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The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - proto57 - 30-03-2020
René had suggested, on another thread, that he would like to address the reasons he believes the 1665/6 Marci letter is not a fake, and almost definitely real. This refers to my original work and ideas suggesting otherwise, as seen here:
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That blog post goes into more detail, and the entire post should be read to fully understand my points. But here is a summary:
1. Voynich said he paid little attention to it, at first:
"His claim is somewhat implausible, considering how stunning and mysterious the Voynich Ms. is, and seemed to be to him. So of course any included documents would have also been of tremendous interest."
2: He walked out of the Villa with it:
"... that no Jesuit took the time to examine the work he was offering to purchase from them. At least, well enough to notice one of their precious Kircher letters was inside."
3: Marci held back information?:
"When reading the other letters to Kircher which are presumed by many to describe the Voynich Ms.,... ... i.e., the Baresch, Kinner and other Marci letters, it is clear that these men are very interested in getting an opinion from Kircher about this work. So then why would they not mention [the important clues the 1665/6 Marci letter contains, until shortly before Marci's death]", and etc.
4: That Latin:
"Many who are proficient in Latin have had difficulty with various aspects of the Latin phrasing and/or grammar in the letter.", etc.
5: The Folding: This is to me the most damning trait of this letter, because the fold lines, placement of seals, and so on, do not in any way resemble either the other letters of the Carteggio, or really any letter of this type, from this time.
"I think these anomalies suggest that the 1666 Marci letter was created from another source sheet, which was possibly trimmed down. This source may have had seals on it for some purpose, perhaps as an unmarked envelope. Perhaps an original address was trimmed off, or erased. This source had some folds, but others may have been added to create what we see today… an odd format with seals and folds that cannot be made sense of."
There is a video under this topic on the post, which demonstrates some of the above problems.
6: The “Signature” & Date:
These line up perfectly, as in a perfect overlay, with another, genuine, Marci letter from the Carteggio... with only minor alterations: The addition of a small line to convert the year "5" to a "6", and the date "10"'s "0" having a tail added, to make it a 9. Well, that is the implication, as I see it. Otherwise, why are these so perfectly aligned like this, except for those to anomalous differences... the first of which still causes consternation, confusion, and alternate opinions?
![[Image: marci_signature_compare.jpg]](https://i2.wp.com/www.santa-coloma.net/voynich_drebbel/general/marci_signature_compare.jpg)
There are other issues, not mentioned, which relate to the seal itself, the dimensions of the paper, the chain and line counts, and so on. But these would involve an examination of the letter in person, which I have not had the opportunity to yet do.
And lastly, that letter does not actually describe the Voynich we know today, very well or completely. But that might not be related to whether or not it is a genuine letter, as none of the other letters come close to an adequate or logical description of the manuscript, given the purpose for them being written in the first place.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - ReneZ - 30-03-2020
Well, I didn't say that I definitely wanted to address this. I said that I might.
I am sorry to point out that none of the above points tell me that the letter would be a fake. It simply does not follow from any of them.
I might just lift out one example:
Quote:4: That Latin:
"Many who are proficient in Latin have had difficulty with various aspects of the Latin phrasing and/or grammar in the letter.", etc.
So, how is "difficult Latin" evidence that the letter is a fake??? And who are these "many who are proficient in Latin?
Marci is a rather famous historical figure. His life, deeds and works have been the subject of numerous studies. Let me quote from:
Garber, M.: Optics and alchemy in the philosophical writings of Marcus Marci in post-Rudolphine Prague 1612-1670, dissertation submitted for the degree Doctor of Philosophy, San Diego, 2002.
p.33:
"Marci did not write in the most efficient of manners".
His Latin was cumbersome.
That the Marci letter is genuine follows from the facts that a letter exists that was written one month later, and it was written by the same scribe (not Marci himself) and signed by Marci in the same manner, while it was impossible for anyone except a very small circle of Jesuits to access this letter.
It was preserved, just like the Barschius letter and the two Kinner letters, all very important evidence for the history of the MS, in the Kircher carteggio, which was hidden and safeguarded by the Jesuits.
That was not in Villa Mondragone.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - ReneZ - 31-03-2020
Some of the statements in my previous post may appear quite bold. However, they are based on a very significant amount of solid evidence that I have gathered since 1999. The circumstances of the sale of the manuscripts to Voynich have interested me since then, and new evidence has been trickling in little by little, and this is still continuing today.
