Polygraphiae libri sex
Six Books of Polygraphy
prdl-24389_polygraphiae-libri-sex-ioannis-trithemii-abbatis
Edition 3 of 3 of this text in the corpus · Francofurti, 1550
About this work
Polygraphiae libri sex — "Six Books of Polygraphy" — is Trithemius's systematic cryptographic manual and the first printed book on the subject in the West. He completed it late in life — the dedication to Emperor Maximilian I is dated 1508 — and it appeared in print only after his death, in 1518. Where the companion Steganographia hides its cipher beneath angelic conjurations, the Polygraphiae is openly didactic: it teaches the craft in plain language, walking the reader from simple substitution alphabets through transposition grids and the famous "Ave Maria" cipher, in which any plaintext is recast as a grammatical Latin prayer. Its sixth book culminates in the polyalphabetic tabula recta — the rotating-alphabet table that anticipates the Vigenère cipher by the better part of a century.
This is the 1550 Frankfurt edition (BSB scan), one of three print witnesses of the Polygraphiae in this corpus (alongside the 1518 and 1600 editions). Composed 1508; printed posthumously 1518; this witness 1550. The Latin was re-OCR'd from the page scans with a vision model and translated by GPT-5.5, with a Fable 5 review pass recovering the cipher tables that a first pass tends to flatten. The cipher apparatus carries a dedicated cipher-key and cipher-grid rendering set beside the source facsimile; the cipher itself is decoded on the cipher solutions page.
English translation
From the books of [Iorinis Georgij?] of Werdeß, counselor of review to the most serene Elector of Bavaria.
Six Books of Polygraphy
By Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Würzburg, formerly of Sponheim
Addressed to Emperor Maximilian
There has been added one book, the Key to Polygraphy, by the same author
Contained in these books is the method by which one person can communicate to another whatever he wishes, not only secretly, but sometimes even without suspicion. They also present a method most useful both in teaching and in learning. Furthermore, they provide the capacity for understanding the deepest mysteries of the arts and disciplines.
There have also been added explanations of certain passages, especially of those in which the principles of the admirable work Steganography lie hidden; these indeed offer to the ingenious an occasion for discovering things far greater and subtler. By the very learned man Adolph von Glauburg, patrician of Frankfurt.
Frankfurt, 1550
Dedication to Emperor Maximilian
The letter of Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Saint James of Würzburg, on the Polygraphia
I was hesitating, wavering in mind, most invincible Maximilian Caesar, and doubting somewhat within myself whether or not I should be doing something worthwhile, were I to dedicate the volume of our Polygraphy to your Caesarean majesty. For among the great [you are] the greatest, among the more powerful the most powerful, among all the wise by far the wisest—to whom, therefore, nothing ought to be inscribed except what is great, nothing dedicated except what is elaborated with the highest erudition. But I, having attained little or nothing of literary erudition, not without reason hesitated the longer whether I ought to bring my trifles before so great a majesty: since I am neither suited in talent to elaborate anything, nor adorned with the necessary charm of speech. For I know, and cannot deny, how scanty is my furniture, how rude my talent, and that I have no vein of eloquence in speaking—on account of which, with just consideration, I held back for some time, and dreaded, an inept writer, to appear before your glorious majesty. For since after God you are by right lord of the world,
it is no wonder if I, unlearned and the least of monks, should fear the censure of so great a majesty as yours, and dread to offer those lucubrations of mine which I know to be unworthy of your hands. And while I was revolving these things in my mind, there came a messenger with letters sent from your highness, by which you summoned me to Cologne, the expenses necessary for the journey having already some time before been appointed through another. But when I had read over the letters of your serenity, confidence soon conquered my bashfulness, and the consideration of your innate gentleness put my fear to flight. For I know your nature to be most mild—you who, since you are the most modest of all, are wont both to grow gentle toward the humble and to resist the proud. You know not how to be vainly exalted, nor, in the manner of tyrants, to despise the humble who are devoted to your highness; for just as you have nothing by which to grow on earth, so no envy will penetrate your mind. You are the greatest; many and great things, too, you have accomplished no less bravely than wisely, both in peace and in war, by which you have both won an eternal name and are celebrated with the reverence of the highest honor, the affection and favor of all your subjects. These are the riches of princes: the love and favor of the people, and to do justice to each according to the precept of the charity of God. Since, therefore, all bear your name to the stars with praises, and all proclaim you most mild and most humane, why should I, singularly, suspect you to be more severe [toward me]? Thereafter [there is] no
it was not, especially when by your letter you deign to entice me to write. Thus, at last encouraged by weighing these things, I laid aside all fear and took up great confidence in your innate gentleness. Indeed, since all draw confidence from the fountain of your piety, why should I alone not approach trustfully? You, who are always gracious, gentle, and pious to all, surely cannot be cruel to me alone. Therefore, with that humility which is fitting, and which I owe and am able to show, I approach the throne of your most excellent majesty, prostrate upon the ground: I devotedly offer the aforementioned work of Polygraphy, and humbly commend my littleness to your serenity as a servant to his lord. Therefore now accept, most gracious Caesar, the very small little gift which I bring, in which may you deign to weigh my spirit, most subject to you, not its value. But in the subject system of the Polygraphy there are, in certain places, some mysteries wrapped in riddles, lest the meaning of the more inward art which lies hidden should become manifest to the understanding of all. Just as not all things befit all people, so not all things everywhere and always suit everyone. There are therefore certain mysteries shut up here, which in my judgment can be more useful and more necessary to none than to princely men. For the more people they are concerned with, the greater caution of secrecy must be applied to their counsels. For this book teaches princes to command secrecy for their secrets.
But because your Caesarean majesty, occupied with many affairs, does not have time to search out those things which lie hidden wrapped in mysteries, lest he be deprived of the fruit of my labor, I have appended a little explanatory book of the whole work, which I have entitled the Key of Polygraphy; with it as guide you will more easily understand everything obstructed here by figures. May God preserve you unharmed for our salvation. I wrote on the twenty-sixth day of the month of April, in the year of Christ 1508.
Table or Index of the Lucubrations of Johannes Trithemius, Abbot first of Sponheim and afterward of St. James at Würzburg
Johannes Trithemius the abbot was born in the village of Trittenheim, in the diocese of Trier, on the banks of the river Moselle, on the first day of the month of February, at the eleventh hour, in the thirtieth minute after midday, in the year of the Lord’s Nativity 1462, in the tenth indiction of the Romans: his father was Johannes de Heidenberg, and his mother was called Elisabeth de Longo Vico. This was in that year, namely, in which the city of Mainz, in the dissension of two pontiffs, was captured, lost its liberty, and found servitude, with many of its citizens driven into exile; in the fourth current year of Pope Pius, the second of that name, and the twenty-second of Emperor Frederick III. But in the year of the Lord 1482, in the monastery of Sponheim in the diocese of Mainz, on the first day of February, that is, the day on which he had once been born, he laid aside the secular habit, and there assumed the monastic habit under the rule of the divine father Benedict, according to the observance newly introduced. In the following year, which was the eighty-third above the four-hundredth and the thousandth, after Johannes de Colenhusen the abbot had been transferred to Seligenstadt by canonical postulation, Johannes Trithemius, by the common election of the brethren, was promoted and ordained abbot of the aforementioned monastery of Sponheim on the fourth day before the Kalends of July, and presided for twenty-three years, one month, and nineteen days. When these had passed, not without many labors, provoked by the rashness of certain rivals, he accepted the abbacy of St. James at Würzburg, which was offered to him, and of his own free will resigned Sponheim, full of useless cares. In both places he wrote several little works, from which, recently on a sheet in his own hand, to me
he recorded the following. Since you, as a friend, ask me for their titles, I gladly assent to your wishes, so that from the consideration of such great labors of his you may have a more exact memory of our common friend and teacher. And first I shall record the titles of those lucubrations which he laboriously composed while he was abbot at Sponheim. First he wrote the constitutions of his order, which were made in the provincial chapters by command of the presidents, one book. On the visitation of monks, one book. On the manner of celebrating a provincial chapter, one book. On the Rule of Saint Benedict, two books. Homilies and exhortatory sermons to his monks, two books, which he dedicated to his predecessor. On the temptations of cloistered persons and their remedies, two books. To Nicholas, priest of Mernic, on the priestly life, one book. Against the private property of monks, one book. A penthic work, that is, a mournful one, on the ruin of his order, one book. On the illustrious men of his order, four books. Praises of the order of the Carmelite brothers, two books. To Gerlach, abbot of Deutz, praises of manual writers, one book. To Johann Dalberg, bishop of Worms, on ecclesiastical writers, one book. On the praises of Saint Anne, grandmother of the Lord, one book. Chronicle or annals of the monastery of Hirsau, two large volumes. Chronicle of the succession of the dukes of Bavaria and the counts palatine, to Philip, count palatine and elector, one book. Life of Saint Irmina, nun and first abbess at [Horrio?] in Trier, one book. On the misery of cloistered prelates, two books. Praises of Saint Andrew the Apostle, one book. Praises of the monastic life, one book. Praises of true penitence, one book. Monocollogion of a man devoted to God, addressed to himself, one book. On the miracles of the holy mother Anne, one book. To Ulrich, canon of Cologne, on questions concerning the Gospel of John, one book. To the same, on questions concerning the Psalms, one book. To the presidents of the annual chapter concerning the Bursfelde observance, he abridged the statutes of the same union, one book. An epitome or breviary of the same, one book. On ecclesiastical computus, one book. The spiritual exercise of monks, one book. To Jacob Wimpfeling of [unclear], one book. On the illustrious writers of Germany, to Jacob [unclear]. Letters from Sponheim to various persons, four books. Orations delivered in chapters and elsewhere are twenty-four in number, which make one book. He wrote forty very fine sermons to his brothers of the monastery of Sponheim, one book. Sermons on feast days to the people, one book. Several supplicatory prayers to God and the saints, one book. From Greek speech he translated into Latin Maximus the abbot on the incarnation of the Lord. Also the anathema of Saint Cyril, archbishop of Alexandria, against the heretics, promulgated in the third synod of Ephesus; and certain letters of the same synod. He also wrote for the edification of monks a notable work which he entitled On the Threefold Region of Cloistered Persons, three books. He also wrote certain other smaller works, whose titles he did not record for me. These, most loving brother Nicholas, are the Trithemian works which, during the twenty-three years in which he was abbot at Sponheim, he wrote by lamplight for the honor of God, amid cares and continual occupation with household affairs, reading or writing day and night whenever he was able to steal leisure for himself. During the years in which he presided he brought into the library of Sponheim a very great treasure of books in every discipline, not only by the art of printing but also by the hand of scribes. For when I was with him for the space of one year, to learn Greek and Hebrew letters from him, I counted two thousand volumes in the library, of which at least eight hundred had been properly written by pen on parchment and paper. I often heard from his own mouth that he had spent more than two thousand florins on books, which he had not received from the substance of the monastery, which was always very slender, but
and since he was dear to princes, the gifts with which he was honored by them he spent, for the most part, on books. For he is the greatest lover and cultivator of books, beyond all whom I know today living in the flesh. It is said by many, however, that his successor, who is now abbot in Sponheim, has alienated many volumes; whether this is true, I certainly do not at all know. In the year of the Lord 1504, when a fierce war had arisen between the kingdom and Philip, count palatine, Trithemius, from fear of the enemy, withdrew with his library and the possessions of the monastery to Kreuznach, a nearby town, and I likewise returned to my own affairs. But in the year 1506, in the month of October, Trithemius himself, spurred on by the envy of certain men, accepted the abbacy of Saint James at Würzburg, and resigned that of Sponheim. There, in quiet, he writes various works, whose titles and number he sent to me through these persons when asked.
To Emperor Maximilian he published a wonderful work, which he entitled Polygraphia, six books. To the same man, a key to the same Polygraphia, one book. Responses to eight questions of the same emperor, one book. To the same man, on the seven intelligences that move the spheres, one book. To Joachim, margrave of Brandenburg and prince elector, two books of various questions, orations, and propositions. To the same man, two books on foreknowledges lawful and not lawful for a Christian. To the same man he wrote that wonderful and laborious work of Steganographia, eight books, which that rash Bouillus, not understanding it, criticized most ignorantly and most falsely. To the same prince, one book of letters. To the same man, against sorcerers and all arts and superstitions prohibited by the Church, five books. To the same man, on the causes and cure of epilepsy and of sorcerers, three books. To Jacob Trithemius his brother, an itinerary of his life, two books. To Burkhard von Horneck, physician, on the private property of nuns, one book. He wrote a history or annals on the origin, kings, and deeds of the people of the Franks and Germans, three large volumes, beginning the narrative from King Marcomer, who in the year 433 before the incarnation of the Lord led the people from the borders of Scythia into Germany to the mouths of the Rhine, down to the twenty-eighth and ninth year of Emperor Maximilian.
To Lorenz, bishop of Würzburg and duke of East Francia, he wrote an epitome or breviary of the same three volumes of histories, three books. To the same man, on the dukes and bishops of the Franks of Würzburg, one book. On the miracles shown at the memorial of Our Lady Saint Mary at Dettelbach, two books. On the miracles of the same woman shown in the nettle-patch at Heilbronn, six books. An apologetic work against Charles Bouillus, who calumniated things he did not understand, one book. On the origin and kings of the Franks, one book. A chronicle of his monastery, over which he now presides, Saint James at Würzburg, one book. To Albert, of the margraves of Brandenburg, archbishop of Mainz and Magdeburg, the life of the divine Rabanus, archprelate, three books. On his translation from Mainz into Saxony, one book. To the same man, the life of Saint Maximus, bishop, one book. To Johann, count palatine, duke of Bavaria and count in Sponheim, residing at Simmern, on the origin, kings, and dukes of the Bavarians, together with the counts palatine and those of Sponheim, four books. He has in hand a laborious work on demons and profane, magical, and superstitious arts, which will have twelve books, in which he demolishes, confounds, and overturns all the deceits of the diabolical arts. Of the Würzburg letters, which he wrote in that abbacy, four books.
