The Modern Forgery Hypothesis

[proto57]

Hi Ovum Vitellus:

It's no problem at all! If you haven't seen it already, the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. contains almost all of the things that we/I have found about this. A ctrl+f on there will show any of the forms found so far.

I went down the list of source manuscripts and poured through the descriptions/provenance to see if Voynich owned any of them. Most of the provenance descriptions of most books don't, unfortunately, include book dealers and brokers in their provenance, unfortunately. They have the owners, usually, or maybe the auction houses... rarely. But hardly ever the actual broker who bought or sold the work between listed owners.

A few of the dates of transition of ownership do overlap Voynich's active years in London, Florence and Paris. But that tells us nothing... other than (to beat a dead theorem) full my requirements. That is, the minimum possible requirements, in this case, that the item be somewhere Voynich is also known to have been... broadly, Paris, for several of these. Of course he would have been very interest in the collections of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. And their Richelieu Site (Historic/Research Site) was only a (presumably) pleasant 13 minute walk from Voynich's Paris location:

   

So beyond simply fulfilling the most basic requirements of the Theorem, these books actually place my suspect within 13 minutes of several of the sources.

But even further than that, I found another intriguing (to me) possible connection to one of your listed volumes, #166 on your list, the book at the Walters: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

In that description it is pointed out that one Léon Gruel sold this volume to the Walters "before 1931". The description seems a bit contradictory, as it both states, "Henry Walters, Baltimore, purchased from Gruel before 1931", then below that, "Walters Art Museum, 1931, by Henry Walters' bequest"... is it before 1931, or IN 1931? We wants to know. AI tells me this is not a contradiction, as "Henry Walters passed away in 1931. In his will, he bequeathed his entire private collection and his gallery building to the City of Baltimore "for the benefit of the public". But, still, he bought this book "before 1931".

I did further searching, and it turns out that the Walters bought two other items from Gruel in 1903 and 1906, but the specific year they bought this Book of Hours is not stated.

Although I didn't track down exactly WHEN the sale was, I hope to find out, and here is why: Léon Gruel, book binder and book seller, had an association WITH Voynich. Gruel's Paris bookbinding shop was located at 418 Rue Saint-Honoré, Paris, which is only an 11 minute walk from the location of Voynich's, which at the Hôtel St. James, 211 Rue Saint-Honoré.

They had some sort of mutual trust, too, as when Gruel failed to compel De Costa Greene into buying his "Lives of the Martyrs" in 1912, Voynich went to her, in person, and she changed her mind and bought it on Morgan's behalf in 1913. It sold for some great deal of money at the time, too... I forget the figure, but it was a fortune.

I do not know, but I have not found any record of Léon Gruel being in the USA to do business directly. Maybe he did? Maybe, like his use of Voynich in the case of the Lives of the Martyrs, it was Voynich who actually brokered the deal with the Walters, in the case of this Walters Book of Hours. But no matter... Gruel owned it at some point, for some time before 1931, and presumably had it in his Paris shop, which was, as stated, an 11 minute walk from Voynich's location.

I think, I mean, that anyone trying to argue that Voynich could not, or would not have, or even, likely didn't have knowledge of the month name forms in the zodiac pages of the Voynich manuscript would be hard pressed to show why. There were several easy and close ways he could have seen them, and he had a great interest in ancient manuscripts... obviously.

Rich

AI addendum:

Léon Gruel and Wilfrid Voynich shared several significant connections beyond their overlapping attempts to sell The Lives of the Martyrs (also known as the "Giotto manuscript") to J.P. Morgan:

- Inscribed Presentation Copy: Léon Gruel gifted an autographed presentation copy of his multi-volume masterwork, [Manuel historique et bibliographique de l'amateur de reliures](You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ""Manuel historique et bibliographique de l'amateur de reliures" NYPL"), directly to Wilfrid Voynich. This volume is currently preserved in the collections of the New York Public Library.