I am aware that most people interested in the Voynich MS are less interested in this part of its history.
The Marci letter in the Beinecke and the one written one month later were already shown together in another post, here:
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with some relevant accompanying comments.
That Voynich had no access to the Kircher carteggio, and could not have seen this letter (or the Barschius letter, or the Kinner letters) is part of on-going research, some of which is described in what I would like to call the darker corners of my web site, where few people will venture. But not all, because it is on-going work, incomplete, and not all evidence can be shared just yet.
Voynich did not just buy his "Bacon cipher MS" from the Jesuits. It was one of a set of at least 20.
Yes, this sale was done in secrecy, but for a good reason, and taking that as an argument that the Bacon MS is a fake by him is misleading. None of the other manuscripts are fakes.
These manuscripts, just like the historic collection of the Jesuits that includes the Kircher collection, were hidden before 1873. At that time, Wilfrid Voynich was 8 years old. The reason for this hiding is quite interesting, and well recorded, e.g. in: "Carini Dainotti, Virginia: La Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele al Collegio Romano. Olschki, Firenze, 1956.".
When Italy was united (by force), the new government decided that the new capital Rome required a national library that could rival with those in Paris and London. Such did not exist, but there were many large libraries owned by the various religious orders. The minister calculated that by confiscating these, they would immediately achieve such a national library. Thus, a law of confiscation was issued.
While this law was in preparation, several of the religious houses (not just the Jesuits) started moving their most important collections away. The government was aware of this but could not do much about it.
This is how the Jesuit belongings ended up (at least partially) in Castel Gandolfo. They were kept under lock and seal. While this may seem to have been an illegal activity, it was clarified that personal libraries were not to be confiscated. This explains the various notes "from the private library of P.Beckx". This may remain a bit of a grey area, but it has become accepted over time.
The Kircher carteggio was in Castel Gandolfo. Whether the books later sold to Voynich were also there is not yet clear to me, but I still hope to find out. By the time they were sold to Voynich they were, I believe, in Frascati, but not necessarily Villa Mondragone. Again to be found out.
The Kircher correspondence (with over 2000 other books) was moved back to Rome in 1919, seven years after the Voynich MS and the 20+ others had been sold to Voynich.
There, it still remained inaccessible apart from a small circle of Jesuits.
The Kinner letters, which are barely mentioned in Rich's post about the Marci letter, are of great importance.
They prove that, some time before January 1666. Marci had indeed sent an illegible book to Kircher with a request for translation / deciphering. They show that the Marci letter *should* exist.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - proto57 - 02-04-2020
René: Thank you for taking the time to respond. However I do note that you still do not address the points on my list. Whether or not you personally consider them red flags to forgery of the Marci letter, I contend that they do, very much. But let's consider that you are correct, and they are not evidence the letter is a forgery: Why not address them?
But as I have often said, and is a major part of my point here, this is the problem with this investigation... for this letter, for the Voynich manuscript itself, and for the actions and statements of Wilfrid. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of anomalies and anachronisms, which are dismissed on no grounds, or ignored. I strongly contend that the reason why they are not addressed to any degree of satisfaction, if at all, as you have not here, is because they cannot be addressed.
So for the above list of points, I will continue to note (except for one) that they are unanswerable, until answered. And as standing unanswered, they stand as evidence that the 1665/66 Marci letter is a fake.
To your picking out and addressing one point on my list, and question, in your first response:
"So, how is "difficult Latin" evidence that the letter is a fake??? And who are these "many who are proficient in Latin?"
Standing alone, it calls into question the authenticity of the letter. Marci and the men of the the time would and did do better. And while you point out the instance, the quote,
"Marci did not write in the most efficient of manners".
You choose to interpret that to "His Latin was cumbersome". However, we may be talking about apples and oranges here. One of the persons who noted this, who is proficient in Latin, is Philip Neal. For the other letters from the Carteggio and elsewhere, the translations are pretty straightforward. But then, for this one letter, he used to have "addtional notes" (paraphrasing, the link is gone), which tried to parse the difficult Latin seen here. Since that time, he seems to have incorportated these concerns into one page of notes:
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He writes, "Unfortunately, here for the first time the Latin is ambiguous. It might also be that the direct speech form of praesentarit is praesentavi (first person not third person). Raphael may be saying that he, Raphael, presented the ducats. Can we resolve the ambiguity?"
