Folder: MAIL/folders-splitted/vm-folders/inbox-2003-05-22-semifiltered From VM Wed Sep 25 09:29:30 2002 Message-Id: <200209250531.g8P5VXh4019526@mail3.alphalink.com.au> Reply-To: jguy@alphalink.com.au Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 15:31:22 +1000 From: Jacques Guy To: voynich@cryptogram.org (Voynich Ms. mailing list) Subject: VMs: Re: Question from a newbie 24/09/02 11:18:18, Dennis wrote: > Welcome! ... > I don't recall anyone's suggesting that [a syllabary]. The Voynich > alphabet, as we've understood it, we think has about 23 'real' > characters, plus ligature forms, rare characters, etc. That would be > too few for a syllabary. It might, only just might do, for Piraha, an Amazonian language with 7 consonants and 3 vowels, ignoring its two tones, and breaking up its consonant clusters, Linear-B style. (Jorge, they're your next-door neighbours, how about... oh, just pulling your leg). It couldn't do for Rotokas, because its 6 consonants and 5 vowels make 35 different syllables, even though Rotokas has no consonant clusters. You have to turn to artificial languages, and even among those, I see only Solresol which would easily be accomodated (but Solresol was invented long after the VMs was written). There is also Zikamu. But I invented it, and I swear, solemnly swear under penalty of perjury, that I did not write the VMs! Someone else must have done it, guv!