- Geographic Proximity in Paris: The two operated in very close physical proximity along the same street in Paris. Gruel’s famous bookbinding workshop was located at 418 Rue Saint-Honoré, while Voynich established his Parisian base just a short walk away at the Hôtel St. James, 211 Rue Saint-Honoré (voynich.nu)

- The Giotto Provenance Trail: Before Voynich marketed the manuscript, Gruel was the primary figure in possession of the volume in Paris. Gruel explicitly reached out to Morgan’s librarian, Belle da Costa Greene, in late 1912 to sell it. After she turned him down, Voynich took over the item, using photographs of the illustrations to consult art expert Bernard Berenson before eventually closing the sale with the Morgan family. (voynich.nu)

[eggyk]

I think, I mean, that anyone trying to argue that Voynich could not, or would not have, or even, likely didn't have knowledge of the month name forms in the zodiac pages of the Voynich manuscript would be hard pressed to show why. There were several easy and close ways he could have seen them, and he had a great interest in ancient manuscripts... obviously.

Could voynich have seen 'jong' on an astrolabe in a museum in london, and then seen octebres in a collection in paris, and then seen an aberil from a single poem printed in the 19th century, technically yes. But if everything in the BNF library now counts as "may have likely been seen" by Voynich then there isn't much that won't be found in some way. How likely that is then becomes a matter of how likely it is that those rare examples were picked out of the thousands of other manuscripts and sources. 

If the month names were "mars, apuril, may, jung, jullet, septembre, octembre, nouembre, decembre", I would condede quite happily that it was likely that he could have been aware of such forms, even though some are non-standard. Perhaps another way of putting it is this hypothetical scenario:

Let's say Voynich did have access to the full BNF library, and let's also say that he specifically took an interest in french calendars and sought them out unhindered (would this actually have been the case, by the way?). Based on what we have found, if he were to have seen 200 books of hours, what are the chances that he would have come across the month name forms as written in the VMS? Obviously mars, may, sept, nov, dec are basic. Octembre + knowledge of em -> ē is also reasonably likely. Augst was common german so that's easy. The ones we have left are aberil, yong, and iollet.

jong (technically yong but lets just say jong to give the best chance at success here) is practically a zero chance. 'joing' is a rather low chance, with only 3 or 4 clearly displayed BNF joings in everything we've found thus far. He would then have to choose to omit the i too. And as we mentioned previously, iollet seemingly doesn't exist anywhere.  

All of this assumes a specific attempt at perusing french language calendars in particular, when there are hundreds or thousands more calendars in latin. If we change the scenario to "400 calendars from france, at random", the chances are even lower. If we change it to "1000 interesting manuscripts at random" the chances are extremely low, in my opinion.

But that is my opinion, and I suspect we will have to agree to disagree on the likelihood that these things occured. I don't think it was likely, but I agree most of the forms are possible to have been seen anyway. That is also seperate from the likelihood that these forms would be chosen given that he saw them, but that is a matter on which both of us can only speculate. I mean, technically voynich may have owned a one-of-a-kind calendar with all of these forms, or got lucky and found them all in the first 5 he saw, you know? 

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That is why sources that are linked to voynich himself, or to those he was close to, are far more convinving for me personally, so I appreciate your example. If you actually were to show that yes, many of the rare month name forms were in manuscripts owned by people that voynich knew personally, the liklihood that he would have seen them is far higher. Given the relative rarity of some forms, any genuine link to voynich personally is therefore relatively unlikely and deserves attention. 

I think you would agree with me that -seperate to theorems- the likelihood of him finding something in a huge national library is quite a lot different to finding something his friend/colleague personally owned. Just like the microscope images were readily accessible to voynich, calendars owned by friends would likely have been as well.

[R. Sale]

The task of a forger is to create something that appears to be authentic, even though it is not. The interpretation of authenticity is based in part on the use of standard forms and formats. If I wanted a list of month names appropriate to mid-13th century Paris, I would look for a liturgical calendar of that description. That is not the case for the VMs. If the VMs is a modern creation, then the month names would appear to be a collection of odd variations gathered from various written sources. As such, it does not present a standard conformation, and this detracts from the appearance of authenticity.

Furthermore, this is not the only detracting factor found in the VMs zodiac sequence. The VMs sequence starts with Pisces when Aries is standard and Pisces is last. VMs Aries and Taurus are split into halves. The month names do not correspond to the standard zodiac medallions - Pisces should be February, not 'Mars' and so on. The individual medallions also present examples of nonstandard forms - Sagittarius.

