rt3 here included the horizontal arm, the loop, and the
  top of the right leg of the k, as well as the body (i stroke) of the r.
  Note the sharp transition (at X1) between the Rt3 and Rt2 parts of the
  leg. The ink is darker than the Rt2 ink, and has lots of very dark
  spots. The white glints show that these are neither solid pigment
  particles, nor places where the ink pooled into cavities of the vellum,
  but smooth rounded lumps that rise above the surface of the parchment
  and tend to collect along the borders of the ink trace. It looks as if
  the ink was a mixture of a water-based liquid with an oil-based one, and
  one of these phases collected into the black droplets while the other
  spread out evenly to give the brown stain.

  Quote: To me the match between the shape of the dark ink blobs and the
  faint ink strokes looks extremely hard to explain by restoration. The dark
  ink from the base of r seems to flow perfectly into the line of the
  flourish.

  You mean at the point X3? As I see it, the original trace (A3) was
  wider, and the dark ink flowed only over the top 1/3 of that trace, for
  a little bit. It is not strange that the new ink spreads over older
  traces. Those would have traces of binder, which is probably more
  wettable than blank parchment. On that micrograph (as in the
  Beinecke 2014 scans) I see four very different ink types, Rt0-Rt3, with
  well-defined coverage areas and sharp transitions between them. Rt0 are
  the original traces. Rt1 is the first round of restoration, that was
  applied to almost the entire text of this page, as well as many pages in
  the whole book. Presumably, the few parts that were not retraced by Rt1
  were still legible enough at the time. Rt2 and Rt3 are later rounds that
  retraced a few glyphs and words, or parts thereof.

  Rounds Rt2 and/or Rt3 may have been cases of what I call "back-tracing",
  when a scribe goes back and retraces some stuff that he recently traced
  himself. The back-traced glyphs then may come out darker only because
  the pen is more loaded with ink. But restoration and back-tracing are
  distinct processes from variations of darkness along the same trace, due
  to variations of pressure, ink flow, speed, etc. The distinctions
  between Rt1, Rt2, and Rt3 cannot be explained by such variations.

  Between Rt0 and Rt1 enough time passed for the Rt0 traces become so
  faint that the owner decided to commission a full restoration of the
  manuscript. The intervals between Rt1, Rt2, and Rt3 are less certain,
  but at least one of them was long enough for the leftover Rt0 traces,
  and possibly the Rt1 traces themselves, had faded substantially.


  at the point X3? As I see it, the original trace (A3) was wider,
  and the dark ink flowed only over the top 1/3 of that trace, for
  a little bit. It is not strange that the new ink speads over
  older traces. Those would have traces of binder, which is
  probably more wettable than blank parchment.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "???")

  h.parags(st, """I now have an idea Tweaking that idea about
  that bizarre f. I think that originally there was an isolated r in that
  gap.

  That is, the original text was ... ChtChy r Char ... The body of the r
  probably was where the darker of the two "shins" of the f is now,
  between points (A) and (B). The plume of the r went through ( C), curled
  up along the right "thigh" until a bit below the horizontal part of the
  f, turned 90 degrees at (D), and followed the horizontal arm to the end
  (E).Sorry, I take this part back. That o is almost certainly original. The
  Scribe did sometimes write gallows with the loops overlapping glyphs on
  the previous line.
  here it is again, with the conjectured r in dotted magenta, with the
  estimated baseline and topline in blue.

  The rest of the previous post still stand: I guess that, by the time the
  Restorer(s) did their job, the r had all but faded away. They got
  confused by the ghost of the dark band from f47v (why should I be the
  only VMS reader with Superior Pareidolia?) , and "restored" the r as
  that bizarre "sitting f".

  The (J) and (K) on the first image are the offset print from the flower
  on f46v, and the o that I think was invented by a Restorer, confused by
  that print.Actually I now have an idea about
  that bizarre f. Note the greenish smudge just to the left of it. That is
  a leaf on the other side of the folio (f47v). The green paint on that
  leaf is heavier than usual, and a streak of dark material seems to have
  oozed out of the paint and collected along the left and bottom edge of
  the painted area. (Not as badly as in the dark blue areas on the flowers

  above, but perhaps the same substance. We know that the Painter is
  rather cavalier about cleaning the brush when switching colors...)