And, "The word ipse, which sometimes disambiguates the accusative and infinitive construction, is no help here. The key, it seems to me, is to consider why this piece of reported speech is a relative clause in the first place. The reason, clearly, is to attach it to the words that went before, not the words which come after."
And so on. This letter is clumsily written, and needs careful parsing to make proper grammar, and understandable sense out of it. If it is genuine, and by Marci, then he suddenly wrote one letter in which he wrote crappy, clumsy, grammar-challenged Latin.
But that is just one on the list, of course. The other items, you dismiss with a single disclaimer, "I am sorry to point out that none of the above points tell me that the letter would be a fake. It simply does not follow from any of them."
That does not come close to suffice. We have been doing this for years... almost a decade since I started seriously exploring Modern Forgery. And as I've often pointed out, and do here, again, it is impossible to properly address the many serious problems with the Voynich, and these responses continue that tradition.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - proto57 - 02-04-2020
René: For your second post (and thank you again), you have chosen to add comments. But I note, again, that you do not address the list of concerns in my original post, above, which are summaries of the concerns I list at: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
"The Marci letter in the Beinecke and the one written one month later were already shown together in another post, here:
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with some relevant accompanying comments."
As I answered you, in part, in that thread, "Your answer is not entirely correct, and either misunderstands or misinterprets my points. Also, you've made some effort to show comparisons to known, genuine letters and lists, which are points irrelevant to the possibility the "Voynich/Marci" letter was forged."
I would say that I second my statement, today. And as one can learn by reading that thread, you left the discussion without addressing the questions and concerns directly. In any case, you brought up an issue I had either forgotten, or missed. I may add this to my blog post on the Marci letter, but for now:
You wrote, "Now let's look at the letter from 10 September 1665, also included in Kircher's correspondence. This means: it has been bound into that volume (APUG 562), and it is listed in the hand-written, contemporary index of the volume (on fol.1v), which I show first:
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So the September 10th, 1665 letter, the one which I point out is a perfect model for the identical parts of the 1665/66 letter, appears in this list. Can you come up with a good reason the 1665/66 Marci letter does NOT appear on this list? Was it tucked into the Voynich Manuscript since recieved by Kircher, and no Jesuit noticed it, to place with the Carteggio? And to remain in there, until Voynich bought that book, and removed it from the Villa, only to not notice it for some time (points #1 and #2 on my list)?
Anway, to your other points:
"That Voynich had no access to the Kircher carteggio..." and to all your related reasoning this is so, including the oft-repeated claim these letters were "under lock and seal".
You do not know this, first of all; and secondly, we do know that these letters were accessed various times during your claim they could not be seen. Famously, in 1678 Giorgio De Sepi described them. His work was in print in the time of Voynich, so clearly he would have known of the existance of these letters, at the very least. And in the second part of your answer, you admit this is a question, and is not known, "... and could not have seen this letter (or the Barschius letter, or the Kinner letters) is part of on-going research, some of which is described in what I would like to call the darker corners of my web site, where few people will venture. But not all, because it is on-going work, incomplete, and not all evidence can be shared just yet."
René, this is exactly what I am addressing here: Both unknowns, and little knowns, and contrary evidence, is boldly stated as proof that the letter is real, that the Voynich is real. But it not only goes against what we do know, it also flies in the face of common sense. In this case, that there would be no way that Voynich would be privy to the content, let alone existance of these letters, when he was friends with the Jesuits, bought items from them, was friends with Strickland. And it is illogical, and there is evidence to the contrary anyway, that the Jesuits would have not studied with interest the works and letters of Kircher. That some information, or the letters themselves, was not shared with Voynich, runs counter to what we actually know, and reasonable interpretation of it.
And also, many of such issues are dismissed by claiming that they will be proven false when we know more, "... because it is an on-going work, incomplete, and not all evidence can be shared just yet."
"Voynich did not just buy his "Bacon cipher MS" from the Jesuits. It was one of a set of at least 20.
Yes, this sale was done in secrecy, but for a good reason, and taking that as an argument that the Bacon MS is a fake by him is misleading. None of the other manuscripts are fakes."
