The Book of Hours of Louis de Roucy and the accusation of plagiarism by Peter Kidd. Fact-checking and conclusion that it is a hoax.

It is quite startling—and consequently, rather suspect—that so many took Kidd’s allegation of plagiarism at face value. They believed he had evidence that the scholar in question copied five lines from his blog into her nearly 300-page book, a digital reconstitution of a Book of Hours (the so-called De Roucy Hours) dismembered for profit in 2009. Equally astonishing is that few seemed to have given fair hearing to the scholar’s lectures, in which she lucidly demonstrated how Peter Kidd profited from the manuscript’s disassembly. 
One was presented at the University of Barcelona —a reputable institution that certainly stands beyond the pale of Kidd’s charges of misconduct https://webs.uab.cat/occita/conferencies. 
She also authored a detailed article in Italian, published by the journal Studj Romanzi, https://www.oprom.eu/_files/ugd/494184_a757959529184ab89d7b80047a2821b2.pdf associated with La Sapienza University of Rome. Both of these Universities are above reproach concerning academic integrity. The scholar makes a compelling case that Kidd was involved in the dismemberment of the manuscript for substantial financial gain.
The truly strange thing is that the scholar was not accused of “plagiarism” by any expert in art history or the history of illumination, but many unclear social media profiles, who claim to hold PhDs but do not seem to have any academic titles based on how they write, participated in the hate campaign. American engineers, bridge experts, and many people with unclear social media profiles who claim to hold PhDs but do not seem to have any academic titles based on how they write participated in the hate campaign. Those who took the time to examine the allegations, from both a legal and philological, linguistic and art historical point of view, all took the side of the scholar and in return received threats, as documented on the website of the Organization for the Protection of Medieval Manuscripts.

We analyzed Kidd’s allegations in detail

Alleged “plagiarism” on page 21 of the publication

Kidd claims that a passage from the publication bears similarities to one of his blog posts. The passage in question is the following:

The scholar:
“The text of the first lesson of the Office of the Dead (fol. 105r), included in our BoH , is rare and, according to K. Ottosen [4], is only found in manuscript sources from Châlons-en-Champagne.”

Kidd:
“[…] the first lesson of the Office of the Dead, “Milicia est vita hominis” (on the leaf with the miniature of Job) is extremely rare and, according to K. Ottosen, 1993, p.74, is only found in sources from Châlons”

It is obvious that one cannot speak of plagiarism. If one describes the same thing, one inevitably uses the same words, especially if both refer to a third party (K. Ottosen). The true motivation of Kidd’s actions, however, emerges from his blog itself and is self-explanatory:

“The book published by RECEPTIO, by Prof Carla Rossi, can be downloaded as a PDF from the bottom of the page here. Having a PDF makes it very easy to search the entire text for search terms as “Kidd”, “blog” and “mssprovenance”, none of which occur.” 

The scholar does something more than Kidd does: she verifies, by philologically collating the text on two other manuscripts use of Châlons that indeed the Book of Hours is for use of Châlons. This is original scientific research, not Kidd’s cataloguing work.



"Alleged plagiarism” on page 250 of the publication

Kidd claims that his description of a miniature on page 250 of the scholar’s publication is similar to the description in his blog.

The scholar:
“The two other identifiable saints in the miniature are Catherine, to the left of Stephen, holding a fragment of her instrument of martyrdom, the wheel, and Lawrence, holding his grid-iron.”

Kidd:
“The only two other saints who are identifiable are St Catherine, to the left, holding a fragment of a wheel, and St Lawrence, to the right, more obviously holding his grid-iron”.

Now, we invite anyone to read the dealer’s description of the miniature

https://web.archive.org/web/20230103210808/https://www.pirages.com/pages/books/ST14354/from-a-book-of-hours-in-latin-and-french-an-illuminated-manuscript-leaf-on-vellum-with-a-miniature-of/text-from-the-beginning-of-the-litany

The inconsistency of the accusations immediately catches the eye and one wonders how a hate campaign, with death threats, could have been generated by such trifles. It is obvious that there is something underneath and we wanted to clear things up, trying to understand who Peter Kidd is. Indeed, because if the scholar, before being threatened with death and forced to change nation, was a famous and esteemed researcher and also had a Wikipedia page dedicated to her (which was then filled with insults to the point that Wikipedia itself obscured it), nothing is known about this Peter Kidd beyond his blog.

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