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• RE: L. Rauwolf

  Garlonga > 09-08-2025, 06:11 AM

  I struggled with the mighty Kraken mentioned in the software section of the forum but sadly I'm only a recreational user of (Windows) computers so it will be some time before I get it to work. Will have a look at transcribus, thanks.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  Jim Reeds > 04-10-2025, 06:15 PM

  (04-08-2025, 05:45 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But it is from 1780, so I suppose that it is not very likely to have been used by Rudolf to pay for the VMS...)

  
  According to You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. the MT Thaler is still in production, always with a 1780 date, so your example might be younger than it seems.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  RenegadeHealer > 08-10-2025, 02:41 AM

  (03-08-2025, 05:48 PM)N._N. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The most likely candidate to have obscured the manuscript's provenance before Widemann is actually Widemann himself. First, he had the opportunity, in contrast to the later scenarios where a larger number of people had knowledge of relevant events. Second, he had a financial motive: The value of a manuscript depended significantly on its previous owners or author(s), meaning Widemann had an incentive to tell the most enticing story to his potential customer. I think Rauwolf might have been a reasonably convincing (=valuabe) background story, so there would probably be no need to make up another explanation, such as possibly one involving Kelly and England that might have led Mnišovský to his theory. The only somewhat realistic scenario I can come up with where Widemann omits the connection to Rauwolf is one where he obtained the manuscript in a not exactly clean way, i. e. he simply kept it after the Rauwolfs' death and sold it as soon as no heirs claimed it, this would fit the timeline reasonably well. But this is pure conjecture and certainly less plausible than a number of theories of pre-Widemann ownership that do not involve Rauwolf at all.

  
  This makes a lot of sense.
  
  Antiques and collectables have never been a hobby of mine, but I have known people who are into this. There’s an old saw in the world of antiquing: A problem with an artifact’s provenance means it’s either fake, or, if genuine, it’s not yours to sell. And unsurprisingly, a problem with a piece’s provenance greatly lowers its sale value. And pawn value. And ability to even be put on the block at any respectable auction house.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  ReneZ > 08-10-2025, 05:20 AM

  But we don't know at all that Wideman was silent about how he got the MS.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  N._N. > 08-10-2025, 06:32 PM

  (08-10-2025, 02:41 AM)RenegadeHealer Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.This makes a lot of sense.
  
  Antiques and collectables have never been a hobby of mine, but I have known people who are into this. There’s an old saw in the world of antiquing: A problem with an artifact’s provenance means it’s either fake, or, if genuine, it’s not yours to sell. And unsurprisingly, a problem with a piece’s provenance greatly lowers its sale value. And pawn value. And ability to even be put on the block at any respectable auction house.

  
  
  Thanks, this is an interesting analogy and also something we see in art museums at the moment: While there has been awareness about art looted and sold by the Nazis for quite a while, museums have long ignored everything that was acquired after 1945 unless explicitly contacted by survivors/descendants. Instead, they would just declare 'bought from art dealer xy, 1966' and call it a day. Only recently, larger projects to identify the whole provenance have begun. 
  
  

  (08-10-2025, 05:20 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But we don't know at all that Wideman was silent about how he got the MS.

  
  No, I never claimed that we know this for a fact, and we will probably never know for sure. But we can be fairly certain that at some point between Widemann and Kircher, knowledge about how it got into Widemann's hands was lost. Widemann is the most logical candidate to have obscured the earlier provenance.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  ReneZ > 09-10-2025, 12:42 AM

  (08-10-2025, 06:32 PM)N._N. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But we can be fairly certain that at some point between Widemann and Kircher, knowledge about how it got into Widemann's hands was lost.

  
  I agree with that.
  The possibilities are endless.
  Widemann may have told Geizkofler who acted as the buyer for Rudolf, and he may not.
  If the recipient of the book in Prague - Hans Popp - knew, well, he died within a few months after that.
  
  There may have been a name or names on the then cover, which may have been lost in case it was rebound for Rudolf. Latest when it was rebound by the Jesuits in Rome.
  
  It may even have been widely known when the book arrived in Prague, but nobody bothered to write this down. After all, we are very interested in this, but people then and there may not have cared much who was an earlier owner.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  RenegadeHealer > 09-10-2025, 01:16 AM

  @Rene, I should clarify. I agree that even if we have enough historical evidence to say that Widemann was likely the owner of the VMS immediately preceding Rudolf, the details of the transaction (or the book’s use while in Widemann’s tenure, while we’re at it), are still frustratingly scant. I’m just saying that @N._N. provides a plausible scenario by which the VMS could pass from Rauwolf to Widemann to Rudolf, without leaving much of any historical trace of Rauwolf’s previous ownership.
  
  @N._N. regarding the fine art market, in addition to misappropriation, careful inquiries into pieces’ provenance sometimes also reveals that a work of art was at some point swapped for a highly convincing replica. A surprising number of supposedly priceless museum pieces are almost certainly not the original.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  N._N. > 09-10-2025, 09:05 AM

  (09-10-2025, 12:42 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The possibilities are endless.
  Widemann may have told Geizkofler who acted as the buyer for Rudolf, and he may not.
  If the recipient of the book in Prague - Hans Popp - knew, well, he died within a few months after that.
  
  There may have been a name or names on the then cover, which may have been lost in case it was rebound for Rudolf. Latest when it was rebound by the Jesuits in Rome.
  
  It may even have been widely known when the book arrived in Prague, but nobody bothered to write this down. After all, we are very interested in this, but people then and there may not have cared much who was an earlier owner.

  
  
  There is certainly a number of possible scenarios, but how many are actually likely? Maybe it makes sense to distinguish between purposeful and accidental obfuscation, although both may have happened simultaneously. In the first case, who else actually had motive and opportunity to do so? The latter option is hard to judge without knowing what the provenance actually was. 
  
  For example, if Widemann had explained he bought the manuscript from some book dealer who could not provide additional information, maybe nobody considered this piece of information particularly noteworthy. This scenario may of course have occured whether Widemann was telling the truth or not. I can also see a scenario with gradual degradation of the information, i. e. Widemann explains he got it from the oriental traveller Rauwolf, the next person in line, not being familiar with Rauwolf, omits the name, the people who hear this information just register 'oriental', and by the time Barschius writes his letter, there are just rumors of oriental origin left.
  
  However, many of the accidental explanations seem less likely to me due to the interest in the manuscript shown by basically everyone involved from Rudolf (demonstrated by the price) to Marci and the number of people in connection to the court who were apparently involved somewhat simultaneously, from Geitzkofler and Popp to Barschius and Marci. Plus, as mentioned, information on provenance getting lost in the Prague era is not necessarily a counter-argument to Widemann providing false information in the first place. That all being said, I would of course not put too much confidence in this whole theory, as it is clearly based on a number of assumptions. Nevertheless, I think the scenario drawn up here is just likely enough to at least be quite suspicous of Widemann and a bit more sceptical of the Rauwolf theory, in relation to all the information we have now or which may be found in the future.

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  kckluge > 10-10-2025, 09:09 PM

  (08-10-2025, 05:20 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.But we don't know at all that Wideman was silent about how he got the MS.

  
  I am really concerned by the implicit framing of many/most posts in this thread that Widemann was definitely a prior owner of the mss. as opposed to the most likely known candidate to have sold it to Rudolph assuming the info in the Marci letter was mostly correct (as to buyer and amount, but not as to the price having been for the Voynich as a single mss.).

• RE: L. Rauwolf

  ReneZ > 10-10-2025, 11:51 PM

  This is absolutely correct. It is just not very convenient to add "if he was indeed the seller" every time his name is mentioned....
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