Talk:Codex Seraphinianus/Archive 1

Link
maybe a citation or link to this article? it provides a pretty good overview of the mystery of the work http://www.believermag.com/issues/200705/?read=article_taylor —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.69.101.138 (talk)
 * It's already in the external links section ;) -- Quiddity (talk) 20:40, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Language
Did he actually create a language, or at least encrypt sensible plaintext in his alienese, or is the text just nonsense? Or do we not know? EricDerKonig 206.154.229.139 18:31, 8 August 2007 (UTC)


 * It's unclear at this point. Although Serafini's still alive, he doesn't comment on the meaning or inspiration of the work.  Hofstatder's essay (cited in article) sheds some interesting light on it. 129.79.117.62 (talk) 15:51, 18 March 2008 (UTC)


 * So has he just come out and said whether or not it's even a real language or not? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.98.88.247 (talk) 16:11, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * No. Linguists who have looked into it mostly suggest that it is not real. +sj +  03:57, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Price
Should some mention go towards the absurd prices of some editions? Editions can go for up to £3,000! --79.65.96.35 (talk) 18:33, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't think so, based on the lack of given price in any other book articles. As for the absurd prices, that can be chalked up to Barnum's law ;) See also Book collecting. -- Quiddity (talk) 19:04, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
 * That's not unusual for rare and elegant books. +sj +  03:57, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

I am confus.
Why does this exist. 86.164.222.172 (talk) 15:13, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Luigi Serafini did it. -- Cycl o pia talk  15:25, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * But why did he do it? What was the point?  86.164.222.172 (talk) 15:50, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Art. -- Cycl o pia talk  15:56, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Nonsense. >:  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.164.222.172 (talk) 17:47, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * If you read the article, you'll find that nonsense and art often overlap. There is little I can do if you don't appreciate it. -- Cycl o pia talk  18:59, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I believe that "I am confus" pretty much summarises the commenter's outlook. Goochelaar  (talk) 19:55, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Indentation. 85.100.179.0 (talk) 07:04, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Aliens?
I know that the Codex is primarily a meaningless and abstract art book, But was it written from the perspective of Aliens? the article is not exactly clear. 24.60.143.195 (talk) 00:47, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

More images
Images from a few sample book pages would be useful. If someone can get in touch with Serafini to get copyright release for sample images and cover art, that would be perfect. +sj + 03:58, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
 * here — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.50.1.122 (talk) 12:42, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Voynich maunscript?
Is it worth mentioning the similarity to the Voynich manuscript? Is there any more concrete evidence of VM as inspiration other than gossip on the interwebz? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.217.128.36 (talk) 14:23, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I too am curious about this. On the Voynich manuscript page it clearly states that the Codex Seraphinianus proves the potential for hoax in the manuscript. Was this the artist's intention? Either this page or the Voynich page should switch so that they both match. Anyone with more info? -Bodhisvaha (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:29, 3 December 2011 (UTC).

Notability?
In what way is this book notable? Until that is made clear, the notability flag needs to remain in place. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.114.180.201 (talk) 03:44, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
 * It has been discussed by multiple reliable sources, thus it meets our notability guidelines. -- cyclopia speak! 11:39, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

New US Edition?
I don't know if this is the same as the 2006 Italian edition or if it is brand new, but Amazon (and a few other online retailers) are taking pre-orders for a new release: http://www.amazon.com/Codex-Seraphinianus-Luigi-Serafini/dp/0847842134. If someone more in the know can add this to the "Editions" subsection, please do. 97.124.75.117 (talk) 22:48, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

2013 edition
Can someone explain what "They printed 300 copies in Italian and 300 in English" means when the book is in neither language? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.24.62.196 (talk) 22:52, 30 November 2013 (UTC)
 * My 1993 "Spanish" edition, has 2 introductory notes printed at the beginning. "el editor al lector" ("the publisher to the reader", by Ricci), and "Orbis Pictus" (by Italo Calvino, translated (presumably from Italian) into Spanish by C. Alonso). Both are available on the web, via a googling. –Quiddity (talk) 23:13, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Russian edition
I removed the following edition, recently added, when the ISBN returned 0 hits in any of the BookSources links and I could not find evidence it exists. Copying it here to make it easy to add back. --&mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  |  15:50, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
 * 1st Russian edition, Kiev, Saint-Peterburg: LAURUS, 2014, 396 pp., ISBN 978-966-2449-42-6

What am I missing here?
The introductory paragraph states, "written in a strange, generally unintelligible alphabet". In the Writing System section, appears the phrase: "possibly a false writing system". Yet later in that same section it is noted that the author of the Codex, Serafini himself, has "stated that there is no meaning hidden behind the script of the Codex, which is asemic".