Not only does the VMs artist favor the depiction of nonstandard forms, s/he also used them in provocative and preposterous ways as in the VMs cosmos (f68v3). If the VMs is a modern creation, then this sort of trickery is an intentional finger in the eye of contemporary artistic criticism - the last thing a forger should do. But then, no one noticed because BNF Fr. 565 wasn't recognized in the first hundred years of modern VMs investigation - starting 1912.

[proto57]

Hi Eggo (do you have Eggo frozen waffles where you live?):

I have problems with much of what you You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.:

1) Moved the goalposts: I have practically told you what Voynich put in his coffee in the cafe he loved to stop at on his way over to the BNF, and what he and Mr. Grunel were wearing in their chat in Leon's book binding shop, that rainy morning in Joot, or Jost, while discussing Voynich's cut would be, should he unload the Lives of the Martyrs to Greene, and the Hours to Walters. I mean, it is clear I have more than fulfilled the terms of my Voynich Theorem #1... heck I wrote the damned thing, and purposefully didn't put it anything near the levels you now insist on before you accept it has been met! So again, it is clear to me that you will not ever concede it has been met, and that is fine. But it is wrong of you to demand some higher level of standards than I myself stipulated in my own Theorem.

2) You have reversed the probability argument, something I have explained before... you you and Bluetoes, I think. It will get far too long to show all the places in which this has been done, but here is one good example, I think: "Based on what we have found, if he were to have seen 200 books of hours, what are the chances that he would have come across the month name forms as written in the VMS? Obviously mars, may, sept, nov, dec are basic. Octembre + knowledge of em -> ē is also reasonably likely. Augst was common german so that's easy. The ones we have left are aberil, yong, and iollet. jong (technically yong but lets just say jong to give the best chance at success here) is practically a zero chance."

If Voynich were looking specifically for the words used in the zodiac, as we have to do, then of course it would have been very difficult. That is, the way you describe it, for instance, as though he got in his head he wanted to use "octēmbre", SPECIFICALLY, for some reason. Well first of all, if he wanted to use it, he would have to have already known of it, and so would NOT have to search at all! So your premise is flawed from the start. Obviously what happened in place of your version was that he either already had seen octēmbre (and the others), or went looking for either words in general, or month names in particular, in this case, and simply copied ones he liked.

He could have happened to choose the many other spellings and forms... October, Octembre, Octombre (I think) and so on. He didn't have to go searching for them, there would have been, immediately, dozens or more forms in many of the places you and the others found them, and he just found, or already knew, and happened to like, the octēmbre among them.

Put another way, you are looking at this backwards in assuming that he was seeking these specific forms, when he both could not have been as he would have to have already known them (as we do) before knowing to "seek" them; and secondly, he had a great many words to choose from... we know this, as we know he could walk, see and read... so assuming he "needed" certain words is clearly in error.

3) Another thing about this issue, if one wants to apply probabilities to what we each think happened here: In the case that the Voynich is genuine, we have one of several scenarios: One scribe who happened to know, and decided to combine, month names from different eras, in different languages. He/she knew some in Scandanavian/Germanic, Walloon, Old French... I think there are some others... and in a very un-monk-like way for the time, shirked all convention and expectations in doing so. Why? Or, multiple scribes, using a very similar hand, and dipping into the very same inkwell it seems... "Here's the pen, Friar Sven... when you are done, hand the quill to Friar Frenchy over there, he gets October, by the way." "No problem, Friar Gustav". This makes NO sense. This would simply not have been done, and I don't think either of us ever saw it done. It is literally "un-real". And, not that I like probabilistic terms without math to back it up, it is highly unlikely.

Now in my scenario, we have an erudite but a bit inconsistent, careless scoundrel of a forger, Wilfrid, who had walls of books around him, who frequented the best libraries, museums and  collections all over Europe, seeing styles of writing, and spellings, correct and not, in all languages, with all the abbreviations, dialects, and in all styles imaginable... well that guy must have seen hundreds of versions of just those month names, alone! Now he finds himself sitting down to scribble some month names on his ridiculous and incomplete and repeating and poorly drawn "animals" of the zodiac... he actually, probably, simply jotted down some of his favorites which he had remembered seeing over the years. Heck he probably didn't remember, nor realize, and certainly didn't care enough, that he was putting such a diverse and eclectic selection of month names in there in the first place!

So I would say that my scenario is far more likely than the "Magic Scribe" makes eclectic set of unmatched month names, which actually rises to not believable.