He also wrote several other smaller works, suited to his own devotion and that of his friends, such as: courses, a rosary, a missal office, and various prayers, together with prose sequences on Saint Anne, the grandmother of our Savior. He also wrote praises, prayers, and a rosary on Saint Mary Magdalene. A rosary on Saint Joseph, foster-father of the Lord. A rosary on Saint Peter the apostle. A rosary on Saint John the evangelist. At the instance of Johann, archbishop of Trier, a sequence on Anne, which begins: Jesu, king of the heavens, to the melody Ave praeclara. Another to be sung on her feast, which begins: Let them rejoice on this day. A third to the provincial of the Carmelites at Augsburg, and it begins: Let us jubilate in honor. A fourth on Saint Hildegard the virgin, which begins thus: Praise is made to you, Lord, king of eternal glory. A fifth on Saint
...for Rupert, duke of the Bingii, which begins, “Let them exult on this day.” The sixth, on Saint Joseph, foster-father of the Lord; and it begins thus, “Let us sing, illustrious ones.”
The seventh, on Saint Rabanus, archbishop. The eighth, on the wounds of Christ, which begins thus, “Let us adore Jesus Christ, let us lament with him crucified.” The ninth, on the compassion of blessed Mary ever virgin; and it begins thus, “Come, let us weep with devout mind, sharing the suffering of the blessed virgin Mary”: that is, to the melody “Ave praeclara.” The tenth, on Saint Joachim, father of Our Lady, which begins thus, “Let us adore the Trinity, let us praise together the unity, of Father, Son, and Spirit.” The eleventh, on the good proper angel of each person. The twelfth, for the proper Mass of each priest. The thirteenth, on Saint Maximus, bishop of Mainz. The fourteenth, on Saint Mary the Virgin, Christ’s hostess. The fifteenth, on Saint Mary Magdalene.
The sixteenth, on Saint Mary of Egypt. The seventeenth, on Saint James the Greater, apostle. The eighteenth, on Saint Andrew, apostle. The nineteenth, on Saint Benedict, abbot. The twentieth, on All Saints. And for each of the named [unclear] saints he composed individual new offices of the Mass, conformable to the divine Scriptures. He wrote besides a little work of meditations and prayers on the Lord’s incarnation, nativity, life, passion, and death, suited to devotion, in two books. The Mirror of Heavenly Doctrine, of no small service to compunction of mind, one book, which begins thus, “The beginning of human salvation.” He also composed many most devout meditations and prayers on our Lord Jesus Christ, on his most holy mother the Virgin Mary, and on various saints, with beautiful variety, together with very many other things, which all devout posterity will see and admire. These, my dearest Nicolaus, are the volumes of Trithemius our abbot, which through almost thirty years he has worked out with continual study by lamplight, besides those which, not yet completed, are in his hands under the anvil and unknown to me. Farewell, from my house at Duraclusa, on the fifth of the month of October, in the year of our salvation 1515. Johannes Duraclusius.
From the letter of Johannes Duraclusius, his disciple, to Nicolaus Hamerius Emelanus.
Preface of Johannes Trithemius, abbot of Saint James at Würzburg, to Emperor Maximilian, on Polygraphy
We have read that many wise men of the ancients, philosophers, kings, and princes, once devised varied and manifold methods by which they might safely entrust to their messengers, when sending them to more remote places, the secrets of counsel and whatever secret mystery had to be confided, so that they would become fit for carrying them and secure from every assault of the wicked, lest either the simplicity of the cabalists should lay bare the mystery, or the innate curiosity of the [bacutii?] should bring leaven into apostolic matters. Great among these, Augustus, Caesar of the Romans, wishing in difficult affairs to use the service of messengers in obscurity, changed the breathings of the conceived voice from clear signs into obscure ones; and, by a beautiful invention, through the measure of transposition, he made their barbarous form, resistant to wishes, agree with his command in a dance-like arrangement. And this receptive and, as it were, perpetual order, nevertheless subject to the theme and to the reckoning of time, although it keeps the messengers safe on the road from the assault of the [bacucei?], yet, by not keeping the regulated bounds of its own system, will make all who look on anxious with suspicion of the matter.
Archimedes of Syracuse, easily the foremost of mathematicians, took a white bird suited to his own arrangements, bare at head and feet, fixed it around a staff cut into the form of a tetragon, and, after arranging the attendants in due proportion, entrusted the work to a flying instrument, until the image of the white bird appeared changed into a magpie. When this had been duly done, he released with his own hand what had been fixed; and when he had allowed it to fly away, there was suddenly among the familiar faces of the inner chambers a great separation, and soon there arose [unclear].
[unclear] of monastic [unclear], previously a monster excessively wandering, at the sight of which no one could think what it was. Nor did the dissension of the owls come to rest before the image of the master had skillfully bound the magpie with a similar tetragon.
Marcus T. Cicero, an eloquent orator, using both natural talent and art, changed the small elements of phrasing into signs, and placed the careful mark, or character, of his intention in place of customary phrasing. Indeed he made use of such abundance in this very novelty that his invention could suffice for almost all things in the world. Moreover, to these heralds of mysteries the institution of the art gave marvelous agility, so that, beyond the nature of all things, solid and whole things might serve the good will of the master. A king can always make use of their service most safely, though not without great labor and manifest suspicion of the [unclear]. But Cyprian, most holy prelate and martyr of the church of Carthage, wishing to provide the very teachings of Ciceronian instruction for the use of Christians, enlarged them by no small degree, and added what had been lacking for our customs.
Pharamund also, the forty-third king of the Franks in Germany after Marcomer, most powerful, when in the year of the Lord’s nativity 424 he powerfully entered the borders of the Gauls, in order that everything might be done safely, bound foreign small elements to his secrets.
Clodius also, called Crinitus, the elder son, succeeding his father in the kingdom of the Franks, after he had violently subjected all Gaul to his rule, ordered all the Gauls, as conquered men and slaves, to be shorn and their beards shaved; but he commanded the Franks, conquerors and lords of the Gauls, to let their hair and beard grow. From this he was called Crinitus. In imitation of his father, he wrapped the mysteries of counsel in his own and foreign signs.
Charles, surnamed the Great, the sixty-third king of the Franks after Marcomer, who first of the Franks ruled over the Romans, with Nanno the grammarian as his teacher, wishing to adorn the German language, which was his native tongue, with grammarians after the model of Latin, began an arduous work, which nevertheless, entangled in many matters and overtaken by death, he did not complete. He bound owls with varied and many small elements; Brabant, or Namur in Germany, had no greater native than him. To the several prefects of the kingdom he gave, by art, individual owls. The Northmen, having come out from the borders of Gothia, when once they were cruelly devastating Gaul, summoned owls from Greece and prepared a safe hiding place for their secrets, which today is known to few.
Our Bede, a monk in England, not ignorant of the deed of the Northmen, described many inventions of the ancients similar to these, by which they made a path, bright with mysteries, dark. He was the first to commend artrology to the memory of posterity, and invented dactilogy. There were those who distinguished small elements by visible accidents; by their prudence night was turned into day, and without the service of owls light shone in darkness. Concerning these matters, the illustrious count palatine, prince elector, once an investigator of our Steganography, received from us a manifest experiment of the teaching.
But others, multiplying small elements by regulated division, after the manner of barbarians overturned the figures of nature, hiding in darkness the dances of the shadows of things coming into being; and where the secrecy of counsel required it, they supplied [perdiapyrana ta cabalam] to those absent.
Great labor is involved in these things, and a long exercise of the mind over many years, in which no one suddenly becomes skilled in practice. Necessity bears all things. There were also those whom heavenly harmony taught to compose foreign voices, of which there was a twofold use for those who understood, while one suspended the sense, the other [unclear] the mind. God can do all things. Many tried to seek light in shadow without light, yet they could not at all, because the fire lies buried in ashes. Some practiced painters of masks divided one wind into two to a point; one of them, a hater of light, always hides in darkness, while the other, a lover of light, a philosopher, hates darkness, loves light, and guards the secret with an owl. Again there were certain constant men of Bede, whose intention, advancing to broader things, bound an invisible vein to visible things before the eyes, and compelled many plants, and no less stones and fruits, which lack voices, to speak with a human tongue.
Why should I mention brute things, when all things obey art? This secret is rightly preferred to all discoveries up to now, through which the hidden things of mysteries [unclear]
Strength
they take on strength and virtue. Yet reason bids one hide the great in small things, and by no means cast pearls before swine. From nothing, nothing is brought back. The visible multitude of things is known to be great, but invisible things remain remote from us; if these latter are prudently fitted to the former, the enlightened mind of man would know and behold wonders. But to treat further of these matters is not part of the present purpose; since they are greater and weightier, they require another work and another time.
Matthias, the most powerful king of Hungary and, harder than adamant, the hammer of the Turks, who in our age fought many victorious battles against the enemies of the cross of Christ, discovered many things by wondrous talent and art, adorned owls with circumlocutions, kept his own mysteries secret, concealed by manifold variety, and by manifest diligence destroyed the counsels of his enemies. He preferred wisdom to gold; therefore he always triumphed as a glorious victor. In a wise man there is a sound mind in a well-ordered body; when, borne upward by desire for higher understanding, you have returned through the likeness of the binary from the ternary into unity, thereafter it will now easily rise to the denary. Pythagoras of Samos, that philosopher, warned his disciples not to forget the quaternary, in which the first perfection of numbering is comprised. For thus we number: one, two, three, four. Halt your mind, for you have ten. The denary is the head of perfection. What are eleven, except ten and unity? What is twenty? Twice ten. What is forty? Four times ten. You have a hundred, and you have by no means departed from the quaternary. And what are a hundred, except ten times ten? Deep mysteries lie hidden in these things, and they are manifest to few.
For love of brevity we shall pass over many in silence, who, aiding nature by art, applied prudence to secret matters, and what seemed impossible to many who did not know, by keen study brought into easy use. A cultivated mind can do great things, and he who cleaves to God becomes, in understanding, higher than the world. There are many mysteries of kings, and counsels full of cares, in which trustworthiness and fidelity are required; when rare, this harms the believer, and even when doubt is present, it admits more often. Therefore it would be worthwhile for all princes to be philosophers, endowed with singular wisdom, just, gentle, benevolent, and distinguished for munificence, so that they themselves should neither wish to deceive others nor easily be able to be overthrown by others. Justice alone, the companion of prudence, makes a prince glorious.
At the urging of the aforesaid prince and lord elector Philip, count palatine and duke of Bavaria, I, Johannes Trithemius, now abbot of the monastery of Saint James at Wurzburg, but then of Saint Martin the bishop in Sponheim in the diocese of Mainz, began to write eight books of mysteries in steganography. But while I was already continuing my nocturnal labor on the third book of the same work, an event occurred which, if I can, I am going to recount briefly. In the year of the Lord's nativity one thousand four hundred [ninety-]nine, in the second Roman indiction, when Arnold Bostius, a Carmelite of the town of Ghent, asked by letter what new thing I was bringing forth, or with what studies I was occupied, on the day after Palm Sunday I wrote back through merchants, as to a friend, that I had under the hammer a new and wondrous work of steganography, and I disclosed in order what was contained in each of the books. But before my letter had reached Ghent, Bostius, in the days of Easter, departed from life to Christ. The prior of that place received the letter, opened it, read it, and, astonished, as I think, by the novelty of the things promised, shared it with many others who asked to read and copy it.
From this it happened that my letter itself, made known in a short time throughout almost all Germany and Gaul, and often copied by many, also turned very learned men to amazement and admiration, to such a degree that they hesitated what they ought truly to think of me. Among these there were some who steadfastly asserted that the promises I made in the said letter were frivolous, impossible, and false, and had been shamelessly devised by me for the sake of empty glory. Others, however, said: “This abbot Trithemius promises great and wondrous things; if he can do them, he can do so only by the ministry of demons, since they seem by far to exceed the bounds of nature. But if he cannot do them, who will doubt that he is a liar, and deservedly to be refuted by all good and learned men?” But let both be far from me, since I promised natural things. But of all those rashly judging things unknown to them about me, the most rash, and at last the most unjust appraiser of matters, came forth into the open: Charles de Bovelles, a Picard by nation, who, after travelling through the upper parts of Alsace, to
had come to me at Spanheim as a guest, intending to return to France through Trier, I treated him with all the courtesy I could, and as long as he was with me I showed him every benefit of hospitality with a cheerful countenance. And when, as is usual among friends, especially those devoted to letters, I had shown all my things to my most welcome guest for him to see, among the rest the aforementioned work of Steganography, not yet completed at that time, also presented itself. Bovillus saw it and read it in passing, with his mind occupied elsewhere; he said that he wondered at the invention, praised it, and took no care to understand in what manner it was to be understood. Hence, since he did not ask for the key of understanding, he deserved to hear or perceive nothing of what was contained in that lucubration of ours. After this, having returned to France, he repaid us evil for good and shamefully violated the bond of Christian friendship. For when he was asked by Lord Germain de Ganay, a common friend, later bishop of Orleans, what he had found with me and seen at Spanheim, he wrote back falsehoods as truths and lies in return for benefits, condemning and rashly judging things that he was quite unable to comprehend with his understanding. For since, through envy and falsehood, he believed that the palm of learning would be conferred upon him, he wrote back to the aforementioned most learned man a letter full of falsity, lies, injuries, and many insults, in which, making mention of the Steganography that he had not understood, he falsely, mendaciously, and very injuriously proclaims me, by rash presumption, to be given over to wicked arts, a magician and necromancer. To his most mendacious injuries and blasphemies, God having mercy, the brevity of letters will respond, so that all posterity may understand both that I am innocent and that Bovillus is impious, cruel, rash, and a liar in this matter. I affirm steadfastly, I speak truthfully, and I swear confidently upon my soul that I have never had any commerce with demons, or with wicked or pernicious, magical or necromantic arts; but that all and every thing that I have either written or promised that I would write are pure, sound, natural, and in no respect at all contrary to the Christian faith. Hence I do not fear to give my promised things for examination before good and learned men, whenever and as often as there shall be need, and I do not in any way intend to resist their determination. The reason why I inserted this history of Bovillus's rashness into this preface of mine was reasonable, so that everyone may understand that it was done by mature counsel that the work of Steganography has hitherto remained buried in darkness, not because I fear the rash judgments of Bovillus, but lest I seem to give occasion to many similar persons to suspect similar things of me. Indeed, as far as I am concerned, I would rather placate my rivals by silence than irritate them by letters or provoke them to madness by writings. For I judged it better to condemn all wonderfully invented things to perpetual silence than, even by the false opinion of men, to incur the mark of magical or necromantic pernicious superstition. Therefore let Steganography lie hidden in darkness, and let it not become common to the lying fellowship of Bovillus, which is accustomed to judge matters unknown to it and to deprave the reputation of a good man by the mere lust of depravity. Nevertheless, at the urging of friends, so that our rivals may understand, together with Bovillus, how rash and lying an injury he has done us, while the Steganography remains within its own bounds, we consent to publish the following work, which we call Polygraphy, divided into six books. Let those who wish read it, and let friends read this volume without resentment; when they have understood all its hidden mysteries, let them themselves be judges, without envy, whether they are natural or superstitious. For I know and am certain that all things are sincere, pure, natural, and far removed from every pursuit of evil superstition. Whenever, however, the discourse is rather obscure, this is done for the reason that a madman should not abuse to destruction the sword of defense which a man sound in mind and intellect carries for his own protection. Yet nothing evil is contained in it on that account, since perverse men abuse even good things for evil. But whoever presumes to condemn this edition of ours is himself conscious and a witness to himself that he has never truly understood it. Mysteries are concealed under enigmas, lest the secrets of [unclear] should in any way be made manifest to owls. If it delights anyone to know these things, let the reader approach with envy put far away. For I am a Christian, I am a priest, and a monk under the rule of the divine father Benedict; I love Christ, and with whatever sincerity of mind I can I always devoutly adore him. I have no dealings with demons, I have had none, and, with God as protector, I shall have none; no studies in magical or profane arts, no teachings. Whoever thinks otherwise of me,
he thinks wrongly, does injury, and defends Bovillus’s open falsehood. But now let us set those matters aside, and recount in order what is contained in each book of our Polygraphia.