Given that the author of the work has stated that there is no meaning, and that the script is asemic, then the two earlier statements are clearly in error: the writing isn't "generally" unintelligible; it is entirely unintelligible -- by design. And there is no question of the writing being "possibly" in a false writing system: the author has said that it is in a false writing system, given that it deliberately has no meaning.

These conflicting statements make for a very confusing article, and need to be cleaned up. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.95.43.249 (talk) 21:48, 8 May 2014 (UTC)
 * For something that has entirely no meaning, it looks just *too* realistic. I think that while the text may be nonsense, it still may be inspired by snippets of some actual text or phrases/words.--85.176.242.6 (talk) 18:11, 2 November 2014 (UTC)

more reviews
Putting these here for now. — Jeraphine Gryphon (talk) 16:05, 9 March 2015 (UTC)
 * The Beautiful Mystery of the Codex Seraphinianus Slate (magazine)
 * Codex Seraphinianus: by Luigi Serafini Spectrum Culture
 * Inside a Vision: The World of Codex Seraphinianus KQED

Say what?
The section on Writing system asserts that the page numbering system has been deciphered, and found to be "a variation of base 21". What sort of "variation" would that be? The phrase "base 21" is linked to a generic description of "Base of a numeral system", which says absolutely nothing about "base 21" or any possible variations it might have.

If I were to assert that something was a "variation of base 10", I'm pretty sure someone would demand that I expound further on what that variation was. I submit that some additional explanation is needed in this article as well.

BTW, either the following article:


 * http://everything.explained.today/Codex_Seraphinianus/

... is almost entirely kiped from this Wikipedia article, or this Wikipedia article is almost entirely kiped from that website. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.95.43.249 (talk • contribs)
 * That's a mirror; they clearly attribute Wikipedia at the bottom of the page. Kuru   (talk)  11:48, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Codex
I've revised the explanation of what a "codex" is a bit to coincide more closely with the Wikipedia article on that term. A codex isn't simply "a book," nor is a manuscript necessarily a "codex." "Codex" refers above all to the format of the work, although (as the article on "codex" notes) it is now generally reserved for manuscripts (in codex format). The second part of a named codex often refers to the (original) owner of the codex; thus there is no necessary implication in the name that the Codex Seraphinianus was produced by Serafini. 850 C (talk) 02:37, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I think that is a much better wording, thank you. 63.224.156.49 (talk) 01:01, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm just going to mention this: "Seraphinianus is a Latinisation of the author's surname, Serafini" may not be adequate. I don't have any source to back this (thus I'm adding it as speculation to the talk page) but a Latinisation of Serafini could just as easliy be Seraphinius or Seraphinus. Why the longer Seraphinianus? Judging by the content of the Codex, I wouldn't put it past the author for this to be "Seraphini + anus" as in "I, Serafini, pulled this out of my ass." Like I said, the author hasn't confirmed nor denied this, of course, but it makes some sense. &#39;bitchen&#39; ric (talk) 17:21, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

"Contents"
I refined the description of the contents of "chapter" 8 under Contents, from "The history of the Codex's writing system" to "The Codex's writing system, including punctuation marks, the text being written, and experiments performed upon the text."

I've read the text in question myself, and it seems like a much more apt and accurate description to me - feel free to revert the changes if you disagree.

Moreover, how do we decide what exactly goes into the Contents section? The interpretations are, dare I say, nothing but subjective and I'd imagine there will be disagreements for all of the contents of the book. --Shyllelagh (talk) 07:07, 18 November 2020 (UTC)