A Possible Crib: "Forty days and forty nights"

There are two similar passages in the Rohonc codex where the number 40 is written twice in succession, as in the following case on page 5 line R11:

B1CU CURE B1CU CO D CO D IX T T T T D T T T T K1OA A D CX

And also the following, starting on page 120 L9 and ending on 121 R1:

B1CU IX XB B1CU C D CO D IX T T T T D

IX T T T T X2 K O A D CX CURJX XB B1CU C XB B1CU

The two passages are nearly parallel, but not entirely so. In the first one, the glyphs K and O were written so closely together that my transcription code took them to be a ligature, K1OA. In the second, they are clearly written separately. The second version also repeats IX before the second instance of the number 40, and appears to have a double dot after the last T of the sequence representing 40.

I googled the phrase "quadraginta * quadraginta", to get a rough idea of cases in Latin texts where the number 40 is repeated twice in close succession. (I used Latin in order to select texts in the right semantic domain and era, not because I have decided the language of this text is Latin.) As I had guessed, the most common phrase was quadraginta diebus et quadraginta noctibus, "for forty days and forty nights". This is the period of time for which it rained in Noah's flood, and the period of time for which Jesus fasted in the desert.

If this is a crib, then I suggest the following:

IX: a preposition like "for". Its second appearance on page 121 is completely natural, making only the difference between "for forty days and forty nights" and "for forty days and for forty nights".

T T T T: the number "forty"

D: "days" (or an abbreviation therefor)

K O A: "night" (perhaps plural, perhaps inflected)

It is possible that the word "nights" should include all of the glyphs K O A D CX, but I propose minimally K O A on the basis of page 13 L2:

XU CC D C XVA CV QO ? ? ? XDAS N IX I XVOA N

The end of this line contains the sequence IX I XVOA, where XVOA (a relatively common glyph) looks very much like a ligature of K O A. If so, then this sequence could read "for one night".

Some languages use the singular noun after a number greater than one, while others use the plural. It is possible that D CX contains a plural marker, but an analysis of numbers throughout the text should be done before we say that.

The XVOA glyph appears 65 times in my current transcription, overwhelmingly in the sequence C XVOA C. It may be fruitful to hunt for languages where a relatively common word contains within it the sounds of the word for "night".

Tachygraphic systems

I've been reading articles on Tironian notation and what is known about Greek tachygraphy. The most careful discussion of the topic I've come across yet is the article by F. W. G. Float, "On Old Greek Tachygraphy", in the 1901 Journal of Hellenic Studies.

Float points out that different shorthand systems are designed to accomplish different goals: Tachygraphic systems are designed for quick writing; Stenographic systems are meant to preserve space. Either type of system may emphasize clarity or secrecy to some degree.

Tironian notation is simply amazing. Tironian notae encode a modicum of phonetic information--as much as is needed to distinguish a less common word from a more common one--but I would guess that the average nota encodes less phonetic information than the average Chinese character, arguably making the notae tironianae more ideographic than Chinese.

Many of the classical tachygraphic systems seem to encode syllables. In my last post I had said that there were too many symbols in the Rohonc script for it to be a syllabary, but I was thinking of syllabaries that are based on (C)V syllables. For comparison with Latin, where syllables are more complex, I took the book of Genesis from the Vulgata, divided all of the words syllabically, and counted the unique syllables. There were 1139--roughly the same as the number of unique Rohonc symbols. It is not impossible that the Rohonc script could be (partly) syllabic.

Comparison with Tironian notes

The Rohonc script appears to have on the order of one thousand glyphs. This is far more than one would expect in an alphabet or syllabary, but the most common glyphs are too common to represent morphemes.

It seems there is a relatively small number of core glyphs, some apparent ideograms, and several strategies to extend basic glyphs into more complex ones. These strategies include the addition of new lines and dots (C -> CE); the rotation or reversal of existing glyphs (C -> Q, XD -> XDA); and the use of ligatures (B + CU -> B1CU).

Similar strategies are used in some abugida systems like Ge'ez and Kharosthi, but the historical and geographic context of the Rohonc codex excludes any connection to these systems and their relatives.