TABLE, OR INDEX OF THE THINGS THAT ARE TREATED IN THE FIRST BOOK
In the first book of this Polygraphia of ours we arrange and distribute the words of the Latin language, as many as are visible, placing them according to the order of our ternary; by the use and service of these, all princes throughout the world will find, in any secrets whatever, a secure assistance, which, without danger to the mystery, without [unclear], and without suspicion of [unclear], will remain forever hidden. With these owls the journey is secure, and never to be violated by any investigation of anyone. Knowledge of the hidden matter is granted to two only, if the binary is skillfully brought back to the monad. Ignorance is the mother of error, and he who scorns to learn the good which he does not know loves blindness. These periphrases themselves are extended in the manner either of one advising or of one entreating, and they can be varied for every visible subject of this world. For they are suited to individual mysteries, and are set before the secrets of the Greeks no less than before our own; when you have understood the things you see, do not rashly despise the hidden things which you do not see. You perceive the accidents; the substance remains invisible. Hence the greater things lie hidden, while the lesser are open to those who look upon them. Since this has been done with reason, let no good man take it for evil, since from these every suitable person could advance to higher things, provided he wished to do so. But to me, at this turn, it has not seemed good to pour forth the higher things into the light, since an unfavorable time seems to stand in the way. I have set the letters of the Latin alphabet in order before the individual words with this consideration: that the operator may have an easy method in what he has set before him, and that the reciprocal correspondent may be relieved from excessive labor in the relation. The paraphrases which have been placed outside the straight order of the lines,
[They] are not devoid of the mystery of the art, because they serve luminous propositions, necessary for the consummation of the requisite perfection, not obscure ones. For this reason also they are taken up in the former and neglected in the latter. For they themselves are sure means by which every suspicion of opposition is removed. All things have been set down by reason, so that not even one proposition is introduced idly. By way of example: the farther the sun advances from the equinoctial circle, by so much are the days lengthened for those dwelling in those regions. Therefore, so that unity may advance in the right order, through the mediation of the ternary, into the binary, the paradigm which we hand down must be observed rather diligently. And first indeed let the operator, understanding his intention, after prior consideration, attend to what he is going to grant to the ternary through the binary; let him divide the day together with the night into minutes, and distinguish the minute portions of the winds, not by a foreign but by the proper supposition of the phrase. In any mystical business let him diligently beware lest he overturn the established order of the art, or substitute one paraphrasm for another, or grant to one what is owed to another; otherwise unity does not admit the binary, and the whole operation will be confused and useless. Let the night not wander in excessive prolixity, not advancing unstably beyond the limits established for it by the art; let curiosity not change water into snow, nor let him sleep by day who keeps vigil by night. Let the mind, solicitous in its talent, use art also, lest the hand by its own levity commit an error, which, though slight and small in the monad, is accustomed always to appear great and very large in the binary. One paraphrasm from each order is admitted only into the service of the secret; following its servant’s example, as often as a small particle of the light of day shall demand it, one phrase similarly adhering, not several, is taken up. These things must be entrusted to a watchful mind, and care must be taken lest the wind be stirred.
After these things a rule is prescribed for one approaching the practice of the art: that he imitate, as far as he can by the mystical art, the one person of man, consisting steadfastly of two natures, namely the soul surpassing visible things and the flesh remaining visible. For just as the soul is not seen, although it is established in a visible body, so the secret of the mind, in order that it may remain secret and nevertheless operate at pleasure, requires the guidance of light, while enduring in its workshop of shadows. Therefore as often as the body ministers to the soul, the servant to the master, the will to reason, see that the principal virtue of the power in the light of the paraphrasm is preserved in its natural vigor. For by this instruction the first of the Peripatetics will duly enter upon the second, and the monad will enter the binary. Consequently we likewise admonish the willing man that, as often as a leaf is moved by the wind, he should discern the property of each nature, compare the night itself with the day by degrees and minutes, and conform the shadows to the light. But if Phoebus should prejudice the night, or night the sun, through which a confusion of eclipse would arise, either let unity resume the binary which it dismissed in the light, or let the shadow of night be brought back to the first line of the sun.
Hold fixed in memory whatever is produced anywhere in number, weight, and measure. Therefore, when you have cut into the knot of the difficulty mentioned, number the minute portions of the night, note also the paraphrasms of the daylight, and so temper one from the other that the necessary proportion may follow the action. Beware lest, while the eclipse of the sun lasts, you interrupt the necessary labor. Attend no less that you be mindful of the ancient fathers, Tuisco, who, the grandson of Noah, is the father of the Teutons, and Marcomer, who is read to have been the first to lead the people of the Franks from the borders of Scythia into Germany, to the mouths of the Rhine. For the Franks are brothers of the Greeks and, intermingled with the Germans, once made two languages from one. Hence, according to the oracle .g.gg., those who lost one g. take it up. You are warned, zealous investigator of the newest Polygraphy, that after, eager as you are for the water of these inventions, you have obtained the true mode of operating, you should guard all things prudently and not pour them out indiscriminately into the knowledge of all men, especially filthy ones. For this reason do not ask, since you know that there is nothing in the world so good and holy that the wicked do not rather often abuse it for evil.
An indication of the things treated in the second book of the Polygraphy
In the second book of the Polygraphy, nothing new is composed apart from the first, in which only the paraphrasms of speech are varied. Therefore we admonish that whatever we said must be observed in that book must also be kept in this one. For the symbols of both books have been composed under the path of light in the same [unclear] and order:
IN THER POLICIAM UNDE FURCIAM UNTICIAM FURCIA UNTICIM FURCIM UNTICAM FURCIAM UNTICIA UM FURCIM TUNC FURCIAM TUNC FURCIA UM TUNC TUNC FURCA UM TUNC TUNC FURCIA UM
placed, and with only the meaning of the paraphrasmata necessarily changed. In both, according to the capacity of human talent, multiple progressions can be made, since the words are varied by metathesis. The [feronomata] too are changed at will, whenever minutes are converted into whole degrees. When this has been done, a work altogether wonderful in the art will arise, and the world, brought forth by an image, will stand in the light, and there will be no fear at all of the Bacuceans in the one who is operating. I could have given these matters a more beautiful face, if I had been induced to write them by some hope of profit or by the use of my own advantage. But since none of these things induced me to write, it seemed enough to have given those who desired it an occasion and material to add more polished things to our inventions, and to adorn art by art.
An indication of the things that are contained in the third book of the Polygraphia
In the third book of the Polygraphia, having by a reasoned plan overstepped the bounds of our prescribed nation, we are led to foreign things, and, being essentially set in the midst of the Franks, we wander farther abroad through images and likenesses of barbarians. For with nearly four thousand mythological phrasmata arranged in order by art, we show a very easy way to artificial unity, through which it will at all times safely communicate symbolic notions to its binary. Here the binary is harder than unity, and unless our philologist is sharp-sighted with prudence, he will make the binary contrary to the monad. For only the ternary, which proceeds from unity and the binary, as a palindrome joins both together in itself. But if the usefulness of necessary reason is extended beyond the limits of the proposed matter, let the paraphrasmata be counted each time by minutes from the beginning of the day, until the minutes establish the degree in which night is equal to day. The face of this image knows perpetual silence and does not fear the deceits of the Bacuceans. It is extended in as great an abundance as you wish, and is varied without number.
Brief index or table of the things that are treated in the fourth book
In the fourth book of the Polygraphia we place much confidence in the binary, which, with all obstacles removed, without the labor of difficulty, at first sight we have reduced to unity. Hence here we use a circle in great things, a line or point in the smallest things. Nor does it matter if night exceeds day, or if light does not agree with darkness, because the circle does not receive an end, and fullness does not admit a void. For they are contraries, and whenever they succeed one another, one is corrupted by the other. A singular mystery assisting the binary is handed down in this fourth book of the Polygraphia, since the airy wind itself, the composer of the base, is never designated in anything other than the binary. But in that part the lightness of the owls is always suspect to us in difficult matters. The construction of this thing makes paraphrasmata with infinite atoms.
Index or table of the things that are treated in the fifth book
In the fifth book of the Polygraphia, we have inscribed in order on two tables the letters of the Latins, which we Germans also use; one of these is called the straight table, while the other is named the reverse. Beneath these we have placed windy dances, so that what we seek with labor among foreign things we may see among our own without difficulty. For besides those things that have been set down by us openly, many other secret things still lie hidden within, through the understanding of which a path is opened for the operator toward greater things, though these are by no means proposed to all. We have also set letters beneath numbers, by which hidden things may be made manifest at our will. Hence through the skilled operation of this book, all messages are safely handed on to the cabalists, although the mysteries are not free from suspicion of the Bacuceans. For every form of metathesis of signs produces suspicion in the observer, although it brings no harm to the owls. But you, who have attained the understanding of this work, will easily penetrate every metathesis of letters among our countrymen and the Latins.
Indi[unclear]
A Little Index, or Table, of the things contained in the sixth book
In the sixth book, which is the last book of our Polygraphia, once mental narration has been introduced, we have set forth in order the minute details of almost all the preceding signs and degrees, and with arithmetical distributions we have brought the functions of the letters into the service of cabalistic operation. One thing lies hidden here in the bark, and another is found in the common operation of the signs. For just as the spirit in the blood gives life to the human body, so the vigor hidden in the art commends the operation. Therefore whoever needs knowledge of this invention should open the eyes of his understanding, so that he may comprehend what is the property of each operation. For we desire all things to be open to good men in such a way that, if it were possible, they should nevertheless never become manifest to the reprobate. A reason compelled us to fit the letters of the Latins to numbers, lest, if we were too obscure, the intention of our mind should be clear to no one. Yet this novelty, so that it should not become public without reasonable cause, had to be hidden mystically under [unclear] signs and marks of numbering. For nocturnal winds are always stronger than diurnal ones, and just as night overtakes day in its order, so light shudders at darkness. What nature denies, no one happily dares. We ask the reader not to despise this laborious work of ours before he understands it, but, so that he may be a judge without rashness, let him prudently remove the bark, in order to reach the hidden kernel. Good and natural is a work that can be turned to good use or bad, according as the desire of each person’s will is moved. A sword is a good instrument, and is turned also to good use whenever it is carried for defense without injury. But if it is directed unjustly to the wounding of anyone, through abuse a good thing is loosened into evil. Therefore, so that the good may have something by which they may prudently provide for their affairs, the Polygraphia is written by us; and, lest an occasion for wrongdoing be furnished to the depraved, the kernel is hidden in the bark under various enigmas. He who is good does not abuse a good thing for evil; rather, if he can, he turns evil into good.
What are the causes of this work of ours, the Polygraphia, together with its advantages
We have undertaken the labor of the present work, both rare and arduous, for no other reason than that we might provide for the usefulness of those in need. I say those in need, not of food, not of drink, but of assistance in preserving secrets without danger. Therefore we judge it worthwhile if we briefly note the uses and advantages that can come to those who use these inventions of ours. Indeed, since in our own domestic affairs we have no business such that we need these teachings for concealing secrets, we have certainly labored for those whose command had to be obeyed. The first advantage is that, when understanding of this work is complete, it gives an easy method by which you will make the secret of your mind known safely, secretly, and without any suspicion on the part of any observers, to one who knows the art, as widely as need shall be, across any distance of places, by regulated speech.
What lies hidden in these things the work of steganography draws out, which requires neither letters nor a messenger who knows the secrets he is to carry. It would be otherwise in matters that admit the light, according to the common custom of all our people. Do not take the matter otherwise than it is. The second advantage is that, through the service of this work, in a short space of time you will teach a man ignorant of the Latin tongue, provided only that he knows how to read and write letters under his mother tongue, to write under the Latin language as you wish, ornately or neatly, and to conceal all the secret mysteries of his will, and to announce, safely, secretly, and without suspicion, the art to one who knows it, as widely as he pleases. Again I warn you beforehand not to understand us as having promised otherwise than we promise. The third advantage, however, is that you will teach one unskilled in the Roman tongue, not only in a few hours what [unclear],
We are permitted not only to write and to read, but also to understand, if you have prudently applied the duty of the office, which we have thought should be disclosed not without reasonable cause. For the pupil of the new art will write a language which he did not know, and will understand and interpret Latin discourse composed under regulated instruction, if you yourself command him word by word. Finally, this instruction can be extended to all the things and affairs of the world. If anyone wishes to learn from me how these things can be done, let him remember first of all to show himself such that he deserves to receive it. For not all things are owed to all people, but one person is to be preferred to another.
The fourth usefulness is that, through the enlargement of the likeness of the thing received, all these things can be extended into any language whatever, with the instituting binary reduced to unity. Yet not just anyone among men can do this everywhere, but only he whom, with God going before him by his special grace, art and nature have made worthy.
