Vorkosigan

No. According to a poster on another list, patina is a chemical effect that grows quickly initially, but then after that barely grows at all once it has assumed its cauliflower shape. There's no way to date it.

Vorkosigan

Sauron

I'm unclear what you're answer is here, Michael, probably because the question you're responding to contained a double negative.

Let me ask it again: Assume the two inscriptions were done at different times, with the 2nd inscription coming 200 years after the first one.

In that scenario, is there any way that patinization could be used to distinguish that fact?

Amen-Moses

If, as the good professor claims, the added text require the removal of the surface to eradicate a "frame" around the original text and then the box was stored in similar conditions to the original then the patina would be the same.

Amen-Moses

Vorkosigan

Yes, if the forger ignored the patina. But according to Altman, the forger made a number of changes. Strikes me a forger would have cleaned the surface before carving, removing the patina, and any patina-wise proof of forgery. Thus, if the patina is disturbed, it is proof of forgery, but if it is undisturbed, it proves nothing either way.

Apikorus

If indeed the second half of the inscription is in another hand, the "forger" may have been ancient as well, and may have known nothing about patina.

I don't understand Altman's point about the framing. I'd think someone adding to the inscription would simply extend the frame. What am I missing?

Toto

The question is, if a modern forger had added the words "brother of Jesus", cleaned off the patina, and stored it in a way to form a new patina, would this produce the results we have now? Could this have been a project 20 years in the making? 5 years?

Vorkosigan

Certainly, but all I meant was, the forger (whenever he did it) may have cleaned it simply in order to have a clean work surface.

Vorkosigan