The Book Switch Theory

[Jorge_Stolfi]

Items from the Marci letter that are named here are Rudolf, Kircher, Ferdinand and the 600 ducats.BUT!... As already in 1915, and here still in 1918, he is not talking about 'our' Rudolf II of Bohemia, but about Rudolf I who died in 1291 and was a contemporary of Bacon. Voynich believed that the Rudolf in the Marci letter bought the MS from Bacon for 600 ducats.

OK, but then that mistake makes no difference to any of the provenance/switch/forgery theories, does it?  

In particular, there was absolutely to reason to think that MS 408 had anything to do with Bacon, except that specific letter.   There was absolutely no evidence that he could have shown to the millionaire buyer, except that letter.  So how come he "didn't think it was important at first"?

I am especially amused that he mentions Kircher only by his first name: Atanasius.

Fair enough -- I prefer to call him "Wilfrid" because the name "Voynich" is "burned out"...

Atanasius, noted astronomer and philosopher of that period, is said to have transliterated the beginning of the book, the study of ciphers being one of his achievements. It was Atanasius who established the famous astronomical observatory in Peking, China, and wrote many books on the Chinese.

Athanasius wrote an encyclopedia on China, based on the work of other Jesuits, but never set foot there, and did not establish any observatory there.

That is one reporter who did not need AI. 

All the best, --stolfi