SIR WALTER RALEIGH, EL DORADO, AND RENFUSA
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June 23, 2009
Sir Walter Raleigh reported that on his 1594 trip to South America, he learned of a large lake, Parime, on the shores of which was the city of Manoa… or “El Dorado”. He did not visit or see the lake or city, mostly because neither actually existed, then or now. Whether he mistakenly believed stories of the natives, or got the stories he did hear, wrong, or more darkly, he was spicing things up to impress Elizabeth… all are possible, from what I know of this so far. Here is a later engraving of Manoa, made from his descriptions:
Manoa: a Fantasy City
According to Wikipedia:
“Once back in England, he published The Discovery of Guiana,an account of his voyage which made exaggerated claims as to what had been discovered. The book can be seen as a contribution to the El Dorado legend. Although Venezuela has gold deposits, there is no evidence Raleigh found any mines. He is sometimes said to have discovered Angel Falls, but these claims are considered “far-fetched”.”
So Manoa, Parime, and El Dorado, all fiction. And any illustrations of them, fictional. But if we found an illustration of Manoa, today, with no labels which we could read, would many be looking for these buildings and castles as fruitlessly as one may have back in Raleigh’s time? I’ve no doubt at all. We don’t look for them only because we know these images are of fictional places and buildings. And if we saw the fantasy entrance city to New Atlantis, called Renfusa, illustrated in some mysterious cipher text, would we recognize it? Or would we continue to search for the “real” castles of the rosettes page of the Voynich Manuscript?
Another Map of the Fictional Manoa, with Fantasy Buildings
Also another quote from Wiki, relating to his poetry:
“Raleigh is generally considered one of the foremost poets of the Elizabethan era. His poetry is generally written in the relatively straightforward, unornamented mode known as the plain style. C. S. Lewis considered Raleigh one of the era’s “silver poets”, a group of writers who resisted the Italian Renaissance influence of dense classical reference and elaborate poetic devices.”, and “…while achieving a power and originality that justifies Lewis’ assessment, and contradicts it by expressing a melancholy sense of history reminiscent of The Tempest and all the more effective for being the product of personal experience.”
So what does this tell us? First of all, once again we see the fascination and importance of “the fictional city”, the exploration of new worlds, the Utopia, and of forgotten or unknown cultures and lore, which pervades the art, theatre, poetry, history, religion, literature and politics near the time I suspect the Voynich was created (1610 to 1620). Shakespeare was including it in his plays, Bacon in his philosophies and the New Atlantis, Jonson in his plays, and everyone in their art. And the objects from the new world appeared in the curio cabinets… Kunstkammers… all over Europe, right alongside the microscopes and telescopes and kayaks. And the plants (sunflowers for one) and animals (armadillos, alligators) of the New World were also included in these collections, and influential to many aspects of the early 17th century Renaissance culture.
And here is Sir Walter Raleigh, as one of this very circle, as both a source and an outlet for much of this lore and culture. He fits right in with the others, whom we see borrowing from Medieval alchemy, herbals, art and lore, and combining it with both their discoveries in science and the New World, into an amalgam of truth, error, and fiction. Raleigh was an important, many toothed-gear in the machinery of his time, contributing much to both to the real and mythical lore of his time… and adding to one of the greatest myths, of all time. H.R. SantaColoma
—adapted from a 2008 post on the VMS-net list.
–edited for addition, 6/28/09: I came across an interesting fact which ties Raleigh’s first Virginia expedition directly to Bacon’s New Atlantis… well, not a “fact” so much, as a person. It seems the Jewish scientist in The New Atlantis, Joabim, is believed based on the real Joachim Gaunse… a man of some repute for his abilities in metallurgy. And Joachim Gaunse was on Raleigh’s expedition as a metallurgist and mining supervisor. The symbiotic relationships between the people of Raleigh’s circle are decernable without such connections, but it was nonetheless gratifying to find one. Rich Santacoloma.
The Fictional Walled City, Renfusa, from The New Atlantis?
Posted in Dating the VMs, fantasy | 2 Comments »
The Book M, John Heydon, and the Book of Solomon
June 20, 2009
The Rosicrucian Fama Fraternitatis makes reference to several important works. The “Book M” is one of these. From meta-religion.com:
“In Damcar, the Fama recounts the learned men ‘to whom Nature was discovered’ received the precocious boy ‘not as a stranger but as one whom the had long expected; they called him by his name, and showed him many other secrets’ – among them mathematics, physics, alchemy, and a document the Fama refers to as the Book M. This last treasure, whose full name is thought by some to be Book Mundi, or Book of the World, is said to have held the secrets of the universe. Young Rosenkreutz decided that he would translate this prodigious work into Latin, so that he might share it with others upon his return to Europe.”
