Speculative fraud hypothesis

[dexdex]

There are no thousands of fake books. There are thousands of fake items.

One can split these fake items up in two ways (or more, but let's just look at these two).

Split 1: perpetrated less than 150 years ago vs. more than 150 years ago
The vast majority is from the last 150 years, especially when it concerns art (including books and individual leaves).
I did not really check, but I believe that the examples from Rich are all from the last 150 years.

Split 2: the faked items are complete books, or they are something else
The vast majority of these fakes are not complete books. Yes, they exist, but I am aware of fewer than 10 in total, and these are all from the last 150 years.

Counter examples are really welcome, as far as I am concerned!

I think that one main point from Rich's longer post was that fakes aren't necessariy perpetrated for monetary gain.
This is certainly correct, and this was also part of the argument of the first post in this thread.

People who are looking at sales prices of manuscripts, and consider these a motivation for a fake, are omitting more than half of the equation. 
Sale price does not equal profit. 
Creating a fake manuscript is very difficult and costs money.
There is the risk of being caught.
There is the risk of the thing not being sold.
It is illegal or at least morally unacceptable (yes this matters to many people).

Direct question to Rich: do you consider that the book(s) sold to Rudolf for 600 gold pieces is/are a fake?

Another split (for forgeries in general in the modern age) is: either extremely skillful (like the Spanish Forger's work) to fool experts for a high potential payout; or quite intentionally shoddy, to only hook gullible marks.

The VMS mostly fits neither category: it is too shoddy to sell as greatly skilled, but it is too long and too elaborate to produce for fooling someone once. The 'reusable prop' theory helps explain why it's right in the spot where few fakes exist, though it still has lots of difficulties.

I think any Wilfrid related theory is fraught with the difficulty of the discovered corroborating letter. The quantity of parchment is also wholly improbable: if Wilfrid found this much untouched parchment it would honestly be worth more to sell it to other con-men as supplies, or produce smaller fakes inviting less attention. It could be that he had other reasons for crafting it the way it is, but the quality of the finished product doesn't support this.