L. Rauwolf

[ReneZ]

However, for the sale to Rudolf, it was important to Widemann to give a convincing backstory, particularly for a manuscript that does not offer much information on its own. ...

For me, following are the arguments that count the most in this question:

- Indeed, Rudolf must have known what he was buying. He may have learnt this from Geizkofler, who lived in Augsburg, and must have seen the book before and heard its story. The other Paracelsus manuscripts would also have been of interest for him but not worth several hundred florins
- Rudolf had already bought Rauwolf's herbaria in 1593
- This is not the sort of book Wideman could afford to buy. It was probably given (or left) to him
- If it was presented to Rudolf as a Bacon book (we don't know), it may still have come from Rauwolf's library

There aren't many candidates (that we know of) who could have given/left this book to Wideman.
It wasn't material for copying.
Beside Rauwolf there were the Rosenbergs, as I mentioned in the talk, but there is also his noble sponsor in Padova. From Guzy's paper:

Er immatrikulierte sich – vielleicht auch in Erinnerung des Baderstandes seines Vaters – daher im Mai 1582 in Padua, um dort nach einem Semester Medizin promoviert zu werden, jedoch nicht auf dem üblichen Hochschulweg, sondern etwas zweifelhaft als Doctor bullatis von einem dafür bevollmächtigten Adeligen, in diesem Fall Graf Fernando de Amadis. 242

242: Lucia Rossetti (Hrsg.): Matricula nationis Germanicae artistarum in Gymnasio Patavino (1553–1721) (Acta nationis Germanicae, Bd. 3). Padova 1986, S. 53 (Carolus Widemann Augustanus, nachgetragen: Doctor. In patria praxin agit feliciter); Elda Martellozzo Forin: Acta Graduum Academicorum Gymnasii Patavini. Bd. 4: 1591–1600. Roma 2008, S. 188.

This seems worth following up.