And what language was Rosenkreutz translating this book “out of”, if “into” Latin? From the Fama:
“After this manner began the Fraternity of the Rosie Cross–first, by four persons only, and by them was made the magical language and writing, with a large dictionary, which we yet dayly use to God’s praise and glory, and do find great wisdom therein.”
So the answer is, that the Book M was written in a, “magical language and writing”. Now from New Atlantis, about the Book of Solomon:
“Some think it beareth the founder’s name a little corrupted, as if it should be Solomon’s House. But the records write it as it is spoken. So as I take it to be denominate of the King of the Hebrews, which is famous with you, and no strangers to us; for we have some parts of his works which with you are lost; namely, that natural history which he wrote of all plants, from the cedar of Libanus to the moss that groweth out of the wall; and of all things that have life and motion.”
So in New Atlantis, in Bensalem, we have the lost works of Solomon, which included “…all plants…”, and “…all things that have life and motion.” Now I come to a man, John Heydon, described by Elias Ashmole as “an ignoramus and a cheat”, and Francis Yates as a, “strange character…an astrologer, geomancer, alchemist, of a most extreme type.”
See wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Heydon
John Heydon wrote “The Holy Guide” (pub. 1662), in which he shamelessly rips off Bacon’s New Atlantis, and re-writes many portions of it as a straightforward Rosicrucian text. Of course the New Atlantis is undeniably Rosicrucian in it’s premise, and contains not only RC tenets and philosophy, but also RC symbolism. But Heydon took it a step further, and stripped away Bacon’s reluctance, in a sense, in his version. On the lost works of Solomon reference in NA, Heydon reworks this into,
“…we have some parts of works which with you are lost, namely the Rosie Crucian M, which he wrote of all things past, present, and to come”.
We might ask “of what importance?” is Heydon’s later interpretation of The New Atlantis? Yates and others saw his view of the work as the intent of the work, and also how the work was perceived in his time, i.e., as a Rosicrucian document. It is considered that Bacon, or his friend and posthumous publisher, in being cautious, stripped The New Atlantis of the most obvious and direct Rosicrucian references. James I would not have been open to such RC references and connections. The later John Heydon can be seen as having returned, or added, originally references which reflect the intent of the work.
Now imagine if a faux book were created, meant to look either like the Book M, or the Book of Solomon, from New Atlantis, between about 1610 to 1620. Would it not have a look of mystery, and yet contain many plants, and scientific devices, both familiar and yet somehow mysterious? And contain both borrowed and invented bits of astrology, astronomy… all perhaps Hermetic-inspired, but enigmatic illustrations of these themes, nonetheless? And in addition we know that if such a book were created, it would need to be written in a “magical language and writing”, in order to accurately reflect the fictional original. And it would, to complete the effect, have to be made to much older look than it really was. But unavoidably, it would possibly give us a sense, today, of a “newness”, because it would be difficult to mimic exactly the look of a book one to two hundred years older. We can only imagine it, because so far as we know, no such book has been found. And if the Voynich is such a book, it would be the first, with nothing exactly like it to compare it to.
The Book M was not alone in the crypt with the well preserved remains of our mysterious figure:
In the tomb of Rosenkreutz, “In another chest were looking-glasses of divers virtues, as also in another place were little bells, burning lamps, and chiefly wonderful artificial songs–”
Of course I am struck by the inclusion of “looking-glasses of divers virtues”, as they are clearly not referring to glasses simply as corrective vision, but either telescopes of microscopes, or both. Optics both as devices and a concept ran through the philosophies of the time, and were a tool of the new movement toward inductive reasoning. The tomb of Rosenkreutz and the New Atlantis contained optics for much the same reasons: for what they meant to the new concepts promulgated by the Rosicrucian movement. And, as I personally would argue, why I believe optics may have been included in the Voynich.
Looking at these fantasy cipher tomes: Book M, The Book of Solomon from Bensalem… and remember, Prospero’s books: I’m not so certain, if all three of these faux books were created in 1610/20, that we would be able to tell them apart today… or, for that matter, apart from the Voynich Manuscript. And if the Voynich is one of these books, everyone has been looking for answers in the wrong places, which would then make it unsurprising that no answers have been found.
