An Eighteenth-Century Manuscript : Control of the Scribal Hand in Clement’s Letter to Theodore

Abstract

This article discusses Morton Smith's role as a self-professed manuscript hunter in uncovering the only known copy of Clement's Letter to Theodore, and critically assesses the existing studies on its handwriting. We argue that Stephen C. Carlson's analysis is flawed due to its dependence on distorted images, that Agamemnon Tselikas's study has a number of problems due to the unsuitability of applying standard palaeographic practices to a case of suspected deception, and that Venetia Anastasopoulou has made a sustainable case by arguing that Smith could not have imitated the difficult eighteenth-century script-a qualitative verdict strengthened by our quantitative study of the lack of signs of control. We conclude that the handwriting is indistinguishable from authentic eighteenth-century handwriting.

WWFD or What Would a Forger Do: A Critical Inquiry of Poorly Argued Contemporary Cases for Forgery

“…As such, the fact that the papyrus fibres contain ink cannot be used to argue for difference (forgery), but only for similarity (authenticity), as the case may be. As I have argued elsewhere with my co-author (Paananen and Viklund, 2015), this slight adjustment of the research question would bring the standards in contemporary studies on forgeries closer to those used in forensic sciences.…”