The Modern Forgery Hypothesis

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In fact, the ENTIRE evidence for the provenance of the VMS between ~1438 and 1912 hinges on that letter describing the book B and no other book.

Well, no. The first evidence is the C14 dating, coupled  with the fact that vellum was generally used a little time after it was made (I'd guess in a few years). It's not impossible for pristine vellum to sit unused for ~500 years, but it's quite improbable, expecially in the quantity needed for the VMS. It's not enough to say 'he might have found 500-years old pristine vellum when he bought a whole library': unless you can demonstrate he actually found pristine vellum there or that at least it was highly probable to find it, it's just an You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. hypothesis.

It's also not impossible that a forger will use unusual foldouts, then bind his forgery out of order and add additional quire marks, add arcane marginalia and doodles, then add stains, damages, colour transfers etc. in so good a way to be undistinguishable from what usually happens to a manuscript during 500 years of history, then cut away pages, then replace the cover and rework the binding... But all this to happen is, again, quite improbable.

I see you are somewhat familiar with my theories, and used the (Yale) words "highly unusual" for the use of foldouts in a 15th century book. How do you explain... a real question, not really a challenge... how do you explain the use of foldouts this way, so much earlier than standard practice?

Well of course the idea that Voynich could have found enough vellum at the Libreria Franceshini is a judgment call, and of course we don't have a record of it being there, and never will. But in my opinion, the fact he had this vast repository of 500,000 items of all types, certainly rises to the level of a plausible source for it. I don't know, Mauro, if you had seen this, but the quantity of parchment needed would have only been three quires of full folio size, which could be cut down to the size of the Voynich bifolios, and at the same time afford the source for the anachronistic foldouts... from uncut bifolios. I mention it in this context because I feel that idea, a physically possible idea, and supported by some evidence... is easier to picture than the four times greater number of bifolios needed if not cut down.

There are instances of vellum, wood and bark being used by forgers up to millennia after it was made. And many cases of parchment sitting blank for centuries. But also, foldouts of this type are very anachronistic... not having shown up, for this type of use for about 150 years, or more, from the C14 dates.

The last page marginalia was written with the same ink as the main text, according to McCrone.

The Baresch letter is fully expected on the hypothesis that the Voynich existed when he wrote, it's also fully expected if some other similarly unreadable manuscript was involved too, of course, but we know the Voynich exists and has the right characteristics, while we do not know of another comparable manuscript which could have been referenced by Baresch. Occam's razor favors the first hypothesis (even if this is a rather weak evidence compared to C14 and the overall status of the manuscript).

Add in the Tepenecz signature, then the fact he wanted to sell the manuscript as a Roger Bacon work but did not put in the book even a hint of it being Bacon's (microscopes in the recipe section are in the eye of the beholder, imho), etc.

Again, a genuine question... have you thought about the fact that none of the letters describing the Voynich in the Carteggio, nor 1665/66 letter, mention the name of Tepenecz being there on f1r? How would you explain this omission by them?

And to make it clear, I doubt this was created AS a Roger Bacon, and if those are microscopes... yes speculative microscopes... if that is what they are, there is an explanation, context, for why they would be there, in my hypothesis: They were known and described as being in the Court of Rudolf II, and I believe that was the intended, false origin for the manuscript.

Everything we know is explained quite well by the hypothesis the VMS was penned in the XVth century, while the hypothesis of it being a XXth century forgery requires a lot of improbabilities to be overcome, that's the harsh reality.

But here is another problem with that... the overwhelming majority of experts, of all backgrounds, did not think this was penned in the 15th century... not until the results of the C14 came back did all the opinions begin to abandon those later theories, and begin to drift towards early 15th century. I've NO doubt that if that C14 dating happened to be different than it is, the opinions would drift to THAT date, too. And so on.

Why can I say that? How could I know that? Because I trust those experts. For instance, Charles Singer. Well I have heard so many excuses, post C14, as to why he wasn't the "right" expert, and that is why he "got it wrong". And all the others... I trust them. I even trust the two who hit the C14. I think they were all right. I think all the stuff they "saw" in there, is in there. And there is only one way that could have happened.

But in any case, in order to hold the position that, "Everything we know is explained quite well by the hypothesis the VMS was penned in the XVth century...", one has to ignore the great number of expert opinions, and evidence, that says it was not.