  That dark stripe on f47v seems to be precisely opposite to that bizarre
  f on f47r. So perhaps the Restorer mistook the ghost of that dark stripe
  for a faded glyph, and "restored" it...

  double-legged and weird 'f' (or 'p'?) on the same page, in the lower
  right (not that I can say what this might mean)

  I can't explain it either, except note that this f is a Frankenstein
  monster of restorations, and it crosses or touches glyphs on the line
  above and on the line below. Who knows what it was originally.

  By the way, there is another interesting case in that same area.

  Note that there is a light brown crescent shape just to the SW of that
  glyph. That turns out to be an offset print from a dark blue flower on
  page f46v. That particular blue paint seems to have a component that
  collects along the edges of the painted area and then leaves offset
  traces on the facing page.

  Just inside that crescent there is an o that crosses the loop of the t
  on the line below. That o is restored (probably Rt2) and happens to
  match in part the outline of that flower offset.

  So my guess is that the o was not there originally, but the Rt2 Restorer
  mistook the flower offset for text and "restored" a non-existent o on
  that spot...
  since we are looking at f47r, consider
  the very first glyph on the page.

  The arm and hook are those of a p. But it has two legs. More precisely,
  one and a half. What is it?

  If it is original, it would be either a one-of-a-kind weirdo, or a p
  with an extra leg added as some bizarre form of decoration.

  But I would now say "neither". That was originally a simple p. On round
  Rt1 the loops, arm, and hook were retraced (a bit clumsily). On that
  occasion the Restorer (who presumably did not know the Voynichese
  alphabet) added the left half-leg by mistake, perhaps by confusion with
  the two-legged gallows...

  ??? explain the ligting of page f115r

  Yes, I am well aware of the
  changes in darkness due to mere variations of ink flow. Like suddenly
  darker after dipping the pen in ink, then gradually lighter as the pen
  runs out of ink. Or when the Scribe him/herself goes back and corrects
  some mistakes. Or when he/she presumably mixes a new batch of ink
  halfway through a page. But those are easy to spot because (1) the hue
  of the ink does not change, and (2) the sequence makes sense considering
  the way he/she must have operated.

  And I am well aware of the chemistry of iron-gall ink.

  however, the restorations by the Restorer are quite distinctive in both
  counts. The ink is not just darker, but has a different hue and
  appearance: almost black, tending to purple rather than yellow -- as one
  would expect from iron-gall ink. And it is applied in an unsystematic
  manner: either on parts (text or figures) where the original ink had
  clearly faded with time, or to add details that clearly were not there
  initially, like the crowns and "lobed showercaps" in the Zodiac pages.

  Of the images you posted, f75r and the starred parags section are
  examples of the former. Whereas f73r clearly shows the difference
  between normal ink flow effects (e.g. in the text rings) and the
  Retoucher's work. The former can be seen, for instance, in the middle
  text ring at about 02:00: note how the traces become gradually fainter,
  then suddenly darker but with the same yellowish brown hue.

  In contrast, note how the darker labels are uniformly dark, while the
  lighter ones, by comparison, are uniformly light apart from normal
  ink-flow variations. On higher resolution images, as one can download
  from the Beinecke site, original faint yellowish brown strokes can be
  seen in places under the dark labels; for instance, the "feet" of the k
  gallows on the okedal label in the outer-band at 07:00.

  On the figures, note how the darker strokes cannot be explained by ink
  flow variations or the original Scribe going back to fix mistakes and
  accidental faint strokes. The darker ink was applied to the right breast
  of almost every nymph, and to the left breasts, nipples, eyes, eyebrows,
  and other details of some of them, apparently at random. Check the left
  thigh of the outer nymph at 05:30, the right thigh of the one at 07:30,
  and the right arm of the inner nymph at 11:00. All three are (wrongly)
  retraced over a light yellowish brown trace, which the Restorer
  apparently did not notice. And the dark traces on hair and "showercaps"
  of some nymphs are clearly spurious additions.

  It would be very helpful if Beinecke provided some really high
  resolution images, even if only of small selected areas of selected
  pages. High enough that one could see whether glyphs or figure details
  have been traced once or twice.

