Can you crack the code in this mysterious book? One expert says he's finally cracked the Voynich manuscript, and the solution is easier than you think

Latin words, combined and abbreviated make up the text in the book.

An expert claims he has cracked the meaning of the Voynich manuscript, which has baffled cryptographers for over a century. The 600-year old book is written in an undecipherable language and adorned with bizarre illustrations. One expert says the manuscript is a health manual for women.

LOS ANGELES, CA (California Network) -- Could the Voynich manuscript be a health manual for women? At least one expert thinks so, and he knows the secret for cracking the code to the book's hidden meanings.

The Voynich manuscript surfaced in 1912, in the hands of London book dealer, Wilfrid Voynich. The book baffled experts and many claimed it was a fraud. However, carbon dating proved the book was an authentic work dating back over 600 years.

According to Nicholas Gibbs, an expert on medieval manuscripts, the book appears to be based on medieval Latin, and uses images in place of abbreviations for whole words. The coded pictures describe remedies for gynecological conditions faced by women. The text is similarly written. When words are combined and turned into symbols, they are called ligatures. The Voynich manuscript is written entirely in ligatures.

An example is the ampersand, '&,' which is an abbreviated symbol for two Latin words that when written means "and."

Gibbs admits he cannot read all of the ligatures, but he does feel confident in his hypothesis that the book contains remedies for women.

Although the book is one-of-a-kind, the style employed by the author is not unheard of. People often wrote coded books in the medieval period, especially if the ideas in the book could be frowned upon. During the medieval era, people could be severely punished if they held a contrary opinion, or were seen to be dabbling in evil.

 With Gibb's hypothesis in mind, it is only a matter of time before other experts evaluate his work and validate, or debunk his idea.