4) Also, this, which is another example of a demand of a much higher level of evidence than genuine ever deigns to offer, "Could voynich have seen 'jong' on an astrolabe in a museum in london?". To insist that is moving the goal posts, and changing the standards in my own Theorem so that they can appear to not have been met when they have been. This is an example of making an extremely, and really impossible, demand at a level that is unreachable; while at the same time, anyone who believes the Voynich is genuine and 1420 has an entirely different standard, one which is blurry enough to cover any possibility and still be said to point to genuine.

In this case, I must have Voynich's nicotine stained eyeballs on a specific engraving on a specific astrolabe on a particular Saturday afternoon for there to be any chance he wrote that name in there, and instead, the Zodiac month names are claimed to be genuine simply because they existed somewhere in the world... well, or might have (like much "evidence" for authenticity it is said that even though we have not found the thing needed, it probably exists or existed somewhere, so we must accept it as fact). No matter they are all different spellings and in several different languages and from hundreds of miles and possibly years apart, but in the same hand made with the same ink at the same time... no, I must prove Voynich himself actually saw each particular example you all found?

That being said, I actually strive to have my standards for evidence set high, yet find it rich that they are set impossibly and illogically high for forgery, while genuine skates along with wishes and maybes.

5) "Let's say Voynich did have access to the full BNF library, and let's also say that he specifically took an interest in french calendars and sought them out unhindered (would this actually have been the case, by the way?)." Yes, by the way. The access to materials in his time were generally far more lax than in eras since. I've looked into this, read about this, and spoken to people about it. In many cases, libraries, museums and booksellers would let people they trusted take HOME rare and valuable books. The world of scholarship was of a high level of trust, in general.

6) "I mean, technically voynich may have owned a one-of-a-kind calendar with all of these forms, or got lucky and found them all in the first 5 he saw, you know?" What? Why "the first 5 minutes" (of course you mean in a generally short amount of time, but again why?)? Why would one calendar have to have "all of these forms" to have had him use them? And anyway, by asking that question, you actually have buttressed my point #3, above... as you are by using it, unwittingly emphasizing that it would be unusual, and hence unlikely, to even find "all five forms" on one document... exactly my point! It an anomaly to find them all together, and is evidence of forgery.

7) "All of this assumes a specific attempt at perusing french language calendars in particular, when there are hundreds or thousands more calendars in latin." Again, "why?". I don't "assume" that, why would anyone? The calendars exist, and in libraries he frequented, again, why do you imagine he must have made a "specific attempt" at perusing them?

8) "I think you would agree with me that -seperate to theorems- the likelihood of him finding something in a huge national library is quite a lot different to finding something his friend/colleague personally owned. Just like the microscope images were readily accessible to voynich, calendars owned by friends would likely have been as well."

Possibly, but I don't necessarily agree this was the case. Well, at least that the difference between those two possibles, as sources, is unknowable. I do not know how deep into Gruel's collection Voynich read, nor how many hours he spent in libraries. But I think I can safely speculate that he spent a very good chunk of his life in libraries of all kinds, and as I suggested above, his head was probably filled to overflowing with a veritable alphabet soup of almost every character and word known to man, and each in every style. And I think it entirely reasonable and common nonsensical that he, as really almost anyone can, drew from his memories and experiences of them all.

Rich

[eggyk]

Hi Eggo (do you have Eggo frozen waffles where you live?):

No, I don't think so 

1) Moved the goalposts: I have practically told you what Voynich put in his coffee in the cafe he loved to stop at on his way over to the BNF, and what he and Mr. Grunel were wearing in their chat in Leon's book binding shop, that rainy morning in Joot, or Jost, while discussing Voynich's cut would be, should he unload the Lives of the Martyrs to Greene, and the Hours to Walters. I mean, it is clear I have more than fulfilled the terms of my Voynich Theorem #1... heck I wrote the damned thing, and purposefully didn't put it anything near the levels you now insist on before you accept it has been met!

I'm really not trying to move goalposts at all. I accepted outright that most forms in the VMS meet your theorem. I apologise if I didn't make that clear.

