Cipher Mysteries

Tony Gaffney, a chess player / tournament organizer I knew back in the early 1980s when playing for Hackney Chess Club, made some fascinating comments to my recent blog post on The Subtelty of Witches and Eric Sams' attempted solution to the Dorabella Cipher. Firstly: having spent a looong time in the British Library looking at ciphers (you'll see why shortly), Tony ...

I've just heard back from the British Library Manuscript department about BL MS Add. 10035, "The Subtelty of Witches", which I mentioned here a few days ago: "unfortunately it does not begin in English. The whole of the manuscript is written in cipher." So: was Eric Sams mistaken? Might the British Library actually have two unreadable books? Well... after a rather longer trawl through ...

Are you an historian with an enciphered document you want to read? If so, here's a link to an article you really ought to have a look at: "Cryptanalysis and Historical Research" by Eric Sams, from Archivaria 21 (1985-1986) [it's actually an extended version of two earlier ...