The fifth usefulness is that, by imitation of likeness, we can communicate the art of our invention to one who knows it, and as much as we wish of our mind, abundantly, in many ways, and very widely, by various methods, which cannot be known or observed by anyone else. Here is given a manifold speech without voice, by which, safely, securely, very widely, with all suspicion removed, we shall be able to indicate fully to those who know the art all the conceptions of our mind, however difficult. And this wonderful invention has innumerable progressions, capable of all mysteries.
The sixth usefulness is that, through understanding this work, you will be able to discover any regulated metathesis or transposition of letters, and nevertheless to form them in such a way that they serve only those who know the art, and absolutely no one else in the world. And great is the power of metathesis in its form and also in its operation, which both has many modes and is varied in many ways.
The seventh usefulness is that, through understanding this volume, a very great faculty is given to those who desire to enlarge the memory without labor, whenever the seeds of minutiae are set in their proper degrees. All things, for the sake of goodness, lie hidden, wrapped in the secrets of words and figures; if anyone wishes to understand them more fully, let him recall to mind that unremitting labor conquers all things. For it will have been enough for me to have discovered the principles of the art and to have handed down a rough method of writing, and one intentionally unformed. For there was neither time nor reason for our discoveries to be shaped in a more polished form, lest honey produce vomiting in the nauseated, or truth produce hatred in the indignant. Every age is to be valued according to its own merits, and swine are not to be adorned with pearls, nor loaded with precious jewels. All things are untimely which do not agree with the habits and times of the mortals upon whom they are thrust. There have been many very noble talents among men in unsuitable times, and more new ones are found almost daily in times not their own. What advantage did the wonderful invention of nautical art bring to the excellent [versifier?] Bartholus under Pope Innocent VIII, which in a certain little book he offered for sale for one hundred thousand ducats, when neither the supreme pontiff himself, nor the Venetians, nor the Genoese, to whom he proposed that his invention be bought, deigned even to meet with him for a small amount? For he promised that by his art he could keep a ship unharmed in the middle of the sea for thirty months, repair one that was broken, and bring back without danger whatever had been cast into the deep. But no one cared. Nor has it escaped me that many, with Naso, have perished by their own genius. It is therefore better to set a limit to knowledge than to expose oneself fruitlessly to the hatred and detraction of many, for whom it is more familiar to despise any knowledge whatever than to have learned it.
End of the Preface
On the seventh day of April, in the year of the Lord’s nativity 1508.
Key to the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of St. James at Würzburg, formerly of Sponheim, of the Order of Saint Benedict, of the observance of the fathers of Bursfelde
[unclear]
[unclear] of Tatianus [unclear] of Saint Joachim, Hanna [unclear]; by the first edict of the [unclear] document, of the eastern and Greek kingdoms, and of the index of pontiffs
Preface to the Explanation of the Whole Work of the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, abbot of Würzburg, that is, of Würzburg, at St James
No one who has read these things, I trust, will judge me either proud or superfluous because I myself have provided a commentary on the Polygraphy recently composed by me, especially if he has been able to weigh exactly what cause led us to speak obscurely. For whatever, if made public, can do harm had reasonably to be concealed in mystical language. But the subject which we treat in the Polygraphy is, among good men, very good, useful, and honorable for the advantage of the commonwealth; and for that reason, persuaded by a rational cause, we wrote it down, so that by its service we might render good men safe and secure from the investigation of the wicked when they communicate their secrets to one another. But lest an opportunity be offered to the depraved and perverse, who very frequently misuse even good inventions, to deceive the simpler and less cautious in their judgment of things, we handed down in it mystical or hidden modes of writing, and covered the truth lying hidden in the marrow with certain coverings of figures. Yet we by no means doubt that any industrious man, eager with desire for these matters, will easily grasp everything, if he applies even a moderate persistence in searching them out. For the things I have handed down are not so difficult, nor wrapped in such great mysteries, that they cannot be thoroughly penetrated by a studious man. For everywhere we have so tempered the riddles of our words that they are easily accessible to learned and studious men, and nevertheless remain inaccessible to sluggish men of darkness. But after it pleased us to dedicate and offer the work of the Polygraphy itself to the most serene and most invincible Caesar of the Romans, Maximilian, ever august emperor of the world, I judged it worth the trouble to make it clear and open with brief and few explanations, lest the mind of his sacred majesty, which is daily burdened by many affairs and cares, be drawn back from understanding it by the opacity of the mysteries. For unless my opinion deceives me, the work will be so much the more pleasing and useful to his majesty, the briefer and clearer it has been. Therefore, first of all, with the Lord granting it, we shall briefly explain the meaning of our proposal, which is contained in the prologue wrapped in various riddles; then, through the individual books of the Polygraphy and the modes of operation, the rules, precautions, and distinctions, we shall succinctly set forth, according to order, what necessary things remain, as far as the powers of our intellect allow. All these things, so that they may more quickly become accessible to those who desire to know, we shall show in sequence by examples, and we shall be as brief as the cause and reason permit.
Key to the Explanation of the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Würzburg
Exposition on the Prologue.
Our whole intention in the entire work of the Polygraphy turns upon this purpose: to hand down certain modes of writing secretly, through which kings and princes, noble and ignoble, priests and laymen, learned and unlearned alike, may secretly, safely, and without any suspicion of a hidden secret, by the service of letters, communicate to one another and to any friends, even those far distant from one another, whatever conception of their minds may be necessary and as often as it may be necessary. And lest we should seem to have presumed to do this either first or alone
[unclear], we forewarn the reader that many of the ancients long ago, especially tyrants, princes, and kings, moved by a similar consideration, devised for themselves familiar and various methods and rules of writing, by which they themselves attempted in particular what we have promised universally in our Polygraphia.
From their number, first, for the sake of an example of the proposed matter, we introduced Caesar Augustus, whose secret method of writing is thus made plain. He changed the breathings of conceived speech from clear letters into obscure ones; and their barbarism, resisting his wishes, by a certain fine invention, by the movement of metathesis, he made obedient to his command. That is: the great Caesar Augustus, in order to write secretly and safely what he wished, changed the letters of the alphabet by various transposition, so that he put B for A, C for B, and so consequently for each one. And so that the writing might remain more twisted and more secret, at his discretion he transposed the letters in breadth and length to any distance of order, number, and place.
Mystery. And this receptive order, as though perpetual, subject to the will and to the reckoning of time, although it keeps messengers safe on the road from the attack of [unclear], nevertheless, since it has no regulated limits, makes all who encounter it anxious with suspicion of a hidden matter.
Explanation. Although no one can easily comprehend with the understanding the secret mystery hidden beneath the transposition of letters, nevertheless this writing makes those into whose hands it comes suspicious about the hiding-place of the matter enclosed within.
Mystery. That Archimedes of Syracuse, easily the foremost of mathematicians, [unclear] his white bird, suitable to his institutions, bare through head and feet, and the rest.
Explanation. Archimedes had two little rods made, of one length and thickness, rounded or squared, of which he kept one with himself and delivered the other to his absent friend. And whenever he wished to write something more secretly to the other, he wrapped the bird, that is, a sheet of papyrus of small width but of the length of the doubled rod, around the wood, and bound it below and above with wax. Afterwards he wrote on the sheet, continuously from the sides, artificially joined together into a mass, whatever he wished; then he released the sheet from the rod, and at once there appeared such a distance between the letters that not even one word cohered with another. He was turning the sheet from
and when he wished he wrote in like manner on the other side. Nor was there anyone ignorant of this device who could have discovered the secret. But the man who had the other rod, when he had received the sheet, fastened it on and restored the letters to their earlier order.
Mystery. Marcus T. Cicero, the eloquent orator of the Romans, using both talent and art, changed the minutiae of phrasing into signs, and so forth.
Explanation. He wrote for his son a book of signs, which the blessed martyr Cyprian afterwards enlarged for the use of Christians, namely in the manner of a dictionary, where first the characters or signs are set down in order, and afterwards the words designated by the same characters, so that any given word is signified by the sign placed before it. Written in these signs or characters we once saw an entire Latin psalter, beautifully copied, in the library of the greater church of Strasbourg; some man, ignorant as a judge of things, had placed on its outside the following title: “A Psalter in the Armenian language.” But he was mistaken, since it should rather have been written thus: “A Latin Psalter written in Tullian characters.” For each character represents one Latin word.
Nor does my assessment deceive me, since I possess the very dictionary of Cicero, corrected by Saint Cyprian, written complete and uncorrupted in an old volume, which I have seen nowhere else. So great is the abundance of signs or characters, with the words subject to them, that they are altogether sufficient for writing in the Latin tongue whatever you wish.
Mystery. Faramund, the forty-third from Marcomer, king of the Franks, when in the year of the Lord’s birth 424 he powerfully entered the borders of the Gauls, and so forth.
Explanation. From the time when, in the year 430 before the birth of Christ, the kings of the Franks went forth with their people from the Scythian territories to the mouths of the Rhine, where Guelders now is, they waged continuous war with the Gauls for almost nine hundred years, and at last violently made them subject to themselves, as we have written in the first volume of our Annals. Of these, the aforementioned King Faramund, in order to send messengers safely through the kingdom, devised new letters peculiar to himself, which no one could know without his voluntary instruction. Nor did he use only one, nor a few, but many new alphabets.
Mystery. Clodius Crinitus, son of Faramund, and after him king of the Franks
of those [unclear], who subjected all Gaul to himself, after the Romans whom he found in it had been destroyed, used his fathers’ inventions for written secrets. Explanation. This king devised alphabets of his own and new ones, and handed one to each of his commanders, and he alone kept with himself knowledge of them all. Mystery. Charles, called the Great, the sixty-third king of the Franks, who first of the Franks wore the diadem of the Roman Empire, and the rest. Explanation. This elder son of King Pippin is read to have been born as duke of Brabant in the county of Namur, bordering on the people of Liège, although some assert that he was born in the village of Ingelheim, not far from Mainz. He also invented various modes of writing, and, with Nanno the grammarian lending his assistance, devised different alphabets, by which he communicated secrets in a special way to the governors of the kingdom. Mystery. The Northmen, having once gone forth from the borders of Gothia, when they were laying waste Gaul with a cruel incursion, called in owls from Greece and prepared a safe hiding-place for their secrets, and the rest. Explanation. The Northmen, roaming through Gaul, as Bede the monk in England bears witness, in order to write their secrets safely among themselves, substituted Greek numerals for Latin letters, from A, the first, up to the twenty-fourth point, such as W, or gu, according to the custom of the Gauls. This mode of writing is altogether very beautiful: in it all the letters are Greek, and according to the Greek order of numbering they designate our Latin letters, as A, 1; B, 2; C, 3; D, 4; E, 5; F, 6; G, 7; and so consequently up to W, which is 24. Neither a Greek nor a Latin will understand this writing, unless he has first learned the method of the device and the art. Mystery. Our Bede, a monk in England, not ignorant of the deed of the Northmen, described many inventions of the ancients similar to these, by which they made what was clear dark in their mysteries. He [unclear], and the rest. Explanation. This Bede, the monk, in his little book on the inventions of the ancients, reviewed many and various modes of writing and noting secretly, by which they safely reported their secrets to friends and spoke without voice to those present. He was the first of all to commit artrology and dactylogy to letters; by the use of these one person most safely discloses to another whatever secret he wishes, which no one else sitting by will notice, much less understand.
He taught that this very thing could be done in many other ways too; since we have written nothing about these in the Polygraphia, we rightly decline to say more about them here. We long ago assigned a proper place for these very difficult matters in the Steganographia, which we do not yet intend to publish publicly. And who could set forth all the modes of secret writing among the ancients? For some had as familiars in the service of the proposed art owls called Philophotos, others Mysophotos, others called both into practice from the art. Again, some transposed the known letters of the common alphabet; others devised their own characters for themselves under the form of those of barbarians. Again also, some used the service of visible letters, writing with minium or ordinary encaustic; others, however, formed invisible characters at their own will on command. The modes of visible characters for secret writing are very many and utterly innumerable; to mention all of them belongs neither to our will nor to our power. Of invisible characters, however, there are three kinds more commonly used among mortals today. The first is called dermatic, by which a certain artificial writing is made on the backs of messengers, visible only through the washing of a certain fluid [unclear]. The [second?] is written in cloth with a certain penetrating [unclear], which, when dried, can by no means be seen until, when moistened in cold water, it is perceived. The third kind is named alleotic, which is manifold and various, both in form and in material, and has almost innumerable modes of writing secretly. Its writing is done on paper or without paper, with [nemilua] and [cala], with [raphocam], [lapolce], and other diverse things. Letters are likewise written in various ways and hidden in places, as under [race tabulata], under [rosi rilacubior], in [leopi], in [necostas], in [ceocali], [locubat], in [ratera], in [lispilia], and in other similar things almost infinite in number. But because none of these things on this occasion serves our purpose, therefore it is fitting that we hasten to those matters which the plan demands. There is also another kind, dactiletron, not of writing, however, but of signs, by which one person can make known the conception of his mind to another in very subtle ways. This too is varied by so many differences that there is no one in the world who could enumerate all the kinds of so great a mystery. In the principal mode, at the same time
... and many others descending from it artificially, while sitting at table, or in any other place, you will be able to convey whatever you wish, safely, most securely, and without anyone’s suspicion, to one who knows the art. Finally, how, without letters, you may disclose the secret of your mind to someone absent, even without the knowledge of the very person who performs the office of messenger, remains ascribed to the inventions of steganography. For indeed, since kings and princes encounter many affairs about which, at times, they do not trust that knowledge can be given safely enough by customary letters to their deputies far away, it will be worth the effort for each of them to have certain special methods of writing and sending messages, by which they may most securely make their secrets known to friends, especially in these times, in which, with license to sin prevailing, trustworthy faith is found nowhere in the world. Everywhere the messengers of princes are seized by savage robbers, stripped, and very often killed; nor do the impious plunderers spare even the letters of kings sealed and closed with rings. Hence it would be necessary for your commonwealth, O most glorious Emperor Maximilian, that you put on the skin of Hercules, brandish the club in your hands, and purge for yourself, by God’s help, the world entrusted to you of these savage monsters. There will never be peace in the kingdom unless the [unclear] are removed from its midst. He who disturbs the peace of the kingdom shows himself to be the king’s enemy. These are the robbers who beset the roads of travelers, seize others’ goods; with them the earth today is full, and nowhere is the road safe for those walking.