As for points 2-7, they are deliberately discussing a related, but different matter: the likelihood that the forms (that fit the theorem) would have been seen and used by Voynich. The hypothetical scenario was crafted to give a favourable chance to him coming across the month name forms before choosing to use them later. The idea of it was this: if it would have still been unlikely in such a crafted scenario, then other scenarios where he saw fewer manuscripts and fewer such sources would be even more unlikely. But it would also mean that any scenario where he would have seen more sources would make it more likely. 

I was not saying that he actually sought out such examples or actually did specific research on medieval french name forms - it was just the premise of the hypothetical. The same scenario would work by saying he had a particular interest in expensive/sought after books of hours, or that he happened to view 1000s of french sources; i'm not assigning any actual motive to the actual Voynich.

Saying "he could have found them in the first 5 minutes" requires an acceptance of your theorem, because it admits that those forms did exist in places accessible to Voynich, and we have no way of knowing what he looked at exactly, or why.

Why would one calendar have to have "all of these forms" to have had him use them? And anyway, by asking that question, you actually have buttressed my point #3, above... as you are by using it, unwittingly emphasizing that it would be unusual, and hence unlikely, to even find "all five forms" on one document... exactly my point! It an anomaly to find them all together, and is evidence of forgery.

The "one-of-a kind calendar with all of these forms" comment was for the same purpose as the "first 5 minutes" statement I explained above. Just a way of saying "regardless of how likely or unlikely I think it was, its entirely possible he could have found the (theorem-conforming) forms easily".

I disagree that the anomaly of finding the month forms together represents evidence of a forgery. I actually don't see it as evidence of anything in particular. Given what we see so far there is no evidence of that mixing practice in genuine manuscripts. So in my opinion: 
- Such mixing is not evident in known manuscripts, and so is either completely unique or very unusual
- A forger trying to produce a believable manuscript would surely know this, so using a mix represents a huge risk to the forgery's credibility

So to be clear, based on this variable I am not saying that the manuscript is not a forgery, and I am not saying the manuscript is genuine either. Both have pros and cons with regard to this, and both theories have issues in explaining this anomaly for certain.

No matter they are all different spellings and in several different languages and from hundreds of miles and possibly years apart, but in the same hand made with the same ink at the same time... no, I must prove Voynich himself actually saw each particular example you all found?

That being said, I actually strive to have my standards for evidence set high, yet find it rich that they are set impossibly and illogically high for forgery, while genuine skates along with wishes and maybes.

No, of course i'm not expecting you to prove that, or even try to prove that. As you rightly say, that would be an impossibly high standard to request. I'm just laying out what I think on the matter. There is no "prove he saw them or it wasn't a forgery" going on here (from me, at least). 

The only two forms that truly puzzle me are yong and iollet, because neither have been found yet by anyone. We have both admitted that this represents an issue that requires explaining in some way. Both genuine and forgery theories can try to explain these in some other way anyway, so even that isn't a 'gotcha' for either overarching theory. 

But -as far as we know- they are forms that do not fit the theorem, at least not yet. If we ever properly find either, it's entirely possible that it will be in a source that was accessible to voynich. It is also possible that we will find something later, instead of in the 15-16th century. Time will hopefully tell.   

Possibly, but I don't necessarily agree this was the case. Well, at least that the difference between those two possibles, as sources, is unknowable. I do not know how deep into Gruel's collection Voynich read, nor how many hours he spent in libraries. But I think I can safely speculate that he spent a very good chunk of his life in libraries of all kinds, and as I suggested above, his head was probably filled to overflowing with a veritable alphabet soup of almost every character and word known to man, and each in every style. And I think it entirely reasonable and common nonsensical that he, as really almost anyone can, drew from his memories and experiences of them all.

I believe that we are broadly on the same page then. Neither of us know for certain what he had access to, but it was a lot. I appreciate the answer on how accessible the BNF would have been, as I genuinely didn't know. I just meant that if the forms were present in sources strongly linked to Voynich personally -such as the manuscript he personally got involved with to sell- that would be far more convincing to me personally. 

It would be, I would say, an unlikely coincidence. 

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Seperately, out of interest, if we were to find a genuine manuscript with the same french+german sequence found in the VMS, and that manuscript was not yet uncovered/discovered before 1912, what would you think of that?

For me, there are two ways I could go: 
1) The unusual VMS has a sequence attested in a genuine manuscript that voynich didn't see, so the VMS is likely genuine
or
2) If we find a second example, there were likely many many more examples out there, which means Voynich may have seen one of the others