This is a straw man argument, and also irrelevant on its own: No one is taking the secrecy of the sale of the Voynich, as evidence the 1665/66 Marci letter is fake. But it is irrelevent whether or not any of the other purchases by Voynich are real or not, nor how many he bought. These are unrelated issues, and again sidesteps my list of questions and concerns.
"The Kinner letters, which are barely mentioned in Rich's post about the Marci letter, are of great importance.
They prove that, some time before January 1666. Marci had indeed sent an illegible book to Kircher with a request for translation / deciphering. They show that the Marci letter *should* exist."
Again, you point out issues irrelevent to the list of concerns I outline in my original post, and on my blog post about the Marci letter. And no, they in no way "show that the Marci letter *should* exist", any more than any letter anyone could write, yesterday or today, relating to those Kinner letters. It also goes against the known timeline of mentions in those letters, in various ways.
The fact is, those other letters, when seen in comparison to the "found" Marci letter, the sparse detail in them, which in no way can be said to be anything close to an adequate description of the Voynich we know today, fall far short of being anything more than a possible influence to create "something like" the Voynich, as a forgery. They do not deserve, and should not, be used as provenance for it. And by their differences and similarities to the "found" Marci letter, actually serve to undermine the latter's authenticity, as I've outlined in my (continually unaddressed) points.
I'm hoping you will find the time to do so, otherwise I will have to consider them unaddressed, and therefore, continuing to support my contention that the 1665/66 Marci letter is actually a fake, probabably by Voynich, in an attempt to cement his desired and false provanance for the (probably also forged) Voynich Manuscript.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - ReneZ - 02-04-2020
Hello Rich,
I admit that I addressed your points only too briefly:
(30-03-2020, 07:33 PM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I am sorry to point out that none of the above points tell me that the letter would be a fake. It simply does not follow from any of them.
What I meant is that all your arguments are non-sequiturs. The observations do not logically lead to the conclusion, or even that the letter being a fake is more likely.
All of them have completely natural possible explanations. It is only if one is convinced that the item is a fake, that one would see an argument for it in these points.
Now since the item cannot be a fake, the right conclusion from each of them it the alternative one.
As a general clarification, we simply do not know where it was found by Voynich, when, under which conditions, what happened with it from 1665 to, say, 1969.
Who knows, it may have been contained inside the cover, under the paste-downs.
Who knows how many times it has been re-folded since 1665 ???
One cannot conclude anything from these unknowns.
Quote:otherwise I will have to consider them unaddressed
I will not try to avoid the unavoidable.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - proto57 - 02-04-2020
Well thank you again for your response, but I have to again point out that you do not address my list, whatever you think its value, or lack of one. You give as a reason not to, for one thing,
"What I meant is that all your arguments are non-sequiturs. The observations do not logically lead to the conclusion, or even that the letter being a fake is more likely.
"All of them have completely natural possible explanations. It is only if one is convinced that the item is a fake, that one would see an argument for it in these points."
OK then, if that is true, explain why they are fallacies, non-sequiturs, and so on. You say they are, but do not address them. And that is the key point I am making... you do not address many of the problems with the letter, nor with the Voynich, but claim the arguments are incorrect, then refuse to say why. Tell me, tell us, what the "natural possible explanations" are.
And no, this is a frequent false claim, that I or anyone who realizes the letter or the ms. are probably fake, that we are driven because that is what we thought it was to begin with. I, like almost anyone else, started with the very strong foundation this was real. So I consider a claim this is circular reasoning to be unfounded, and deflection.
"Now since the item cannot be a fake, the right conclusion from each of them it the alternative one."
Then René, again, what is your "alternative one" for the items on the list? Why not take a moment, and explain?
"As a general clarification, we simply do not know where it was found by Voynich, when, under which conditions, what happened with it from 1665 to, say, 1969."
And thank you so much for that. We do not know... but if you really meant 1969, of course that would be about 1915 or so, when Voynich first said he found the letter (Chicago Exp.?).*
"Who knows, it may have been contained inside the cover, under the paste-downs.
Who knows how many times it has been re-folded since 1665 ???""
I think, perhaps, your "re-folded" comment above is in response to my observation that the fold lines on the letter are incorrect. They do not allow for the folding of this letter as the other letters in the Carteggio. But it cannot be dismissed by alternative folds, or additional folds, because none of the fold lines allow that piece of paper to fold into a self-contained envelope. That is a problem, that is a point. So if that is the reason you mention it, then I suggest it is not an adequate explanation for this problem. I would say, though, print out the letter, as I did, and try doing it.
