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• RE: Missing folios

  ololololo > 27-07-2026, 02:08 PM

  (27-07-2026, 02:01 PM)eggyk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view."Uselessly taking up space" would imply that it was of no value to him to keep, or that he could not extract any meaning.

  That's exactly what I meant. It's meaningless in the sense that there's no point or usefulness in this book for Baresch in its current form.

• RE: Missing folios

  Jorge_Stolfi > 27-07-2026, 02:18 PM

  (27-07-2026, 11:43 AM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (27-07-2026, 09:19 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Did the MS arrive in Prague with the pages already removed?

  Apparently, yes.

  Why do you think so?  
  
  The missing pages (that we know about) were removed after the folio numbers were written.  According to experts, the style of the numbers says they were written in the 1600s.  IF the VMS was acquired by Rudolf from Widemann, that happened in 1599.  So, in order for the pages to have been removed before that sale, the timeline would have to be stretched a bit.  
  
  (By the way, that date would imply also that the book did not have folio numbers when it was sold to Rudolf, and was either a stack of loose quires, or was already bound but with no folio numbers. To ponder...)
  
  (By the way, IIUC, in 1599 Rapahel Mnishowsky was still a young college student with no role in Rudoph's court.  Thus he cannot have witnessed the purchase; he must have learned about it many years later.  Which would explain how "600 florins for a pile of books" became "600 ducats for one Bacon book".)
  
  

  Quote:Before Baresch and Wiedemann, it had other unattested owners, including an alleged heir who knew about Voynichese and the author of the names of the months in the Zodiac.

  
  I don't see any evidence of a later owner who could read Voynichese.  Maybe there was a heir who could do it, but he does not seem to have left any trace.   The iconic sign figures at the center of the Zodiac diagrams must be original, and the month names would have been deduced from them.
  
  All the best, --stolfi

• RE: Missing folios

  ololololo > 27-07-2026, 02:23 PM

  (27-07-2026, 02:18 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The missing pages (that we know about) were removed after the folio numbers were written. According to experts, the style of the numbers says they were written in the 1600s. IF the VMS was acquired by Rudolf from Widemann, that happened in 1599. So, in order for the pages to have been removed before that sale, the timeline would have to be stretched a bit.

  It could have been in other hands before it reached Widemann. It's possible that whoever numbered the pages already knew that some pages were missing.
  But it is possible that the book was taken apart after Widemann and Baresch. At the very least, I'm sure some merchant who liked the book did so. It's unlikely that the Emperor's personal healer or the Prague alchemist would tear out the pages...
  

  (27-07-2026, 02:18 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I don't see any evidence of a later owner who could read Voynichese

  I really believe that, say, the "second owner" understood a little bit of what was written. It's possible that he was the author of the markings on f17r, f66v, and f116v, but it's not a fact. It's possible that he worked on this manuscript himself, and it may have been inherited by him as the "best employee." In any case, it's highly likely that he could understand Voynichese, even if he didn't leave any traces.

• RE: Missing folios

  Malatin_1 > 27-07-2026, 06:46 PM

  Thanks everyone for the detailed corrections and suggestions. The key correction to my original post is now clear: the missing leaves were removed after the seventeenth-century foliation, not before it. Lisa’s codicological summary also shows that we are not dealing with a single type of loss, but with two distinct processes: two single leaves were cut out, while several bifolia were removed from quire centres or as complete singulion quires.
  
  That distinction may matter more than identifying any specific suspect.
  
  The two cut leaves could have been removed without rebinding and may fit a scenario of sampling for study, copying, or correspondence. The missing bifolia are more likely linked to a later binding intervention, though, as Jorge notes, they might still have been removed without fully dismantling the manuscript. In any case, the different methods suggest the leaves were not necessarily removed at the same time or for the same reason.
  
  This shifts the archival question. Rather than looking for a single group of Voynich leaves that stayed together, it may be better to consider two separate survival paths:
  
  1. Individual cut leaves: correspondence, scholarly papers, notebooks, or sample collections.
  2. Removed bifolia: discarded bindings, rebinding materials, loose fragments, or papers of later custodians.
  
  In that context, René’s point about the lost Moretus notebook is interesting, even if Moretus himself is unlikely to have removed anything. A notebook, letter file, or compilation of copied scripts may be a more plausible context for a single leaf than a formal manuscript collection.
  
  A further question is negative evidence: do any surviving descriptions, inventories, letters, photographs, or early examinations record the manuscript’s physical extent before Voynich acquired it? Even brief notes on leaf count, thickness, loose quires, or binding state could help constrain the timing of removal. As Jorge noted, the lack of such records is itself significant, but indirect traces may still exist in Jesuit, bookseller, restoration, or ownership archives.
  
  So I would now reframe the question less as “Where are the missing folios?” and more as:
  
  Can the different removal methods be linked to different custody periods, and do they imply different archival contexts in which the leaves might survive?
  
  This remains speculative, but it seems a more testable approach than assuming a single removal event and a single destination.

• RE: Missing folios

  Jorge_Stolfi > 27-07-2026, 07:53 PM

  (27-07-2026, 02:23 PM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (27-07-2026, 02:18 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The missing pages (that we know about) were removed after the folio numbers were written. According to experts, the style of the numbers says they were written in the 1600s. IF the VMS was acquired by Rudolf from Widemann, that happened in 1599. So, in order for the pages to have been removed before that sale, the timeline would have to be stretched a bit.

  It could have been in other hands before it reached Widemann. It's possible that whoever numbered the pages already knew that some pages were missing.