  PS - don't waste time and space downloading the "full size original
  (tiff)" images from the Beinecke site. They are the same as the "Full
  size (jpg)" images, merely converted to the much more wasteful TIFF
  format. With the same resolution and JPEG encoding artifacts.

  one may easily go overboard with the "splitting". But it is a
  consensus that several distinct agents added stuff to the VMS: the quire
  numbers, the folio numbers, the month names, the marginal "letter"
  tables, the 116v and other "semi-Roman" text, the penciled "a" and "b"
  on f70r, the Jacobus signature... While some of these "agents" may have
  been the same person, it is very unlikely that they all were the same
  Scribe who penned all of the text. So the existence of a Restorer would
  not be extraordinary.

  On the other hand, I tend to agree with that earlier handwriting expert
  that there was only one original Scribe, who wrote all the text and drew
  all the figures in the same yellowish brown ink. I respect Lisa's
  expertise, but I believe that it does not apply to the VMs -- because
  its nature and the circumstances of its creation are quite unlike those
  of most manuscripts that she built her expertise upon. The variations in
  glyph shapes that are supposed to indicate different "hands" on
  different pages is dwarfed by the similarities that indicate the
  opposite.

  a statistical summary of the nymphs and stars in the
  Zodiac section. Maybe this file can help. It is (or was meant to be) a
  verbal description of every page of the VMs.

  The restoration must have been decades sfter the original scribing, because the
  obvious motivation was that the original writing had faded out to the
  point of becoming almost illegible.

  Also, the original Scribe must have known the Voynichese alphabet and
  must have been supervised by the Author who invented the script (if they
  were not the same person); whereas the Restorer seems to have worked
  independently and did not know the alphabet. The Restorer was generally
  very careful while retracing the text, but, IIRC, there are a few cases
  where he/she mangled a glyph into an invalid squiggle.

  ???
  Only the first restoration round required high effort and extreme
  precision -- and it was so good and extensive that most people still
  cannot see it. That restoration left out only parts that were so faded
  that the Restorer himself did not see them, parts that could not be
  easily retraced (like the tips of plumes and tails), and parts that were
  still acceptably clear. But a couple centuries later the latter had
  faded further, and the contrast with retraced parts became much more
  pronounced.

  later restoration rounds were much more limited and clearly did not care
  much about fidelity and quality.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "f72r2 (Gemini)")

  h.parags(st, """Take for example the nymph on the outer band of f72r2 (Gemini) at
  ~10:30.

  This is my guess at how the Original Scribe drew her:

  This is my guess at what she looked like a couple centuries later, when
  the owner decided to restore the manuscript:

  And this is how she looks like now:

  To be fair, I believe that there were at least two rounds of restoration:
  the first one very careful and faithful to the original, but who may
  have left some parts un-retraced. And later came another Restorer who,
  not satisfied with retracing faded parts, also added several details of
  his own, just for the fun of it.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "f75v top pond")

  h.section(st, 3, "???, three nymphs in ???") 

  h.parags(st, """The double stroke on the right side of the torso of
  the top left of the three nymphs in the ??? has been iterpreted as
  her left arm. However the leftmost (darker) of the two strokes
  that make the spike is an addition by a Restorer. Who also added
  the right breast.

  My best guess is that the original figure did not have a left arm,
  and the rightmost (lighter) of those two strokes was the outline
  of her torso and belly. The Restorer mistook it for the left arm
  and added a new outline for the torso, which he assumed had been
  lost.

  Here is my guess for what the nymph on ??? looked like:""")

  hr.image_parag(st, "f80v/nymphs/original-guess.png", thumb_width, "Original guess")
  hr.image_parag(st, "f80v/nymphs/original-over.png", thumb_width, "Guess over current")

  h.parags(st, """The proposed original above has the features of many other nymphs,
  including the two other nymphs in that group: The outline of the left
  breast is just a deviation of the torso outline Only one arm and
  shoulder are visible What is a bit unusual is that the nymph is rather
  quite well on the plump side. But that is the case even if we take the
  other trace as being the outline of the torso.