"One cannot conclude anything from these unknowns."
First of all, thank you for at least admitting they are unknowns. They are unknown, in that they are factual observations, with unknown reasons. As for my claiming that the list of problems with the Marci letter are evidence of forgery, I would say that, while we cannot conclude they are, they do very much point toward that probability.
But whether or not you think these are signs of forgery, or incorrect observations, or for whatever reason... I note you still will not address them. With all respect, that is, to me, a sign you cannot. I have been challenged on many aspects of my theories, and as difficult as it is, or as pointless as it may sometimes seemed to me (in some cases), I do my best to address the issues. So I ask, again, will you? Can you?
* not knowing the origins of an item is a red flag to forgery. As you may or may not know, the subject of my 2017 lecture at the NSA symposium was based on the list of historical characteristics of forgeries in art and literature. It includes poor and missing provenance. There are 11 red flags, and the Voynich arguably hits on 10 of them. The Marci letter, I think, 3 or 4:
1) Elicits multiple, widely contrary expert opinions
2) Has poor, contrary and/or missing versions of provenance.
3) Contains anachronistic content
4) Owner/seller lies about provenance
5) Contains incorrect uses of iconography
6) Improper tools, methods, and/or materials used
7) It looks "too new”
8) There is a reluctance to produce, and/or test, original
9) Copy of illustrations from books and catalogs
10) Financial or other incentive is offered for positive opinion
11) Claimed disappearance of original
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - ReneZ - 03-04-2020
I am sorry, but I don't see the point in continuing this discussion.
There is clearly very strong, documented, historical evidence that the Marci letter found together with the Voynich MS has to be genuine. This evidence is almost entirely ignored, and the part that is represented at your blog is represented incorrectly.
Then arguments that supposedly support a fake are presented that are not more than speculation.
Voynich would not have done this, the Jesuits would not have allowed that, such-or-other is suspicious.
(Edit)
I am very skeptical that any response is likely to have any impact. But let's try another one.
If the Marci letter was a fake, written by Voynich, he would have written it on a plain and unfolded piece of paper.
So both a real Marci letter and a fake Marci letter would have started their life flat and unfolded.
So why would it be impossible for the real letter to end up folded as it is, while it would be possible for the fake letter?
I am sorry but that just makes no sense.
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - -JKP- - 03-04-2020
(30-03-2020, 05:47 PM)proto57 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....
6: The “Signature” & Date:
These line up perfectly, as in a perfect overlay, with another, genuine, Marci letter from the Carteggio... with only minor alterations: The addition of a small line to convert the year "5" to a "6", and the date "10"'s "0" having a tail added, to make it a 9. Well, that is the implication, as I see it. Otherwise, why are these so perfectly aligned like this, except for those to anomalous differences... the first of which still causes consternation, confusion, and alternate opinions?
...
So you are going to ignore the minor differences?
I know people who can write the same phrase 20 times and have it so much the same you can pretty much lay them one on top of the other. Good fine-motor coordination and good muscle memory. Not everyone has it, but some do. I have come across a few manuscripts that are that way as well. One scribe was so precise you literally could drop the letters on top of each other and not see any difference. This is especially true of words and numbers that are frequently written, like the current date and a person's name and place of residence.
To me, the examples you posted do not look the same. They DO look like the same handwriting, but each letterform is slightly different, just as one would expect for something written by the same person on another day.
I don't understand the logic of your argument. The handwriting is almost identical, therefore it is a forgery??? Is that what you are saying?
RE: The 1665/6 Marci Letter: A fake? - arca_libraria - 03-04-2020
(02-04-2020, 09:57 PM)proto57 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.There are 11 red flags, and the Voynich arguably hits on 10 of them. The Marci letter, I think, 3 or 4:
1) Elicits multiple, widely contrary expert opinions
2) Has poor, contrary and/or missing versions of provenance.
3) Contains anachronistic content
4) Owner/seller lies about provenance
5) Contains incorrect uses of iconography
6) Improper tools, methods, and/or materials used
7) It looks "too new”
8) There is a reluctance to produce, and/or test, original
9) Copy of illustrations from books and catalogs
10) Financial or other incentive is offered for positive opinion
11) Claimed disappearance of original
There have already been a lot of excellent counter arguments to the reasons you’ve put forward for the Marci letter possibly being a fake. I’m not going to add any more objections to your arguments against the Marci letter’s authenticity, but I want to challenge your suggestion that the VMS may hit up to 10 of your red flags because I think all that this list reveals is that you’re not sufficiently trained in working with historic manuscripts and documents to be making such judgements and applying them to something like the VMS.
