[8] In 1988 Mary V. Orna found that one of the illustrations contained Prussian blue (KFe[Fe(CN)6]), produced since 1704 only.

"[10] In early 2006 the University of Chicago announced that digital images of the manuscript had appeared online in an effort to "foster further research.

"[11] By February Stephen Carlson had announced his findings that the codex was a forgery, and proved his case beyond a doubt at the 2006 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature.

[14] What made the text a forgery was that it was carefully manufactured in the style of a medieval codex, when it was in fact a very recent creation, no older than the late 19th century.

What originally made scholars so suspicious was that it was textually the closest known manuscript – in fact, virtually identical – to Codex Vaticanus, but of a much later date.

Furthermore, Greek codices of a single gospel are extremely unusual, further contributing to the suspicion that it was made as a souvenir.