A Brief Explanation of Those Things Which Seem More Obscure in the First Book of the Polygraphia
Although nothing obscure is contained in the first book of the Polygraphia, nevertheless, lest its composition should perhaps seem profound to the simpler sort, we briefly explain those things that are thought more difficult. We have distributed the words of the Latin language, in order, nine thousand in number, under nearly four hundred alphabets, arranged in such sequence that if from any alphabet one word only is taken after another, from the beginning to the end, they will cohere with one another and produce a fitting Latin discourse. For it will be a very suitable method of writing most secretly whatever we wish, since each word represents the letter set before it at its head. And let it not trouble you, reader, that a multitude of words in the open text contains a brief sense in the hidden one, since in this childish arrangement of ours there lies concealed a higher method of writing whatever you wish, more broadly and much more secretly, which public reason has forbidden us to make open to all. But whoever has been endowed with intelligence and has applied the necessary powers to the investigation of the doctrines hidden in these things will discover subtler matters, and things marvelously unknown before; plainly he will understand more marvelous things. Nevertheless, this open method of writing will suffice for all purposes, since you can repeat it as often as you wish, and the repeated narration will always be varied. For if, as we have said, you take one word from the first alphabet, likewise one from the second, and so consequently one from each, and one from those placed between, outside the ordered line, up to the period or the end of the book, a Latin and sufficiently fitting discourse will arise for you. But care must be taken that at one time, together and once for all, no more than one word be taken from one alphabet, and that the writer, through negligence or excessive haste, not skip over any alphabet and confuse the order of the narration. By “day” understand the open narration; by “night,” however, the hidden and secret one, which should not be too long but brief. The examples that follow in the text, concerning the invisible soul and the body that is seen, pertain to both narrations, the hidden and the manifest. “Whenever a leaf is moved by the wind,” and the rest: we advise that you count the secret narration in relation to the open one in such a way that both at once end at the foot of each period. But if anything remains over from the secret matter, let it be enlarged with such moderation that both narrations end at one point, lest a confusion of eclipse be produced. The other things that follow in the first Polygraphic book are implicitly referred to the document of explanation and to all the things that we have said. It should be noted, however, that under the order of the alphabets there is no idle word, but each one represents the letter set before it at its head; and lest the reader lack perfect knowledge of this matter, let us explain by an example. Let us suppose the case that a wicked man seeks through you to be promoted with some friend of yours, but you, wishing to cut off his troublesome requests and yet not promote an unworthy man...
... you may [unclear], thus to write more secretly to a friend through the very man who asks for it, so that he may not understand. “Beware of that man, because he is a thief and the worst scoundrel.” Go to the first alphabet: write the word “Creator,” which signifies C; in the second, “merciful,” which gives A; in the third, “discerning,” which represents V; in the fourth, “worldly things,” and it signifies E. Now you have, in the hidden narration, “beware.” Proceed in sequence also through the other alphabets, and the discourse will come out as follows: “May the merciful Creator, discerning worldly things, impart to those who seek it seraphic delight with all his saints in heaven, amen. The gentleness of the most glorious prince, everywhere reverently to be remembered by the saints, urges us, most abject sleepers, by the best precepts, to forsake present things because of reverence for the director of good things, and with every affection, according to our powers, to await the glory of perpetual rest. Therefore, O vain mockers, receive instruction, so that you may be able, most happily adorned, to enter the most blessed rejoicings of the [unclear] rewarder of the orthodox. Rise therefore from the foulest honors of this pilgrimage, since you are about to enter most holily into the most blessed joys of the kindly Savior of the ages.” In this public narration set down above there is contained in secret this hidden sentence, namely: “Beware of that man, because he is a thief and the worst scoundrel, but be silent, I pray.” The same order must be followed in all other cases whatsoever; one must begin from the head as often as necessary, until you have enclosed the hidden narration of your secret clearly. But the words that are placed outside the order of the alphabet, since they designate no letter and do not serve the hidden narration, have been inserted because of a lack of synonyms, so that the sequence of Latin discourse might be completed. For we could not always have so many words with the same meaning, especially among pronouns, conjunctions, prepositions, and interjections, that we could have made an alphabet in place of twenty-four wandering letters, as is clearly evident after the eighth alphabet, where we placed two words outside the order, lest we leave the discourse defective. For thus we placed them, and thus: “with all.” Of these the writer may choose two, so that the Latin discourse may be completed. Let him do likewise in the others, whenever he finds similar cases. We have adopted a double M because of our native speech, in which we frequently need it in our German language. For one who is ignorant of Latin speech may write his hidden secret in German beneath a Latin discourse without any difficulty.
Now follow the rules or cautions to be observed in the operation of this book
The first rule or caution warns you that the secret of your mind which you wish to announce to an absent friend, one who knows the art and has the book of Polygraphy, you should write on a sheet as carefully as you can, in Latin or German, or in any other language you wish that can be comprehended by Roman letters. Then place the sheet so written before you, so that for each single letter of the secret you can fit an appropriate word. For, as we have shown in this practice of writing, a whole word is taken. We gave an example a little earlier in what was set down above.
II. The second caution instructs you, as has been said, not to take more than one word at the same time from any alphabet in a single narration of public Latin discourse; otherwise you would both confuse the open sense and entirely draw away from understanding the secret the friend to whom you had written.
III. Third, one must take the utmost care not to skip through negligence any alphabet from which you do not take one word appropriate to the secret. Likewise provision must be made that, whenever one or more words occur outside the series of the alphabet, you take the whole upper line or the lower one, and not both.
IIII. Fourth, care must be taken that whenever the discourse of the open speech has been brought to a completed sentence, the following sentence should take its beginning from a larger, thickened letter, according to the form of the preceding example, in which, according to the sense of the Latin discourse, we have taken capital letters at the beginning and small ones in the rest, in the common manner. When the secret of your mind is lengthy, so that it exceeds the narration of the open discourse, if much remains, you should begin again from the beginning; if little remains, let the discourse be brought back at will from whatever place one likes. For no one even moderately skilled in this practice will be unable to know where you have begun again. Nor is it necessary to fear the consonan[unclear].
[unclear]
let him who receives letters written from the Polygraphia to be read know that understanding is needed in the reading. And therefore, whenever he takes up a sheet or booklet written polygraphically, let him go to a secret place; and, having opened the book of the Polygraphia, which he ought to have with him, let him consider each word through all the alphabets, and let him most carefully note with chalk on the table, or with ink on paper, what letter each one represents. And when he has examined the whole letter in that way, let him put the letters together into words, and he will easily understand what has lain hidden in secrecy. XII. Twelfth, kings and princes should note this, who have many vicars in different places, to all of whom it is not prudent to write by one kind of hidden narration. Therefore, so that they may have their own secret manner of writing to each one individually, let them change the order of the words as many times as they wish to have separate methods. Thus they themselves will possess the writing methods of all, and none of their subjects will understand another’s method. For the variable methods of writing more secretly in this art are infinite. XIII. Thirteenth, it must be noted that, in order to stop the mouths of those who speak wicked things, we show the truth of this new invention of ours to be possible, placing the words in the alphabets of the first book so coherently with one another that, in the manner of an exhortation and supplication offered to God, they render a fitting and Latin prayer. Beneath its narration we can conceal the secrets that occur to us and write in such a way to a friend skilled in the art that, if all the people in the whole world were to come together into one place, they could never discover the secret lying hidden beneath the open discourse, provided it has been arranged correctly. XIIII. Fourteenth, it should be known that in this very invention of our Polygraphia there still lie hidden certain things far better than those described above, namely how you will be able, in a few days, not to say hours, to instruct someone ignorant of the Latin language so that he knows how to write, read, and understand Latin: not, indeed, absolutely everything universally, but, according to a certain method, whatever necessary thing comes before him in his affairs on any subject. Likewise, in what manner you may make known safely, securely, and most secretly to your friend far absent, and knowing the practice of the art, all the conceptions of your mind, without writings and without the messenger knowing; indeed sometimes without a messenger, naturally and without
Some superstition, danger, or fear. But reason has moved us to let these things remain buried in their hiding-places with the rest, since it neither pleases me nor is at all expedient to throw away precious stones once found, and to undertake difficult things without the fruit of gratitude. In short, beneath these things there lie no small subtle mysteries concerning medicines, herbs, plants, precious stones, rivers, the members of the human body, brute animals, saints, nations, cosmography and the seven liberal arts, and also concerning all those things that are in human use, and concerning the whole world, both of visible and invisible things. And, lest we be more prolix than is proper, all things that are in the world, through the expansion of the likeness shown beforehand, serve the mystical teaching of the art of polygraphy.
XV. Fifteenth, note that all these things which we have handed down as discoveries in the Polygraphy are certain small introductions in comparison with those which still remain to be discovered and written in this same faculty; concerning these we pass over in silence, lest we should seem to boast in vain. For we have given suitable minds the occasion for discovering greater things than we either have written or perhaps could have discovered. Let him who can add, for the completion of this aid, those things which he knows to be useful; but let him who cannot, not rashly judge what he does not understand.
Explanation of Those Things Which Seemed More Obscure in the Second Book of the Polygraphy
In the second book of the Polygraphy, apart from the order and sequence of the words, [unclear]; and therefore there will be one and the same method of operating in both, and we carefully warn that all the things which we said must be observed in the first are also to be observed in the second. The difference is seen to have arisen plainly in the narration alone, since the former is composed concerning our Lord, the Son of God, but this one is raised up to his mother, the ever-untouched Virgin. Now in the second book there are three hundred and eight alphabets set in order before the words, though under different subjects. For from the beginning the narration of the discourse is directed to that same Lady of ours; afterwards the Lord’s Prayer is expanded under twenty-four alphabets; then [unclear]
[unclear] discerned, lest he to whom you write take two as one, or one as two, because it would give birth to a great error. Let us set down an example of this matter.
Abrin madon badis, cadulur pasu, adin loroff masara damis, boda omo dro mi drus uares mastron pha lares medas rassut madebor tara, mesen baiu phosat, galos, prosol fane lemoros, arosocabil neso, hamol heliet rhamil fesia doron hubor rodex.
In this narration of fictive speech there is contained this brief secret sentence, of a friend warning a friend about danger: Do not come to the court, because the king is angry with you. You see how easy, safe, and secure this method becomes for writing and announcing whatever you wish to the friend who understands it. Yet in all things you should know that care must be taken, as was said before, that you do not take more than one word from any alphabet. Whenever you have carried the narration of the contrived discourse to the end of the book, while the secret of your mind is not yet complete, begin again from the beginning, and do this as often as shall be necessary. Nevertheless, each person may, at his own judgment, change these words of ours, improve them, and add more, provided however that he avoid a consonance that breaks out shamefully in the sounds.
Explanation of the Fourth Book of Our Polygraphy
In the fourth book of the Polygraphy, by a similar method, we have placed the words contrived by us in alphabetical order, but in one respect alone we deliberately differ from the preceding book. For in the preceding book the words contain in themselves nothing else of property except that they represent the letters set before them at the head. But in the fourth book, which we now have in hand, each word contains its own [unclear], and nevertheless designates the letters placed before it. They have within what they display without, because the second letter of each word always serves the hidden mystery, as we shall make clear by the following example. Ecorach hanasar dulay semalas, chorion suriel anephor schabaras husarat uiimalo tropon tumelech amasar. For the understanding of this mystery, from each
In any word take only the second letter, and you will find this sense hidden: “Beware this man.” For the second letter in Ecorach is C, in hanafar A, in dulay V, in semalas E. Join these four letters and they will make this word: Cave. And so one proceeds through the rest to the end of the book; and if anything remains to be written of the hidden mystery, one must return to the beginning as often as necessary, until the secret has been wholly completed. In this most secret manner of writing, if anyone has been trained by long practice, he has no need of a book, but will easily compose on the spot words suited to his purpose. But he who has had less practice in composing necessarily requires a copy of the book from which he may write.
For the reader, a copy of the volume will not be necessary, since without the book he can easily find the hidden secret by means of the second letters everywhere. Yet in great, difficult, or dangerous matters, this manner of writing is not considered sufficiently safe, because by the ingenuity of a skilled man the hidden mystery might by chance be discovered. This manner of writing can also be altered by an intelligent man, so that the significant letters are placed in the third or fourth position of the word, with the words changed.
Brief explanation of the fifth book of our Polygraphia
[unclear]
In the fifth book of the Polygraphia we have handed down various ways of writing secretly by transposition of the common letters, arranged in such an order that under their covering we shall be able to write and report everything safely to an absent friend. Now, to speak in our own manner, the progression of the transposition of letters is almost infinite, since from one alphabet by metathesis innumerable alphabets arise. First we described a straight table containing twenty-four alphabets; through understanding it, as many alphabets can be composed as there are stars counted in the firmament of heaven. For as many letters as there are in that table, so many times there arise by the art, in order, one million alphabets. After this we set out a reversed table, which will arise into another as often as you change the first letter at the head.
The letter in the first straight table is B, and in the reversed table Z. Into the fourth place [unclear]
[unclear]
[unclear] he wishes, he can devise more beautiful characters for himself. All the synthemata of this book are sufficiently clear and manifest, and therefore they need no explanation, not even a brief one. Yet those things which have been newly invented by us require a definite declaration, lest perhaps they be judged to have been set down without reason. First of all, we made all the letters of the Latins numerical, after the manner of the Hebrews and Greeks, considering it shameful for us if we should be found inferior to them in this respect. For what if we have doubled certain letters so that they might suffice for an infinite number, since the Jews, compelled by the same necessity, did the very same thing long ago? And the Greeks, because of the lack of letters, admitted certain signs into the number, since they were unable to double the letters. But we, because we are pressed by an equal lack of letters, admit two signs: namely this &, which our writers put for et; nor does it matter whether it is written thus, &, or thus, et, provided it represents six in the number. We have added another, 9, which our writers, when abbreviating, write indifferently for con and com; and here in the order of numbers it represents six hundred. By the same necessity we have doubled two letters, namely r, z, and s: of these r means ninety, but curved z means one hundred, long s two hundred, and closed s three hundred. Further, doubled w, which because of the character of the German language we have placed in the order of the alphabet, represents the last letter, and in the series of numbers one thousand. Let us set down a tabular example of this new invention of ours for the reckoning of numbers, so that anyone who wishes to know the method may have a definite demonstration before his eyes. For what has always been easy for the Hebrews and Greeks will not be impossible for us. The table of numbers follows.
| Numeral sign | Value | Numeral sign | Value | Numeral sign | Value | Numeral sign | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| a | 1 | f | 7 | ia | 11 | if | 17 |
| b | 2 | g | 8 | ib | 12 | ig | 18 |
| c | 3 | h | 9 | ic | 13 | ih | 19 |
| d | 4 | i | 10 | id | 14 | k | 20 |
| e | 5 | — | — | ie | 15 | l | 30 |
| & | 6 | — | — | i& | 16 | m | 40 |
| n | 50 | o | 60 | p | 70 | q | 80 |
| r | 90 | curved r | 100 | long s | 200 | closed s | 300 |
| t | 400 | u | 500 | con/com sign | 600 | x | 700 |
| y | 800 | z | 900 | w | 1,000 | — | — |
The printed table continues the same compound system into the thousands and millions. The distinctive curved and closed letterforms are described in the preceding paragraph; they cannot be represented faithfully by ordinary modern type.
