04-01-2023, 12:38 AM
I suspect that the Marci letter may have moved around a bit over the centuries.
For a while, I suspected the stains on f102v1 (which seeped through to f103) to be caused by the wax seal on Marci's letter, but Paula Zyats considered that this is more likely to be candle wax from a late night (or early morning) reader.
The stains on the inside front cover, which fit rather well with the letter, are also a bit mysterious, because, when Voynich got the MS, this was closed by a paper pastedown. So either the stains leaked through that (which I think is very unlikely), or they postdate Voynich's removal of the pastedown, or the Jesuits actually put the letter inside the cover as part of the filling.
We don't even know if the wax seals on the letter were added by Marci, or later by the Jesuits, with the function of 'glue'. I also don't know how long it would take for such wax to stop leaving stains as it was fully hardened.
For a while, I suspected the stains on f102v1 (which seeped through to f103) to be caused by the wax seal on Marci's letter, but Paula Zyats considered that this is more likely to be candle wax from a late night (or early morning) reader.
The stains on the inside front cover, which fit rather well with the letter, are also a bit mysterious, because, when Voynich got the MS, this was closed by a paper pastedown. So either the stains leaked through that (which I think is very unlikely), or they postdate Voynich's removal of the pastedown, or the Jesuits actually put the letter inside the cover as part of the filling.
We don't even know if the wax seals on the letter were added by Marci, or later by the Jesuits, with the function of 'glue'. I also don't know how long it would take for such wax to stop leaving stains as it was fully hardened.