  The face is qustionable, though. It is quite possible that the
  original had a smaller chin, about where the mouth is now. Note that the
  original nose was a bit shorter than the current one. Maybe the Restorer
  mistook the mouth for the bottom of the nose, and the chin for the
  mouth.""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Page f2r")

  h.parags(st, """Restoration is visible on the flowers of the plant on page f2r.
  Many petals in the central part of the the three corollas were
  partly retraced, not very carefully. Many of the original strokes,
  whose ink is lighter than the retracing one, are clearly visible
  sticking out from under the the retraced ones.  Apparently the
  original ink in those areas was partly washed away when the 
  salmon-pink paint was applied there.

  In the text of f2r, clear evidence of restoration are the glyphs @'ld'
  in the word @'daiildy' at the end of line 8 (head line of P2).
  Those two glyphs are not only darker than those around and below
  them, but are also free of the whitegrain that pervades the latter.
  The @'da' in that same word must have been restored as well.""") 

  h.parags(st, """??? f2r most of the text is restored.

  The word @'{Sh}eey' too (like many others) also may have been
  restored almost entirely, leaving the original ink only in the
  lower part of the plume on @{Sh} and of the tail on @y.

  In the words @'dls' and @'q&136ky' at the start of lines 9 and 10,
  it appears that the whole words were retraced once, leaving out only
  the tip of the tails of the @l and the @q, and maybe a short section
  (~0.3 mm) at the end of the horz arm of the @q, where it connects to
  the next glyph. Compare, for example, the @q of the second word with
  the initial @y on line 11, just below it. The tail of the @y in
  @'q&136ky', on the other hand, was clearly retraced with a slow and
  hence thicker (~0.2 mm wide) all the way to the tip.

  This first restoration apparently included the unique plume on the @o
  (that turned it into &136). It is not possible to tell whether it
  was present in the original.

  But then those two words were affected by a second restoration event,
  with even darker ink, that reinforced the @d (maybe leaving out the
  bottom of the lower loop), the plume of the @s (with two separate
  very thin strokes, ~0.2 mm wide), the (incomplete) @o (without the
  plume), the legs of the @k, and the @y (but only the head and the
  first ~1 mm of the tail).""")

  h.section(st, 3, "Discussion")

  h.parags(st, """From the example of @'{Sh}eey' on line 9, one may conjecture that 
  most of the text of this page was in fact restored.

  General restoration of the text could explain several malformed glyphs
  and the absence of whitegrain on most of it. However, it would require
  extreme painstaking care by the Restorer. (Or washing away the the
  remains of the original ink, if it was not iron-gall.)""" )

  h.parags(st, """On restored words and glyphs, the only parts of the original writing
  that are still visible are usually the ends of tails of glyphs like
  @l and @y, which end by tapering down to a long point. The
  explanation is tha those original tails were drawn by a single quick
  movement of the pen, with decreasing pressure. But the Restorer had
  to move the pen always quite slowly, in order to follow the original
  path precisely. If he had traced the full extent of those tails,
  they would have become thicker and would end with a blunt end, not
  with a long tapering point. That is in fact what happened when the
  @y in the @'q&136ky' was retraced (or re-retraced) down to the end
  of its tail. Therefore, in order to avoid that "obviously retraced"
  look, he had to stop the retracing of a long tail as soon as it
  became narrower than the narrowest /slow/ trace that he could
  produce (apparently, at least 0.2 mm wide).""")


  h.parags(st, """OK, maybe not everybody can do it. But the original
  Scribe did that routinely. He controlled the position and width of
  his strokes with ~0.1 mm precision, at normal writing speed, without
  a sweat.

  When writing a Ch, for example, he would write an e and then an h
  with the tip of the ligature precisely touching the tip of the e.
  Ditto when writing s, t, etc. And the original figure outlines are
  generally ~0.2 mm wide, independently of direction.

  In the first example of this post, while the restorer went
  off-course on some glyphs, he precisely retraced many others. Had he
  used a broader pen (instead of a narrower one) and ink of matching
  color, it would be hard to tell that those glyphs had been
  retraced.