We have shown a sufficient method of counting by Latin letters in the manner of the Hebrews and Greeks, which by way of digression we have reasonably placed here, although it is found earlier in the sixth book. By the fact that, as we proceeded, we have here concluded our number at thirty hundred thousands, we plainly declare that it can be extended to infinity. If this method of numbers displeases anyone, he will easily be able to devise a better one. In imitation also of the Northmen, from the numerical letters set out above, we have arranged a new alphabet, by which you will be able safely to write and report to an absent friend any secret whatsoever you wish. Indeed this method of writing is as secret as it is new, never seen or heard before us, so that it seems to me altogether impossible that it can be understood by anyone without the service of a teacher. But now let us set down its alphabet.
| Numeral sign | Letter | Value | Numeral sign | Letter | Value | Numeral sign | Letter | Value | Numeral sign | Letter | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| a | a | 1 | f | g | 7 | ic | n | 13 | ih | t | 19 |
| b | b | 2 | g | h | 8 | id | o | 14 | k | u | 20 |
| c | c | 3 | h | i | 9 | ie | p | 15 | ka | x | 21 |
| d | d | 4 | i | k | 10 | i& | q | 16 | kb | y | 22 |
| e | e | 5 | ia | l | 11 | if | r | 17 | kc | z | 23 |
| & | f | 6 | ib | m | 12 | ig | s | 18 | kd | w | 24 |
Behold, you now have here an alphabet from numerical letters in imitation of the Northmen, with which you will be able to write and report most safely to an absent friend whatever you wish. No eavesdropper will be able to penetrate the secret except one who knows the secret of the art. For all who see the writing will think that the letters have been transposed, and they will labor in vain in reckoning them. Let us set down an example: Iaaihidifeib, iceigeicchkib. cal'eihid.iei [unclear]ahk.gidibidi[unclear]ig. eiif.iaaihifidibe icda a.cih.iceieik. The hidden meaning of this writing is as follows: Beware the bearer of the present letters, because he is a very wicked man, a thief, a robber, a liar, worthless. From the demonstration of this example it is easily given to be understood how safe and secure this method of writing is universally, in every language known to the writer, and in every cause or business, however difficult, secret, great, or lengthy. Nor do I think there is a man living in the world who by his own ingenuity, without a teacher, can read this very writing. For all who see it will think nothing other than that the letters have been transposed; and when they cannot obtain an understanding of them, at last worn out by despair they will cease from the investigation, and whatever you have written will remain hidden. For no one, as I suppose, will examine by his own powers this craft of writing secretly as it is, unless he has Polygraphy, or this key to it, at hand, or has been instructed by another. From these numerical letters many other alphabets can also be given according to the order of counting, when the beginning for writing alphabetically is taken not from unity but from any other following number. But in that progression you should know that one must beware lest more than two countable letters be taken to represent one letter. Therefore, when you have come to vovo, that is, ten hundred thousands, stop your advance and do not wander farther, lest the multitude of letters, by spoiling the beauty of writing, confound it. For, after unity has been set aside, ten hundred thousand, with [unclear] letters included, suffice for nearly thirty separate alphabets. Nevertheless the method of the first alphabet, beginning with unity, is so much the fairer for wrapping secrets in writing as it is shorter and simpler. Finally, it renders the writing less contorted.
We have also arranged another alphabet, with the Latin letters distributed in a continuous order and transposed without a rule, in imitation of which others too can be made almost without number; and its likeness is now set down.
o a t g c n 9 t p b h a o k u q c i h p n x r d w y q m y i e l d r z s f z m g s f w
Let us also set down an example of this alphabet, to prove that a secret can be hidden in it. Gquog, o[unclear]uqi, yar, din, u, c, qacquxua, riqdi u[unclear]i, aqqurixr 12, siti, idta, yocsaqui g, uc, coddotacuo[unclear], osoqui, iug, g, cj, hidiog. This writing contains in itself the following meaning: Know, friend, that the king in council has decreed that you are to be killed. Therefore flee as quickly as possible into Narragonia from his presence, lest you perish. This manner of writing too is tortuous, and is subject to no regular norm, since it can be varied and changed by arbitrary transposition at the writer's pleasure as much as anyone wishes. Next, it should be noted that we have handed down numerals, which people commonly call ciphers, under whose covering you will safely write to an absent friend whatever you wish, and no one unskilled in the art will be able either to discover or suspect that a secret lies hidden, especially if the rules that we have given concerning these things are observed with careful diligence. This is that the paper should be formed in the manner of an astronomical table, as though it contained something pertaining to the reckoning of the stars, namely so that the characters of the signs or planets are interspersed, in order that someone into whose hands it perhaps happens to fall, led by its tabular appearance, may think that no secret lies hidden in it, but may suppose that everything pertains to some astronomical calculation. We have arranged twelve alphabets according to the number of the twelve signs of the Zodiac, assigning to each a number of twenty-four in place of the letters; the first of these, Aries, begins from one and ends at twenty-four. Yet in great and difficult matters we advise beginning from one, because that manner of writing can easily be suspect for that very reason. But whoever wishes prudently to use natural industry will find subtler things from ours, and will easily make better the things that we have handed down not sufficiently polished. In the numerical orchema great secrets lie hidden; if anyone understands them properly, he will penetrate many mysteries of numbers. For we had neither the time nor the reason on this occasion to pour everything out into public view; but in our judgment what we have done will suffice for the instruction of those to whom they will someday be pleasing, so that they may have several methods not only of writing secretly whatever they wish to absent sharers in the undertaking, but also a way of bringing forth one method into several better and subtler ones according to the capacity of each person's understanding. Likewise, since the numerical orchemata are sufficiently open and manifest in their own places, and their tables likewise set out, it was not necessary here to repeat what has once been said, lest excessive length produce weariness for the reader. Nor did I think it necessary to set down an example of more secret writing by means of the figures of numbers, since there is no difficulty in knowing the method for all who are strong in even a moderate intelligence. With similar ease the very useful signs of numbering that we have brought back to light can be understood and comprehended, by which knowledge of numbers is extended to infinity. For whenever a small stroke is placed above a lesser number, a thousand is signified. Thus xͣ signifies ten thousand, C one hundred thousand, M a thousand thousand, X ten times a thousand thousand; .M. signifies a thousand times a thousand thousand, and so in succession, as far as you wish to proceed in numbering, without limit.
The end of the key to the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, abbot of Saint James of Würzburg, to Emperor Maximilian
The end of the work of the Polygraphy. [unclear] to Simon [unclear] of the land of the Indies [unclear] habitable fortification of geography Pleasure and benefit is This book to the first [unclear] of every [unclear] and what things most amply concern those interested for living and completing the letter and literary men. Harmony and counsel and instruction and governance and method and modification and exceptions and excuses and most reverend and divine providence and by the grace of God and health and protector and of the protector and to patrons and of the shepherd and of the fatherland and of the people and king and queen and kingdoms and of the kingdom and king and queen and kingdoms and king and queen and kingdoms and king and queen and kingdoms and king and queen and kingdoms and King and Queen and Kingdoms and King and Queen and Kingdoms and king and queen and kingdoms and king and queen and king and queen and of the kingdom and of the kingdom and king and queen and kingdom and kingdoms and [unclear] and queen and in the kingdom and king and queen and [unclear] and kingdoms and kingdoms and king and kingdoms and kingdoms.
Apology of Johannes Trithemius Prefixed to the Steganographia
It is the opinion of many that the ancient philosophers and wise men of art and nature, if they had discovered any secrets, concealed them in various ways and figures, lest they should come to the knowledge of wicked men. That Moses also, the most famous leader of the Israelite people, in his description of the creation of heaven and earth, covered ineffable secrets of mysteries with simple words, all the more learned among the Jews confirm. Saint Jerome too, most learned among our own, says that almost as many mysteries lie hidden in the Apocalypse as there are words. Moreover the wise men of the Greeks, men of no small reputation and glory among their people, who devoted their efforts to composing fables, handed down one thing to the unlearned and another to learned men, in the course of a single narrative, by a prudent invention.
These most zealous lovers of wisdom, even if because of the slowness of my intellect I cannot imitate them perfectly, nevertheless I judge it fine and glorious to admire, and with such diligence as I can to read and venerate. Thus, when I consider that they, by their own study, discovered great things beyond other men, I drive myself, doing a kind of violence to myself, toward some imitation of them, even if among the very last. Nor, as I think, has my opinion altogether deceived me; for through continual zeal in reading I have learned many things which I had not known before, and I have opened [the way] to my thoughts for investigating more secret matters.
For even if I am not of such learning or industry that I dare profess that I have comprehended that method of the ancient wise men for concealing mysteries, nevertheless I have devised certain methods, not altogether contemptible, as it seems to me, of writing and concealing secretly, and wholly without any suspicion, whatever you wish. At the request of the most serene prince, lord Philip, Count Palatine of the Rhine and Duke of Bavaria, prince-elector of the Roman Empire, the wisest Maecenas of philosophers, than whom no one seemed to me more worthy to whom this great secret should be revealed, I committed them to writing and reduced them into the following volume, not without immense labor, lest this great Secret come to the ears of common emperors or wicked men.
Reader, whoever you will be, I ask you to consider how many evils could be done in the commonwealth by evil and wanton men through this science if it came to the knowledge of many: adulteries, fornications, conspiracies, betrayals, murders, robberies, and infinite evils. For just as a good and honorable man can safely and without any suspicion from anyone make known and express the secret of his will, as often as he wishes, for private or common advantage, to another who knows this art, so every perverse, wanton, and malicious man will be able to intimate his evil desire, however shamefully, to a person agreeable to his pleasure, with every obstacle entirely removed and without any suspicion.
Nor could trust between married persons thereafter remain secure, since a woman, although up to this point ignorant of the Latin tongue, made most learned through holy and modest words of any language or idiom, could understand very fully the evil and shameless will of her lover, even while her husband presents and praises the letters; and in the same way she could most safely send back to him her own desire, as widely as she wished, in sufficiently eloquent speech. Indeed, although this science may seem childish to some, nevertheless if it were made public the whole order of the commonwealth would be disturbed, public trust would perish, letters, written instruments, and finally all the very speech of men would be turned into perpetual suspicion. No one would any longer trust letters, however good, honorable, and holy; no one would put faith in epistles, since, however holy and modest the words might be, nevertheless deceit, fraud, and evil deception would always be thought to lie beneath, and men would become fearful in all things, and no less suspicious toward mutual conversations than toward any letters at all.
Nor will anyone ever be able to become so learned and experienced in this very science that there will not remain infinite methods of writing secretly and most hiddenly, sufficient for all things, which he himself has not yet grasped. For this science is a chao
a chaos of infinite magnitude, which no one can comprehend. For however learned you may have been in this art, what you understand is still less than what you do not know. For it is the property of this science always to make the pupil, provided he is industrious and willing, incomparably more learned than the teacher.
There follows the exposition of the very distinguished man Adolf Glauburg, patrician of Frankfurt, with examples of matters which were either passed over by the author or treated less clearly.
Magnus, from these, emperor of the Romans. On this method of writing, see Suetonius Tranquillus in the Life of Augustus, chapter 83, and in the Life of Julius Caesar, chapter 80. “There are extant,” he says, “letters to Cicero, and likewise to his friends, concerning domestic matters, in which, if anything had to be conveyed rather secretly, he wrote it by signs, that is, with the order of the letters so arranged that no word could be formed; if anyone wished to investigate these, he should substitute the fourth letter of the alphabet, that is, d, for a, and change the rest in the same way.” Moreover Isidore also mentions a letter of Augustus to his son, in which he writes thus: “Since countless things continually occur which one or the other of us ought to write, and which ought to be secret, let us have signs between ourselves, if you wish, of such a kind that when something has to be written by us, for each single letter we write the following one, in this way: b for a, c for b, and thereafter the others by the same method. But for the letter z one must return to double aa.”
Archimedes of Syracuse. Similar to this is what is read in Gellius, book 17, chapter 9. The ancient Lacedaemonians, when they wished to disguise and conceal letters sent publicly to their commanders, so that, if they were intercepted by enemies, their plans would not become known, used to send letters made in this manner. There were two rods, round, somewhat oblong, of equal thickness and the same length, shaved down and finished in like fashion. One was given to the commander setting out for war; the other the magistrates kept at home, under oath and seal. When there was need of more secret letters, around the rod they wrapped a long strap of moderate thinness, or as much as was sufficient for the matter, in a round and single winding, so that the adjoining edges everywhere of the strap that was being folded came together and held fast. Then they wrote the letters on that strap across the joined edges, in lines proceeding from top to bottom. That strap, thus written all over with letters, when unwound from the rod, they sent to the commander, who knew the device. The unwinding of the strap likewise rendered the letters broken and mutilated, and their parts and strokes were scattered into very different places. Therefore, if that strap fell into the hands of enemies, they could infer absolutely nothing from it. But when the man to whom it had been sent received it, taking the matching rod which he had, he wrapped it around it to the end, just as he knew it had to be done; and thus the letters, coming together along the same circumference of the rod, joined again and provided a complete and uncorrupted letter, easy to read. The Lacedaemonians call this kind of letter a scytale. See also Plutarch in the Life of Lysander.
