(08-02-2026, 03:38 PM)proto57 wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view."“The quantity and size of the foldouts in the Voynich Manuscript are very unusual for the time period; it is rare to find so many large pieces of parchment folded into a single textblock, and this seems to indicate authenticity: In the twentieth century it would be quite difficult to find this many large sheets of genuine medieval parchment in order to produce a forgery.”
That is clearly, at first, an honest observation and scholarly opinion... i.e. "foldouts are very unusual for the time period" (1420), which of course is a big problem for the Voynich, as it is an admitted, and gross, anachronism. But quickly that "wound" heals itself, with the... actually incorrect... assertion that this unusual feature is a sign of authenticity! What?
Their claim (I believe) is that it is unlikely that someone would find this many large sheets of surviving, unused medieval parchment in the twentieth century, and because of that it's unlikely to be a modern forgery. I don't think they are claiming that "its unusual to find foldouts in 15th century manuscripts, therefore its likely genuine". They may be doing what i did in this thread a few posts ago by conflating "not a modern forgery" and "genuine 15th century".
To add my two cents on that matter, it seems unusual to me that a modern forger would go through considerable effort to create such foldouts for their forgery if those very foldouts are not usually found in genuine manuscripts. If this IS a forgery, the forger clearly knew many niche pieces of information to make it seem genuine (swallowtail merlons in images, month names, old numbers in folio notation all indicating a certain time period). Someone knowledgeable enough to know these details must also have known that it's VERY unusual to find such foldouts (would the forger have been likely to have ever seen an example?).
Whether or not other examples of foldouts would/will be found is a question of how things survive to the modern day. If there is something about foldouts (perhaps the size/fragility) that makes it far less likely for them to survive, it would logically follow that it is far less likely to find them now.
However, it wouldn't logically follow that because we do not find many now that they were as rare in the 15th century. So it IS reasonable to state that they may have been uncommon AND they are unlikely to survive so we will not find many in the present day, and may have to look longer to find examples.