  Another common cause for variations in stroke weight
  (darkness and/or width) is the normal ink flow dynamics. After the
  pen is recharged by dipping it into the inkwell, the first word or
  two come out heavier than normal, because there is some ink
  sticking to the very tip of the nib. But in that brief interval the
  weight of the strokes drops to the "normal" level. From then on,
  the flow of the ink -- from the little reservoir up into the
  quill's hollow down to the tip -- is regulated by the opening and
  closing of the two tines of the nib, as the pen is is pressed down
  and lifted off. That steady-state regime continues for a line or
  two, until the reservoir gets exhausted. Then the strokes quickly
  become fainter and fainter. At that point the Scribe would recharge
  the pen, and the cycle would repeat.""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/???normal ink flow dynamics")

  h.parags(st, """(However, a really good scribe would recharge well
  before the strokes started to fade, and he would also scribble a
  bit on a separate scrap paper after recharging to get into the
  "normal" regime before resuming the work -- so that the weight
  would be uniform through the whole document.

  Another cause of weight variation is the Scribe "back-tracing" --
  going back and retracing some glyph or stroke that he just wrote,
  because it came out malformed or too faint.

  And then there may be cases where the Scribe could not figure out
  a glyph from the draft, so he left that position blank, later asked
  the Author, and then went back and filled the gap -- with a freshly
  recharged pen.

  And it may also have happened, as you say, that a stroke became
  darker than normal by accident --- the pen hit some imperfection of
  the vellum, or the Scribe sneezed, or whatever...

  BUT STILL, besides all those "original" weight variations, there
  are many cases where the only explanation is that the strokes were
  retraced by someone who knew even less about the Voynichese script
  and figures than we do now, and did not have access to the draft or
  the Author. You have two such examples in that f1v clip (B and I),
  within a few square cm...""")

  h.section(st, 2, "Some examples")

  h.parags(st, """Instances of probable restoration can be seed on almost
  every page of the VMS. Here are some annotated examples. While each
  instance by itself could be explained in other ways, I believe that
  the sheer number of cases makes restoration the only viable
  explanation.

  *NOTE*: The claims in image captions are all
  personal guesses with varied degrees of confidence. For brevity,
  they are stated as facts; however, the reader should assume
  disclaimers such as "apparently", "probably", "it seems that", etc.
  before every claim that is not totally evident from the images.""")

  #@@@

  h.section(st, 3, "VMS pages")

  bash("( ls -d f[0-9][0-9][0-9][rv][0-9] ) | sort > .pages")
  hr.links_section(st)

  h.section(st, 3, "Other manuscripts")

  bash("( ls -d images/x[0-9][0-9][0-9] ) | sort > .pages")
  hr.links_section(st)

  h.section(st, 2, "Tracing and retracing of circles")

  h.parags(st, """Practically all the circles in the Zodiac and Cosmo
  sections were originally drawn with a compass (as opposed to by
  hand or by tracing around a template). The lightest parts of
  those circles ('A' in the f71v clip below) are very smooth and
  the radii seem to be all different.""")

  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f070v1/ctext-i-0300",  thumb_width)
  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f070v1/ctext-i-0900",  thumb_width)

  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f069v1/ctext-1030-retr",  thumb_width)
  hr.sub_link_parag(st, "f069v1/ctext-1030-skew",  thumb_width)

  h.parags(st, """On pages with such "mechanical" circles
  is a pinprick in the parchment where the "dry" point of the
  compass ahould have been planted. It is best seen in the
  transmitted-light multsipectral images:""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/???compass-pric-ms")

  h.parags(st, """The exceptions are some small circles, such as the one
  at the center of ???, which seem to have been drawn directly by hand.""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/???")

  h.parags(st, """Needless to say, if any part of any circle was
  originally traced with a compass, then all circles must have been
  originally wholly traced that way.

  however, most circles fail to close: the two ends often miss
  each other by up to a millimiter or two, and continue past each
  other by a centimeter or more, resulting in two parallel traces.
  I suppose that these defects could be explained by the parchment
  warping during the tracing, or by a compass that was not as
  rigid as it should be.