There is also another, no less ingenious, method of concealing letters, described by Jerome Cardano in his books On Subtleties. You take two equal sheets of parchment ruled for writing, and in the lines themselves you make small holes scattered here and there opposite one another in both, but nevertheless according to the size or height of the letters. Some will contain seven letters, some three, some eight or ten, so that all the holes together contain one hundred and twenty letters, when all those which can be written in them are joined together. But when there is need, write your first sentence as briefly as you can, so that the number of letters
that the sentence should contain a smaller [number of words?] than that which the spaces admit. Then, on a parchment placed beneath the openings, you will write that sentence, and likewise on another and another; finally fill the spaces of the first parchment, completing and deleting sentences until the sense holds together. You will complete this second sentence on the second parchment in such a way that the words and sentences seem to cohere; on the third also you will fit it so that, without injury to the first letters, the whole sentence, the number and size of the words, agree and retain a certain elegance. When this has been done, place over a parchment of equal size the pattern that you cut out, and at the edges of the openings mark the very finest points, as far as the letters extend which you wish to write. Then take a third parchment, and [write] the letter in continuous words, with a suitable order of spaces and also with suitable size of letters, so that the first sentence and its words are contained within the limits of the points. Therefore no suspicion of deception then remains; when the other man receives it, with the pattern laid over it, he at once understands the thought of your mind. And for this purpose, although it is no light labor, nothing comparable can be found for indicating one’s thought to friends in dangerous times.
Marcus Tullius. The account is that Cicero devised individual and special characters for each Latin word, by which, if necessity demanded, he wrote a speech however long both with very few signs and most secretly. And in this way, they say, Cato’s speech, that the conspirators should be punished, was preserved and committed to writing, when Cicero as consul appointed very swift writers who would take down what was said in notes of this kind. That the ancients also, in writing out words quickly and briefly, followed a somewhat similar method, so that frequently a single letter signified a word, is attested by Valerius Probus, Petrus Crinitus, Angelus Decembrius, and likewise by the very ancient monuments most diligently collected by Petrus Appianus and Bartholomaeus Amantius. But this craft of writing will be treated more diligently hereafter.
Our Bede in England. On computation and the speech of the fingers. These things I find in Bede’s De temporum ratione. When you say one, bending the little finger on the left hand, you will set its joint in the middle of the palm. When you say two, you will place there the second finger from the little finger, bent. When you say three, you will similarly bend the third. When you say four, likewise you will raise the little finger. When you say five, you will similarly raise the second from the little finger. When you say six, you will nevertheless raise the third, with only the finger called the medicus fixed in the middle of the palm. When you say seven, you will place the little finger alone, the rest raised, upon the base of the palm. Next to this, when you say eight, you will set the medicus. When you say nine, you will set the impudicus opposite it. When you say ten, you will set the nail of the index finger in the middle joint of the thumb. When you say twenty, you will put the tip of the thumb between the middle joints of the index finger and the impudicus. When you say thirty, you will join the nails of the index finger and thumb in a gentle embrace. When you say forty, you will draw the inner parts of the thumb over the side or back of the index finger, with only those two raised. When you say fifty, you will bend the thumb at the outer joint, in the manner of the Greek letter called gamma, and incline it toward the palm. When you say sixty, you will carefully gird from the front the thumb, bent as above, with the index finger curved round it. When you say seventy, you will fill the index finger, curved round as above, with the thumb stretched lengthwise, with only its nail raised across the middle joint of the index finger. When you say eighty, you will make the index finger, curved round as above, with the thumb held lengthwise, on the left hand: two hundred on the right, just as [unclear] ten on the left [unclear]. But one hundred on the right, just as [unclear] on the left. Likewise one thousand on the right, just as one on the left. Two thousand on the right, just as two on the left. Three thousand on the right, with only the fingers raised toward the neck. When you say twenty thousand, you will lay the same [hand], spread broadly, over the breast. When you say thirty thousand, with the same [hand] prone but upright, you will put the thumb into the cartilage of the middle of the breast. When you say fifty thousand, the thumb of the same [hand], prone but upright,
[unclear] you will place upon the navel. When you say sixty thousand, with the same [hand] you will grasp the left thigh from above. When you say seventy thousand, you will place the same upon the thigh. When you say eighty thousand, you will place the same [unclear] upon the thigh. When you say ninety thousand, with the same [hand] you will grasp the loins, with the thumb turned toward the groin. But one hundred and two hundred thousand, up to nine hundred thousand, you will complete in the same order that we have described, on the right side of the body. And when you say ten times one hundred thousand, you will clasp both hands together with the fingers [interlaced?]. And so much concerning numbers to be expressed by the gesture of the fingers.
To these the same author immediately adds: "From the very computation which I have noted above, a certain manual speech can also be practiced, both for the sake of exercising ingenuity and of playing a game. By it, when the letters are expressed one by one, a person may convey to another, who also knows this technique, even if he is placed far away, the words contained in those letters, so that they may be read and understood; or he may signify necessary matters more secretly by intimating them in this way, or deceive the unskilled as though by divination. The order of this game or speech is as follows. When you wish to indicate the first letter of the alphabet, hold one with the hand; when the second, two; when the third, three; and so the rest in order. For example, if you wish to warn a friend placed among ambushers to act cautiously, show three and one, and twenty, and ten and nine, and five fingers; for the letters of this order signify 'act cautiously.'"
Thus far the example of dactylogy according to Bede, which is also varied in many other ways. For, once it has been posited, as was also said before, that the sign of unity signifies the letter a, and so on in order, let them be arranged on the left hand: one in the thumb, two in the index finger, three in the middle finger, four in the ring finger, or the third from the thumb, and five in the little finger. Likewise on the right hand let two be understood in the thumb, three in the index finger, four in the middle finger, five in the third from the thumb, and six in the little finger. Once these have been established in this way, let us observe which numbers arise from addition, multiplication, or division of them with one another. For example, twelve arises from the addition of one to eleven, two to ten, three to nine, four to eight, six to six, seven to five. In multiplication, however, twelve is produced from the multiplication of four by three, or of two by six. In division we have twelve if we divide twenty-four by two. Further, when the fingers are merely raised, it signifies addition; but when we touch one with another, multiplication. But if we bend one and raise the other, division must be understood.
Therefore, wishing to demonstrate the letter m, which occupies the twelfth place, I indicate twelve either by addition, or by multiplication, or by division. First, by raising the two little fingers of each hand together with the thumb of the left hand; for the thumb signifies one, while one of the fingers denotes five and the other six; but five, six, and one make twelve, which number indicates the letter m. By multiplication in this way: let us touch the third finger from the thumb of the left hand with the index finger of the right, since three multiplied by four makes twelve; or let us touch the little finger of the right hand with the index finger of the left, because the same [unclear] six twice gives twelve. It could also be done in another way, namely by the contact of the index finger of the right hand and the middle finger of the left, which show six. These again, by contact of both thumbs, or of the right index finger and the left thumb, signify the multiplication of the former number by two; but twice six makes twelve.
By division thus: first we shall indicate twenty-four, the division of which number by two yields twelve. Division by two is represented by the gesture of which I spoke above, namely, if two thumbs are shown, one indeed raised and the other bent; likewise the thumb and little finger of the left hand, while the index finger of the right is inclined. For they signify the partition of six by three, that is, two; by these, twenty-four divided demonstrates twelve. So much concerning dactylogy, or the speech of the fingers, which can also be handled otherwise in infinite ways, by assigning to fixed places vowels, consonants, semivowels, double letters, liquids, and treating such matters as shall seem good to each person. Although these things may appear ridiculous, nevertheless they have very great use if by a certain analogy they are transferred to other matters. Moreover, there are some things of which the author makes mention partly in the exposition of this passage, partly toward the end; but because they pertain to the treatment of steganography, let them be postponed for the present until that point has been reached.
The first dermatic kind. This stratagem also commonly
[unclear] to the soldiers. Pliny, unless I am mistaken, in book 26, reports something else: “Our people,” he says, “call tithymalus the milky herb; others call it goat’s lettuce. They say that, when its milk is used to write on the body, if ash is sprinkled on, the letters appear”; and thus, indeed, they preferred to address adulteresses rather than by little notes.
The second kind, Hyphasmaticon. The very learned Theodorus Bibliander has “hyphalmicon,” for this reason, as I think: because in this sort of concealment none of the letters appears before the paper has been immersed in water. Thus, when we write letters with alum, water poured over the paper will make it darker than the letters, which otherwise could not have been read.
Letters are also written in various ways. Herodotus, near the end of book seven: After Xerxes had resolved to undertake an expedition against Greece, Demaratus, who was at Susa, when he had learned this, judged that it should be reported to the Greeks. But since he could not do it otherwise, for it was dangerous lest he be detected, he devised this thing: taking a pair of writing-tablets, he scraped the wax from them. Then on the wood of them he scratched the king’s plan. When he had scratched it in letters, he covered it again with wax, so that the tablets would present no business to the road-guards for the person to whom they were being carried. When these had been brought to Lacedaemon, the Lacedaemonians could not interpret them until, as I understand it, Gorgo, daughter of Cleomenes and wife of Leonidas, warned them, herself interpreting the matter, ordering the wax to be broken off; for they would find letters in the wood. So the Lacedaemonians, listening to her, found the letters, read them over, and then sent them on to the Greeks.
Gellius, book seventeen, chapter 9: “There is also,” he says, “in the records of Greek affairs a certain deep and hard-to-grasp hiding-place, devised with barbarian cunning.” There was a man named Histiaeus, born in a not undistinguished place in the land of Asia. At that time King Darius held Asia under his rule. This Histiaeus, when he was in Persia with Darius, wished to announce certain secret matters to a certain Aristagoras by clandestine writing. He devised this remarkable concealment of letters: from his slave, who had long had diseased eyes, he shaved the hair from the whole head as though for the sake of treating him, and marked his bare head in the forms of letters. With these letters he wrote out what he had wished. Afterwards he kept the man at home until his hair grew back. When this had happened, he ordered him to go to Aristagoras. “And when you come to him,” he said, “say that I have commanded him to shave your head, just as I myself recently did.” The slave came to Aristagoras as he had been ordered and brought his master’s instruction. And he, thinking that this order was not without purpose, did what had been commanded; thus the letters were carried through.
Herodotus writes almost the same things; in that author it is also read in book one: When Astyages was harsh toward the Medes, Harpagus, insinuating himself with each of them individually, persuaded the leading men that Astyages ought to be removed from the kingship, with Cyrus chosen. When these matters had been arranged and prepared by Harpagus, then at last, wishing to reveal his intention to Cyrus, who was staying among the Persians, and being unable to do so otherwise, since the roads were guarded, he devised a thing of this sort: having gutted a hare, which he had skilfully obtained, so that nothing at all was cut away, he put inside it a little book in which he had written whatever he pleased; and, having sewn up the belly, he handed the hare, together with the nets, to a certain hunter of his household, a man of greatest trustworthiness, instructing him by word of mouth that, when he gave the hare, he should tell Cyrus to open it with his own hands and to do so without witnesses. He sent the man away into Persia. When the messenger had carried this out, Cyrus received the hare, opened it, found the little book that was in it, and read it. See Justin, book 1.
The historians also report that doves served as messengers in difficult circumstances, so that Hirtius the consul sent letters tied to their necks or feet to Decimus Brutus during the siege of Mutina, and Decimus Brutus sent them to Hirtius, after he had arranged food in certain very high places and had taught doves, previously shut up in darkness and worn down by much hunger, to fly back and forth.
Some, in order to avoid suspicion, write on paper with ink, [as if?] they wished to communicate something to a friend about domestic matters; afterwards they write what is secret with urine in the spaces. Others use the juice of lemons or onions; others use pounded sal ammoniac with water poured over it. Things written with letters of this kind are completely hidden before they have been brought near the fire. Some follow the poet’s counsel: “Since he can hide papers bound to his leg, / And jun[unclear].”
And to carry gentle marks beneath the joined foot. Let the guardian beware of these; instead of paper let the knowing back present itself, and let it bear words on its own body. Safe too is the letter, and it deceives the eyes from the recent [unclear]; touch the laws with the dust of charcoal. And it deceives, which will be made with the point of damp clay; the small tablet brings forth hidden marks, and
There are also other devices: for instance, they paint letters on flint with the fat of a goat or ox; when it has been placed in vinegar for several hours and then taken out again, it displays to sight what had been inscribed. Likewise, they write with the white of an egg and dip it into ink; when this is scraped off, the letters are seen. Finally, in this place he wraps many things in obscure words, and in words by no means received in common use, lest he give perverse men an opportunity either to abuse these things or to devise worse ones. He wrote “race” with the true syllables for “cera,” just as “Roma” for “amor,” “nemilua” for “alumine,” “raphocam” for “camphora,” and so on. But since such matters, for the public good, must be handled rather sparingly and do not pertain to our undertaking, let us omit explaining everything; for it is enough if it is understood what he meant to signify by this third kind of letters.
There were also, as Bede bears witness) The sense is: the ancients not only wrote or spoke with words, as we do, but also transferred whatever the world contains, and whatever can be grasped by us, to signify things by a certain definite art. Diodorus Siculus, in book four, says: “The letters of the Egyptians closely resemble various living creatures, extremities, and those of human beings and instruments, but especially those of craftsmen; for their words are expressed not by the composition of syllables or by letters, but by the form of images, through their signification handed down to men’s memory by use.” They write, for example, a hawk, a crocodile, a serpent, a human eye, hands, a face, and other things of this kind. The hawk denotes a thing quickly done, since this bird is almost the swiftest of all; this notation is transferred to domestic affairs that are done swiftly. The crocodile signifies evil. The eye is interpreted as the preserver of justice and the guardian of the whole body. Of the remaining parts of the body, the right hand with fingers spread signifies freedom, but the left with them compressed signifies tenacity and avarice. In the same way the form of the other parts of the body and instruments denoted something definite; and those who had observed these things by memory, long use, and meditation immediately recognized what they expressed. Petrus Crinitus also, in book [unclear], chapter 2, writes that this kind of method of writing existed among the Egyptians. Concerning the letters of the Egyptians which are called hieroglyphic, not only is there mention among the ancient authors, but this can still be observed on obelisks, on which those figures and images of different animals, herbs, rivers, and trees, sculpted there, designate the philosophy of that nation, as Strabo and Pliny, most weighty authors, testify. For on the obelisks of Kings Sesostris and Sennosornis, which were brought from Egypt to the city, the interpretation of the nature of things is marked by symbols of this sort and by hieroglyphic signs. For thus the philosophy of the Egyptians is believed to have first been illustrated, as is handed down by the same Pliny and by others. Among other images, they were accustomed to mark scarabs, bees, rivers, oxen, vultures, and other things of that kind. Moreover, from the very image of the bee the symbol of a king was signified, because in performing the duties of life he ought to have no less the sting of justice than the sweet clemency of honey. In the vulture they indicated the genius and majesty of nature, because among these birds only females are found, etc. They also painted many other signs in place of words; on these see Horapollo on hieroglyphic letters; Pliny, book 36, chapter 8, and also chapter 12, where, according to the more correct reading, “Sesostris” is found for “Sesotidis,” and “Nuncoreus Pharaoh” for [unclear]. Moreover, Strabo, book 17; Cornelius Tacitus, book 13; Coelius Rhodiginus, Ancient Readings, book 29, chapter 26; and Volaterranus, book 33, mention letters of this sort, although he writes that they have as yet been discovered by no one.
