Madrid’s Prado Museum Will Spotlight Pioneering Duo of Female Renaissance Artists: Oooh, I wish I could go! I’m familiar with Fontana and Anguissola mostly through costuming because their portraits work as excellent visual sources, but both were truly revolutionary in their time: Fontana the first professional woman artist; Anguissola the court painter to Philip II.
Purdue and Delaware State professors unravel century-old mystery: Yet another Voynich Manuscript theory! A new book posits a sixteenth century Mexican origin based on illustrations of supposedly New World plants. The folks at Ciphermysteries ripped this theory to shreds a couple of years back for complex cryptological reasons. I’m not a cryptographer or botanist so I’m not sure what to think, though if I remember correctly the vellum is made from the skin of a European species of cow (double-check me – I couldn’t get to a public version of the paper).
*I’m too paranoid to link directly to the CIA site but if you Google “CIA poltergeist” I promise you’ll find them.