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Then the whole cloth would unravel as soon as one careless author made a historical error or used anachronistic language. All the other works that cite this wor

Then the whole cloth would unravel as soon as one careless author made a historical error or used anachronistic language. All the other works that cite this work, and any that cite those, etc., would all be proved frauds. Yet this has not happened. Moreover, new ancient works and new physical evdience (coins, letters, inscriptions in stone) have continued to be found, yet somehow they have all remained consistent with the tremendous fraud that was perpetrated 500-600 years ago. To explain this requires a vast, multi-century conspiracy.

saalweachter 8y ago
Oh, I’m not saying this is LIKELY. I’m just spitballing how it could happen. Honestly, this sort of organic conspiracy could be robust. Suppose a particular work A - which is referenced by other works X, Y, Z - is shown to be counterfeit. Does that mean works X, Y, Z are counterfeit? Not necessarily - A could be a counterfeit version of a work that was lost! That would, indeed, be the most valuable work to counterfeit. Take a work that is referenced by other works, find all the references in other works you can, and use that as the skeleton of your counterfeit work. People will eat it up, because they’ve been waiting for it. New physical evidence, yeah, you’re screwed on that. Especially if you recover an original version of a work that was later counterfeited.