1) Elicits multiple, widely contrary expert opinions - welcome to manuscript studies, it’s really hard, takes decades of training and people disagree all the time. The disagreements about the VMS are nothing special in manuscript studies.
2) Has poor, contrary and/or missing versions of provenance - this is absolutely normal in manuscript studies; some manuscripts may only have gaps of a few decades, others may have gaps of over a millennium. A key part of palaeography training is learning to identify marks, symbols, and letterforms that can help you to date and locate a manuscript in the absence of a helpful note saying when and where it was written and all the places it has been since then. Researchers also use things like bindings, quire marks, library catalogues, letters and lots of other details to try to understand where a manuscript has been throughout its history, and sometimes the question cannot be answered. This problem extends to many other medieval manuscripts (and medieval and ancient artefacts more generally) and is not restricted to the VMS.
3) Contains anachronistic content - you need to define the anachronism, but to my eyes, there is nothing obviously anachronistic in the VMS.
4) Owner/seller lies about provenance - this does happen sometimes, it’s particularly common for items looted from places like Syria, Egypt and Iraq, or for items that were confiscated from Jewish families during the Second World War. Even if it turned out that there were lies about where the VMS has been since it was made, it is still a manuscript written on 15th C parchment that looks like a product of the 15th century.
5) Contains incorrect uses of iconography - you need a strong foundation in the history of art to make judgements about the incorrect use of iconography. The VMS is definitely weird, but nothing strikes me as ‘incorrect’.
6) Improper tools, methods, and/or materials used - the carbon dating tells us that the VMS was written on 15th C parchment, the production techniques and mise-en-page are standard for a European codex of this period, and the only way to safely test the pigments would be with various spectroscopy techniques.
7) It looks "too new” - the VMS doesn’t look too new. It has filthy pages near the beginning and the end, and mild to moderate staining and damage throughout the rest of the leaves.
8) There is a reluctance to produce, and/or test, original - both of these are false in relation to the VMS. The Beinecke will produce the manuscript to anyone with the credentials and a suitable research question, which is how it works for virtually every other medieval manuscript in major public collections around the world. Lisa Fagin Davis who is an expert palaeographer and belongs to this forum has seen it (at least?) a couple of times, and I believe René Zandbergen and Nick Pelling have seen it as well. You would have a much harder time seeing something like the Book of Kells (Trinity College, Dublin) or the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (Chantilly, Musée Condée, MS 65) both of which have heavy restrictions on who can see them and for how long and no one is using those restrictions to argue that they are fakes. The Beinecke has already consented to one round of testing, how else would we know the carbon dating results? I am sure if a suitably equipped team approached them about doing non-invasive tests such as spectroscopy they would consider it. It is not unusual for museums and libraries to refuse tests which would damage their collection by taking tiny pigment samples: in the 21st century it is more unusual to find a museum or library that will permit invasive tests like that.
9) Copy of illustrations from books and catalogs - I’m not sure I understand how this objection might relate to the VMS specifically, but to no other medieval manuscript. Medieval manuscript art borrowed from, was inspired by, and occasionally reduplicated almost perfectly other pre-existing manuscripts. Some medieval artists also invented things. One of the ways we can attempt to understand the VMS is to look at art and iconography from all over the world and see whether we can see any visual influences or similarities. I’m aware of a few forgery cases where the forger copied illustrations, and there’s a whole universe of forgery and fake provenance among the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, but in the case of the VMS if you want to make an argument that the illustrations are copied from somewhere else, you need to present people with the original sources and see if they agree.
10) Financial or other incentive is offered for positive opinion:
Step 1 - Become interested in VMS.
Step 2 - Write positive thing about VMS.
Step 3 - ???
Step 4 - PROFIT!!!
11) Claimed disappearance of original - the VMS is in the Beinecke where it is available to view by appointment subject to the standard manuscript research checks that all libraries undertake when you ask to see their stuff. I’m sure the poor Beinecke Librarians wish they could make it disappear, but alas, it remains available.