  The thinnest traces are ~0.1 mm wide and look like they have been
  drawn with "dry" compass point, like a pencil or a semi-sharp stylus that 
  scored the vellum.  However, some parts of the same 
  circles are a bit thicker (~0.3 mm) and
  darker, with the light yellowish-brown color of the ink used on that
  page. See 'B' in the clip above.  Since these "think ink" traces include 
  parts where circles are double-traced, it seems that 
  the circles were drawn using an ink attachment
  like that depicted in some contemporary manuscripts and 
  still used today.  The "dry" sections would then be those where 
  this attachment was low on ink or was adjusted so tighltly that
  the ink did not flow, so that the attachment acted more like a dry point.""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/??? ink attachment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bible_moralis%C3%A9e Codex Vindobonensis 2554, f.1 verso , you can it on the wikipedia page Bible moralisée  circa 1220 CE")

  h.parags(st, """However, other parts of the circles are jittery, not as
  smooth as the "no ink" or "thin ink" traces, and in a few spots they deviate from the
  underlying penciled circles. This is best seen on that same page, in the
  circles bounding the inner text band, around 03:00:""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/???ink attachment")

  h.parags(st, """Here 'A' are the original circles (~0.1mm, light, and smooth), and 'B'
  are the retraced ones (~0.3mm, darker, jittery). The latter deviate from
  the former by ~0.4 mm in the indicated spots.

  Thus these sections of the circles must have been retraced bu hand over the 
  original mechanical circles.

  Curiously, these hand-retraced retraced circles also fail to
  close, like the original thin traces did. If they were retraced
  by the original Scribe, one would expect that he would use the
  occasion to fix that defect of the penciled traces and join the
  two ends, or retrace only one of the ends.  This seems to be 
  another bit of evidence that the Restorer was not the original Scribe,
  but someone determined to retrace the original as
  faithfully as he could, defects and all.

  And then there are sections of the circles which are clearly retraced
  with a broader pen, and even less care. Like 'D' in the first clip...""")


  h.parags(st, """The straight lines that divide the sectors of ???and the 
  guiding lines of page ??? may have been done in pencil??? or with the
  same implement.""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/???Page ???")

  hr.image_parag(st, "https://www.voynich.ninja/attachment.php?aid=9304", thumb_width, "Occurrences of @qo on f31r")

  thread_link_url = "https://www.voynich.ninja/thread-4377-post-61607.html#pid61607"
  thread_link_text = ""this VoynichNinja post""
  h.parags(st, """This image is diecussed in""" + h.make_link(st, thread_link_url, thread_link_text, None, 0, 0) + """.""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/??????")

  h.parags(st, """In this example from the VMS, the @o{Ct}a was
  obviously retraced. In the original, the last glyph of the word
  was a y, but the Restorer (like us now) did not see its tail, and
  thus "restored" it as a. Also the glyph before the t may have been
  an e, which the Restorer mistook for a C...""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/??????")

  h.parags(st, """In this other example, from another manuscript, those abrupt
  weight changes may have indeed been quirks of the ink flow... but
  they may also be a case of the whole text having been restored, to
  fix the poor handwriting of the scribe who first did the job.""")

  # hr.???sub_link_parag"images/??????")

  h.parags(st, """For instance, in the p198b fragment, note that the left half of
  the "9" glyph is narrower and lighter than the right half, and its
  shape is rather "lame". Imagine the whole text being written with
  such strokes. I think it would make sense that another scribe was
  charged with restoration the whole thing with a slightly wider pen
  and more decisive strokes.

  But, as in the VMS, the Restorer could not redo the tails and
  plumes, because the slower retracing would have made them fat,
  with blunt ends.

  Anyway, that example was indeed fully restored, it probably
  happened shortly after the original scribing, and using the same
  ink. Which is not the case of much restoration in the VMS.

  In that f1v clip that I posted, mistakes B and I happened because
  insects had completely eaten part of the original glyphs. You can
  see the scraping clearly in other parts of that page, and even
  more of it on page f1r. The damage was such that the Restorer
  mistook the remaining half of one plume as being attached to the
  wrong glyph by the wrong end (the B "weirdo") and failed to see
  the surviving tip of the other plume (the I case). It is unlikely
  that the damage happened while the original Scribe and Author were
  still around.  Backtracing cannot explain cases B and
  I, or even the other cases, in the clip ??? I posted.""")

  h.output_doc(st, sys.stdout, 99, last_edit)
  return 0
  # ----------------------------------------------------------------------

def test_html_gen():
  txt = "We need (/weed/) but not (*knot*)"
  h.err("[[" + txt + "]] -> [[" + h.simple_markup(txt) + "]]\n")
  return 
  # ----------------------------------------------------------------------

# test_html_gen()
main()