-post adapted and updated from a May 2008 VMS-net entry
Tags:bensalem, book m, book of solomon, Fama Fraternitatis, john heydon, microscope, new atlantis, optics, prospero, telescope
Posted in codes and ciphers, Dating the VMs, fantasy, history & provenance, optics | Leave a Comment »
There’s No Place Like Utopia
June 15, 2009
As I pointed out in my It’s Fantastic! post, the Tower in the Hole from the rosettes page is often (always?) bypassed by those seeking a match of a building from the page to some real structure. But then, the rosettes map as a whole is also bypassed by those looking for a real location of the included structures. One quick look at the rosettes page might suggest the reason:
It is just plain bizarre. The page includes the Voynich’s usual disregard for scale, and it’s usual flamboyant decoration. But it is clearly a place, as it has towers, castles, houses, walls, terraces, walkways, columned buildings, courtyards, and what could be fountains. There are terraced heights. It appears to be surrounded by water, making it an island, or an island continent. In my opinion, it is certainly not a not a real place, and not meant to be. But if it is not a real place, then it is fantasy place, or, “no place”. More exactly, it is a Utopia, because that is exactly what the word means, as first coined by Sir Thomas Moore for his 1516 book of the same name.
The points to this post are twofold: First, as I wrote, that I feel that the rosettes page is meant to represent a fictional place, and second, that such a concept was very familiar to, and reflected by, the people of my suspected circle of influence. Here are some of them, with copy and illustrations adapted from my page on Utopias. There are links to some larger versions on that page.
Above is Thomas Moore’s Utopia from 1516, although I am not sure of the date of this illustration. Just like the Voynich’s rosettes map, you have Utopia surrounded by seas, with castles and buildings. Also of note is have the unique written language of the island, in cipher.
The above engraving first appeared in 1609, to illustrate the earlier Civitas Veri, or City of Truth by Bartolomeo Del Bene. We have here a utopia with towers, walls, castles, walkways, courtyards, orchards, and so on. From the excellent blog, Giornale Nouvo, which has extensive information on this work, and many others.
Above is Johannes Valentinus Andreae’s Christianopolis. Published in 1619, but the date of composition is unknown.
I was first drawn to Andreae by a seemingly curious coincidence. He admitted to being the author of The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkrantz, published in 1616. This is the third of the three fundamental and influential works of the Rosicrucian movement. The fact is that the Chemical Wedding parallels my New Atlantis theory in a notable way: It is a book written in the early 17th century, but which was intended to look as though it had been composed much earlier… 1459 in this case. This is quite what I am proposing for the Voynich… that it is an early 17th century work, made to look much older.
Think of the coincidence: We have here a man who wrote his own utopia, and probably wrote one of the three Rosicrucian manifestos, when Francis Bacon wrote a utopia, arguably containing references to Rosicrucian imagery and themes.
Above is The City of the Sun, 1602, by Tommaso Campanella. I have read somewhere that a man smuggled the manuscript for this work out of prison for Campanella, while he was incarcerated. The smuggler? Johannes Andreae.
Above is an illustration of Bacon’s New Atlantis. I’ve been unable to find the original source of this image, or the edition of New Atlantis it came from. I do not know the date, but suspect it is much later… possibly even, modern, in a faux 17th century style. The artist attempted to include as many of the fascinating inventions and discoveries found in Bacon’s landmark utopia as possible: Telescopes, microscopes, automatic fountains, hybrid plants and animals, and much more. Also note the large central castle, which seems to be the House of Solomon.
Update, as of October, 2011: Dan Wilson tracked down the artist, and the source, of this New Atlantis illustration. It is actually a 1970 drawing by the artist Lowell Hess, and appears in the book, “Graphic Design for the Computer Age”, by Edward A. Hamilton. From the book, “A profusion of fascinating details in the picture at right represents scientific wonders mentioned in Sir Francis Bacon’s The New Atlantis. Artist Lowell Hess, simulating the 17th-century engraving style, has extracted from Bacon’s prophetic guesswork such surprising ideas as a telephone (n) and a laser beam (e). The drawing is lightly humorous.” Although the drawing is modern, I do feel that the spirit in which Mr. Hess drew it, inspired by Bacon’s work, may be a parallel inspiration to our unknown, Voynich artist. Be sure to check out Dan Wilson’s thoughts on possible sonic meanings in the Voynich, also, at his site.
As you see, representations of utopias were all the rage during the time frame I propose for the Voynich (1610 to 1620), or close to it. Only the original work by Moore predates that range by a significant amount. More importantly, the utopia was often used by the people of my circle, or reflected the sciences and tenets they held dear. I contend that it should not surprise anyone in the least to find one more illustration of a utopia emerge from this time, by these people, for reasons we already know motivated them in similar pursuits… and that the Voynich’s rosettes, which is arguably “a” utopia, may be a map of “the” utopia, Bensalem, from Bacon’s New Atlantis.