  
  I meant that for the pages to have been removed before 1599, the folio numbers would have had to be written before that date.  Which would be stretching the "17th century" date based on the style of the numbers.
  
  All the best, --stolfi

• RE: Missing folios

  ololololo > 27-07-2026, 09:15 PM

  (27-07-2026, 07:53 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (27-07-2026, 02:23 PM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (27-07-2026, 02:18 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The missing pages (that we know about) were removed after the folio numbers were written. According to experts, the style of the numbers says they were written in the 1600s. IF the VMS was acquired by Rudolf from Widemann, that happened in 1599. So, in order for the pages to have been removed before that sale, the timeline would have to be stretched a bit.

  It could have been in other hands before it reached Widemann. It's possible that whoever numbered the pages already knew that some pages were missing.

  
  I meant that for the pages to have been removed before 1599, the folio numbers would have had to be written before that date.  Which would be stretching the "17th century" date based on the style of the numbers.
  
  All the best, --stolfi

  Are you considering the possibility that the same person committed the theft and the page arrangement? If it was a librarian, it makes sense.
  In any case, I think this malicious thief would have left the stolen page in some of his archives. Maybe one of them has survived to this day...

• RE: Missing folios

  ReneZ > 27-07-2026, 11:20 PM

  (27-07-2026, 01:40 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Anyway, he probably did not sell or give the book away before his death.  Had he done so, I would expect the new owner to cross out Jacobus's ex libris on You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and add his own; like Jacobus himself did with the #4 book at the National Library.  Instead it seems that the ex-libris was imperfectly erased.  Maybe Baresch pilfered the book from Jacobus's  library after his death, or had previously borrowed the book and "forgot" to return it.

  
  Quite the contrary: it is more than likely that Tepenec gave the book away before his death.
  There is a letter, mentioned briefly in Stefan Guzy's video recording of his 2022 conference paper, describing that he did hand out some of his belongings before his death. The remainder went to the Jesuits, and most of his surviving books (that have been identified) include an ownership note of the Jesuit college. The Voynich MS does not. (I searched for it using UV).
  
  Also, his Ex Libris have faded or were erased, but let's not call that evidence of anything. Plenty of books have old Ex Libris that were not tampered with by later owners.

• RE: Missing folios

  Jorge_Stolfi > 28-07-2026, 01:36 AM

  (27-07-2026, 06:46 PM)Malatin_1 Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.A further question is negative evidence: do any surviving descriptions, inventories, letters, photographs, or early examinations record the manuscript’s physical extent before Voynich acquired it? Even brief notes on leaf count, thickness, loose quires, or binding state could help constrain the timing of removal.

  
  As far as I know, between Marci's 1666 letter to Kircher and Wilfrid announcing it to the world after 1912, there is absolutely no mention anywhere of any book that could be positively identified with the VMS.  
  
  There is a list (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) of 294 books that the Jesuits supposedly sold to the Vatican Library in 1912 that includes an extremely succinct entry 
  

  Quote:Miscellanea, c.m.[codex membenacaeous] s.[saeculae] XV

  However a dozen of the books in that list, including this "Miscellanea", are not at the Vatican Library.  Some of these somehow somewhen ended up in Wilfrid's possession (which would have been a crime by the Italian laws of the time) and were re-sold by him over several years after 1912.  
  
  It has been generally assumed that the "Miscellanea" was the VMS, and suffered the same fate.  But that conclusion requires one to assume that Wilfrid did acquire the VMS from the Jesuits by diverting it from that sale to the Vatican Library.   Una storia mal raccontata...
  
  Anyway neither that "Miscellanea" entry nor the description of the book in Baresch's letter, allow us to tell whether the missing folios were already missing or not.
  
  All the best, --stolfi

• RE: Missing folios

  ReneZ > 28-07-2026, 03:24 AM

  (28-07-2026, 01:36 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.As far as I know, between Marci's 1666 letter to Kircher and Wilfrid announcing it to the world after 1912, there is absolutely no mention anywhere of any book that could be positively identified with the VMS.  

  
  This rough time span of 'no knowledge' is, by the way, also true for all but four (to my best current knowledge) of the other almost 300 books in APUG 3289. 
  And even more so for the 2000+ books in APUG 3225, a catalogue created around the same time, of books that remained in Jesuit possession. We have no catalogue, no disitised copies of these books anywhere.
  
  Let's not make a mystery out of something that is a completely normal state of affairs. 
  
  Even as there are still chances of finding additional information and descriptions in libraries and archives, it seems unlikely that these will include details of missing pages. 
  
  Some people will remember that a list of missing pages from Newbold (IIRC) did *not* include folios 59-64, leading people to believe that he saw these, and they may have been lost afterwards, but this is generally believed to be a a mistake by Newbold.

• RE: Missing folios

  LisaFaginDavis > 28-07-2026, 02:19 PM

  Those are quire-supports added by H. P. Kraus' conservator Helmut Haupt-Lehman in 1967.
  
  Lisa
  
  
  

  (26-07-2026, 05:35 PM)eggyk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (26-07-2026, 01:09 PM)LisaFaginDavis Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The missing leaves comprise six bifolia plus two single leaves: four bifolia were removed from the centers of quire 8 (three bifolia, folios 59-64) and quire 20 (one bifolium, folios 109-110), two of the bifolia were singulion quires (quires 16 and 18, that is, folios 91|92 and 97|98), and two single leaves were cut out leaving stubs behind (folios 12 and 74). 

  
  Out of curiosity, what is the reason for the stubs seen between You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. - f68r1, and between You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. - f72r1? I thought those represented missing leaves as well. Are they something else?

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