I am not aware of any abugida system used in Europe around the 16th century. However, there was a system of scribal shorthand in use up until the 16th century called Tironian notes. Numerous extensions of this system were apparently developed with 1100, 4000, 5000 and 14000 notes.

Like the Rohonc script, Tironian notation has a relatively small number of core marks, extended to more complex marks using similar strategies to the Rohonc script. Indeed, an astonishing number of Tironian notae are similar to or even identical to Rohonc glyphs.

That is not to say that the two systems are the same. The most obvious difference is that the Rohonc script is written right-to-left. In addition, some I can't find Tironian equivalents for some of the most common Rohonc glyphs, and vice-versa.

However, among the writing systems that might have influenced the Rohonc script, Tironian notation has many features that make it a good candidate for further investigation.

Parallel Passages

There are a number of parallel passages in the Rohonc Codex. I came across one last night, and decided to compare the two versions of the passage side-by-side. I was able to identify several glyphs that my current transcription treats as different which should apparently be the same.

I also found an instance of alternate spelling, which may eventually provide some insight into the phonology of some of these glyphs. Compare the following from page 1 R4:

D CX D IX W CO D C3Q L C I CX D CX D C1FR CURE KB

and the following overlapping passage from page 124 R6:

C3Q L I1G CX D CX D C1FR XB KBAD O I CX CUNW

It appears that the word written L C I in the first line is written L I1G in the second line. It is possible that the two words are synonyms, or that the two glyph sequences are similar in sound. Perhaps I1G represents a palatalized form of C in the presence of I (or something like that).

Zipf's Law in the Rohonc Codex

I've added a column showing frequencies to the catalog of glyphs that accompanies my in-process transcription of the Rohonc codex.

Of course, the first thing one wants to do with glyph frequencies is to see if Rohoncian obeys Zipf's Law. At first blush, it would seem not, because we have the following distribution for the top ten glyphs:

Glyph	Frequency	Frequency * Rank
C	4952	4952
I	4902	9804
D	3816	11448
CO	2983	11932
N	2588	12940
O	2572	15432
H	1657	11599
IX	1538	12304
CX	1402	12618
CX1Q	899	8990

However, this distribution supports something I have suspected already: CO, C and CX are probably the same glyph. I separated them in my transcription because I decided it would be easier to merge glyphs later. But, I suspected that they might be the same because they are apparently interchangeable in the Holy Noun.

If CO, C and CX are merged, then the distribution appears as follows:

Glyph	Frequency	Frequency * Rank
C, CO, CX	9337	9337
I	4902	9804
D	3816	11448
N	2588	10352
O	2572	12860
H	1657	9942
IX	1538	10766
CX1Q	899	8990

It's still not perfect, but it is much closer to a normal Zipf distribution.

Rohonc Transcription online (as-is)

My transcription is still only 90% complete. I estimate about 20 more hours of work would be required to finish the remaining 10%, but it is hard for me to find that kind of time.

So rather than let the perfect be the enemy of the good, I have put the transcription online as-is, with the hope that I can continue to refine and update it as I go along.

I have thrown together a website: http://quint.us/Roho. This site is ugly as sin, because I wrote it with an emphasis of function over form. There may well be bugs, but hopefully they are rare. The site provides four basic pieces of functionality:

Download: Download my current revision of the transcription.

Search: Search the transcription.

Browse: Browse the page images and transcription.

Glyphs: View the catalog of glyphs.

As I refine the transcription system and the transcription, I will also work on the site to make it less ugly and more functional. Every time I update the transcription, I will increment the minor revision number. Every time I update the transcription system, I will increment the major revision number.

My system of transcription represents glyphs as strings of capital letters and numbers. The primary goal of the transcription system was to uniquely identify apparently unique glyphs. The secondary goal was to make transcriptions for similar glyphs similar in form. (For example, glyphs whose transcriptions begin with C have shapes that begin with the same semicircular stroke).

When I am less tired, I'll write up a better description of the transcription system.

Happy hunting. I welcome any kind of feedback on the site. Please leave a comment or email me at rst140720@quint.us if you have a suggestion.