Fragmentation and Narrative Construction: The Cost (and Utility) of Fabricated Provenance

Abstract

Abstract: The Josephinum Bible is a thirteenth-century bible manuscript exhibiting multiple forms of fragmentation, including the excision and replacement of many historiated initials and the commercial breaking of the manuscript into individual folios. It also contains evidence of manufactured provenance, primarily a forged document supposedly linking the manuscript to the Abbey of Saint Geneviève in Paris and dating it to the year "1247." Both the contrived date of the manuscript and supposed early link to the Abbey of Sainte Geneviève have been highlighted by various sellers of first the intact bible and later its broken, individual leaves to inflate the market value of the manuscript. Sellers cite these two pieces of "provenance," however, failing to question them, either tacitly or overtly encouraging buyers to draw incorrect conclusions about the true history of the manuscript. This article examines in detail for the first time the manuscript's manufactured provenance.