There were those who by accidents) The meaning is: whatever things exist in the whole nature of things, whether they are perceived by the intellect or by the senses, can be turned to such a use that they signify in the same way as words. Hence it is that one may secretly signify the will of our mind to another in countless ways, without suspicion and without the hindrance of any person, by words,
by means of signs that indicate words, as by light, by colors, shadows, sounds, odors, tastes, by qualities that affect touch, by shapes, magnitudes, numbers, by the motion or position of any things whatever, such as parts of the body, by gestures of the fingers, nods of the eyes, etc. All these things, indeed, if they are handled properly and, according to letters, syllables, words, and sentences, have been arranged in a fixed order and with numbers assigned to them, furnish men with wonderful capacities, and the more excellent in proportion as one is more skilled and practiced in those disciplines that deal with the principles, causes, and accidents of sensible things. Such is Catoptrics, which teaches how to present visible signs of things to the sight in a moment, by means of certain images projected far from us out of mirrors into the air, and devised to signify some discourse; these are easily understood by one who has knowledge of the signs. But in what way it may be possible for all things to be transferred to the use of signs is not part of the present undertaking, but belongs to steganography; the subjects of that work the most learned man Johannes Trithemius lists in a certain letter to Bostius in these words, etc.
I already have in hand a great work which, if it is ever published, which God forbid, the whole world will marvel at; the title of its first book is Steganography. There will be four books, and each will be divided into at least one hundred chapters. I began this work at the insistence of a certain great prince, whom there is no need to name. You ask what this work teaches? It teaches very great things, astonishing and incredible to all who do not know them, things that have never been heard of since the beginning of the world. For the first book contains more than one hundred methods of writing secretly whatever you wish, without any suspicion, without transposition of letters, without any fear, so that there is no man in the world who by natural ingenuity could know, or even suspect, what is contained in my letters, except the man who knows the art from me, or from him whom I shall have taught. The words are plain and familiar, devoid of all suspicion, but no one without the art will ever be able to perceive my intention, however learned he may be; and the thing is truly astonishing. The second book will contain much more wonderful things, by which, namely, [unclear] in this art I can make known the conception of my mind [unclear].
to one who knows [the art], at any distance whatever, to a hundred miles or more, safely, without words, without writings, without signs, through any messenger whatsoever; and if he has been seized on the road, if he has been questioned even under the harshest tortures, he can disclose nothing about my message, because he knows absolutely nothing about it. Whatever may happen, my message will always remain hidden, nor could all the men of the whole world, if they were gathered together at once, track it down by natural power. This too I can do without a messenger whenever I wish; I can also make my will known, even when long absent, to one sitting in prison who knows the art, however closely he is guarded, even if he were sitting three miles under the earth. And all these things, most broadly and universally, whenever and as often as I wish, I can do naturally, without any superstition or aid of any spirits whatsoever.
They are wonderful things, I admit; but hear things more wonderful. The third book teaches an art by which I can, in two hours, teach a man who knows that same knowledge and only his mother tongue, and who has never known a word of Latin speech, to write, read, and understand Latin fairly elegantly and fluently, as much as he wishes, so that whoever sees his letters will praise the words and will understand them as composed in Latin. The fourth book contains many astonishing experiments, but purely natural ones. Namely, I can make known my mind to one who knows [the art] [unclear] whenever I wish, even while speaking, preaching, playing the organ, or singing, without hindrance to any other action whatsoever, so that while preaching good and holy things I may make known, not by words, not by signs, to anyone who knows [the art], most broadly, whatever I wish, even with closed eyes; and the fourth book will contain many other secrets which are not to be brought before the public.
All who hear these things marvel at them; among them are many noble and very learned men, who think that these things are either impossible or wholly supernatural. To them, and to you, I answer what I have answered to many: that many things are naturally possible which, to those who do not know the powers of nature, seem impossible, or even supernatural. And behold, I speak before my God, who knows all things, that the wondrous things which I have stated above are much more excellent, deeper, and greater than I can write or you can believe; and yet all are purely natural, without any deception, without superstition, without magical art, without invocation or service of any spirits whatsoever. I have said these things for this reason: that if perhaps at some time a rumor should reach you that I either know or can do wonderful things, you should not, I say, think me a magician, but a philosopher. For what happened to Albertus Magnus, that most profound investigator of natural things, namely that because of the wonders which he performed by the hidden power of nature he was considered a magician by the common people, I am certain could likewise happen to me.
If you ask whence I have these things which no one else knows, hear: I learned these things not from man nor through man, but by revelation from I know not whom. For when in the present year I was once thinking what new thing I could discover that would be hidden from everyone, I began to consider whether I could devise those wonderful things which I have mentioned. When, after long imagining, I utterly despaired of it as an impossible matter, I laid myself down to sleep that night, laughing at my own folly within myself, that I had tried to seek impossible things. That same night someone stood by me, saying, “The things you have thought, O Trithemius, are not vain, although they are impossible for you, and neither you nor another with you will be able to discover them.” And I said to him: “If therefore they are possible, tell me, I beg, how they are done.” And opening his mouth, he taught me each thing in order, showing how what I had vainly pondered for many days could easily be done.
Behold, before God, because I do not lie but speak the truth: I have taught these things to no one yet, although many, promising great things, have often asked, except one prince to whom I am writing, whom I have made more certain of the possibility of the art by evident proof. Nor is it fitting for others to know these things than princes; otherwise many evils would be done through them: betrayals, deceptions, fornications, and whatever else evil men might wish. But those using the art well could do many good things for the commonwealth through it. Moreover I can teach all these things in every language of the whole world which I have never heard. I wanted to tell you these things, Bostius, so that you would not think me idle.
Thus far the words of Trithemius. Lastly, there are other immense uses of these books of Polygraphy, which we shall treat in our books On the Method of Teaching and Learning; for whatever these things may seem to be, they have more in reserve than they promise on the surface. Concerning Steganography, in whose first books hidden matters lie concealed, God willing, we shall deal separately.
THE FIRST BOOK OF POLYGRAPHY
There are twenty-four characters of the signs of Latin speech, which, set out in order with the same number of symbolic words, [unclear] at the wish of each person working in this art, abundantly
[unclear] serve the secrets in every respect. The paraphrases, however, have been arranged so artfully that they produce a wholly Latin discourse, if only one is taken from each order. And it should be noted that, by reason of our German speech, the twenty-fourth letter W is taken at the end of the alphabet, since all the remaining letters perform service for both languages. We have set the co-signifying words in such order by this method that, whichever you take from each line, once the total calculation has been made, agreement will remain. Yet caution is needed, so that from any line of syntax you take only one, and so that no monad does injury to the binary. Care must also be taken that, as often as you approach the cabalistic operation, you first count all and each of the minutes of the night, and join them in due proportion to the degrees of the following day. But if, by the arcane arrangement, the minutes do not suffice to the degrees of the day right to the end, the windy runner must by prudent counsel be brought back to the arch-measurer. Nor is it an obstacle if by chance the night falls upon the head of the day, since the prudent operator in the art can withdraw from the front by voluntary addition by as much as he sees the night exceed the light of day. And this is to be understood throughout the whole work of the Polygraphy concerning the individual chapters. Yet we say that this consideration must be assigned to unity, by which the binary may be certified by the indicator of note-reversion, lest it happen to go astray. By the established rule the binary will stand from the monad, and the monad is produced. Nothing is put here in vain; nothing is cited without cause or idly. Therefore we necessarily warn everyone who wishes to transcribe this work of our Polygraphy, either wholly or in part, to take diligent care above all that he does not depart in any respect from our archetype, that he does not skip, neglect, or transpose any word whatever. Indeed, if he omits a letter or word in substantials, if he changes a word contrary to its nature, he has made the procedure of the whole work useless. Therefore let him either transcribe it properly, or not transcribe it.
There follow the words of the first order, with minutes, for the degrees
A God B Creator C Founder D Maker E Lord F Ruler G Comforter H Arbiter I Judge K Enlightener L Illuminator M Governor N King O Emperor P Helmsman Q Maker R Fashioner S Preserver T Redeemer V Author X Prince Y Shepherd Z Moderator W Savior
A merciful B most merciful C pious D most pious E great F more exalted G greatest H best I wisest K invisible L immortal M eternal N everlasting O glorious P strongest Q holiest R incomprehensible S almighty T peaceful V compassionate X most compassionate Y all-powerful Z magnificent W most excellent
| letter | col A | col B |
|---|---|---|
| A | creating | the heavens |
| B | ruling | heavenly things |
| C | preserving | supercelestial things |
| D | governing | the world |
| E | guiding | worldly things |
| F | ordering | men |
| G | adorning | human things |
| H | embellishing | angels |
| I | establishing | angelic things |
| K | directing | the earth |
| L | producing | earthly things |
| M | decorating | time |
| N | making firm | temporal things |
| O | illuminating | the age |
| P | beholding | things eternal [unclear] |
| Q | admonishing | all things |
| R | confirming | every thing |
| S | guarding | the universe |
| T | discerning | the globe |
| V | distinguishing | the stars |
| X | enlightening | the sun |
| Y | fashioning | stars |
| Z | [unclear] | life |
| W | making | living things |
. . 204931865700000000 GREATEST.
| letter | col A | col B |
|---|---|---|
| A | may bestow | upon all |
| B | may confer | upon everyone |
| C | may give | upon all universally |
| D | may lavish | upon believers |
| E | may grant | to us |
| F | may forgive | to Christians |
| G | may bestow | to the faithful |
| H | may distribute | to those asking |
| I | may repay | to those seeking |
| K | may contribute | to those praying |
| L | may pardon | to those entreating |
| M | may exhibit | to those requesting |
| N | may furnish | to those demanding |
| O | may offer | to those seeking |
| P | may bring | to worshipers of Christ |
| Q | may show | to those inquiring |
| R | may reveal | to those requiring |
| S | may manifest | to those choosing |
| T | may intimate | to those desiring |
| V | may breathe upon | to those awaiting |
| X | may restore | to those hoping |
| Y | may return | to those desiring |
| Z | may administer | may favor. ii. |
| W | may favor | to all |
. A ii 20000000100000003000000400000050000006000000700000080000009000000A000000B000000C000000D000000E000000F000000G000000H000000I000000J000000K000000L000000M000000N000000O000000P000000Q000000R000000S000000T000000V000000X000000Y000000Z000000W000000. 1000000ii. 2000000020000003 200000004 200000005 200000006 200000007 200000008 200000009 2000000AA 2000000BB 2000000CC 2000000DD 2000000EE 2000000FF 2000000GG 2000000HH 2000000II 2000000KK 2000000LL 2000000MM 2000000NN 2000000OO 2000000PP 2000000QQ 2000000RR 2000000SS 2000000TT 2000000VV 2000000XX 2000000YY 2000000ZZ 2000000WW . A ii
A Majesty A of the highest B Goodness B of the great C Sweetness C of the greatest D Charity D of the supreme E Wisdom E of the lofty F Power F of the best G Compassion G of the most renowned H Kindness H of the most holy I Gentleness I of the most powerful K Excellence K of the wisest L Piety L of the strongest M Pleasantness M of the gentlest N Brightness N of the highest O Clemency O of the most robust P Mercy P of the almighty Q Divinity Q of the all-powerful R Loftiness R of the everlasting S Deity S of the most glorious T Immensity T ineffable V Virtue V invisible X Strength X immortal Y Love Y inaccessible Z Munificence Z of the most eminent W Perfection W of the most merciful
A of the creator A to Christians B of the parent B to worshippers of Christ C of the savior C to the faithful D of the redeemer D to believers E of the beginning E to the baptized F of the founder F to the reborn G of the maker G to the living H of the maker H to mortals I of the preserver I to all K of the ruler K to us L of the author L to the good M of the craftsman M to the just N of the lord N always to the pious O of the dominator O everywhere to the holy P of the king P to the meek Q of the governor Q to the sanctified R of the emperor R to the justified S of the one commanding S to the devout T of the prince T to the frail V of the mover V to those who love X of the judge X to those who hope Y of the liberator Y to those who fall Z of the governor Z to those who sin W of the protector W to sinners
A sincerely A to be preached B sincerely B to be evangelized C most sincerely C to be prayed for D devoutly D to be adored E most devoutly E to be entreated F humbly F to be worshipped G most humbly G to be honored again H fervently H to be remembered I most fervently I to be remembered again K ardently K to be thought upon L most ardently L to be thought upon again M most prudently M to be contemplated N prudently N to be invoked O wisely O to be honored P most wisely P to be glorified Q cordially Q to be blessed R most cordially R to be venerated S affectionately S to be loved T most affectionately T to be praised V reverently V to be praised together X most urgently X to be extolled Y most strongly Y to be exalted Z most steadfastly Z to be magnified W cheerfully W .
A with many A words B with very many B teachings C with how many C instructions D with several D admonitions E with quite a few E admonitions F with various F admonitions G with diverse G inspirations H with most holy H sermons I with sacred K scriptures L with consecrated M commandments, us N with necessary N persuasions, us O with useful O precepts P Q commands R Q exhortations S X illuminations T Y of promise U examples V Z impulses W .B. X salutary
A wretched A men B poor little B little men C pitiable C mortals D miserable D Christians E most wretched E worshippers of Christ F most unhappy F orthodox G unhappy G pilgrims H perishable H exiles I unstable I sinners K frail K those sinning L weak L living persons M unclean M those straying N vain N wayfarers O most vain O those about to die P abject P those wandering Q most abject Q laborers R unjust R hirelings S stained S sleepers T foolish T earthborn X stupid X and desolate Y changeable Y worldly Z most infirm Z earthly W
A imbues A present things B teaches B the world C visits C worldly things D admonishes D worldly matters E admonishes E the age F forewarns F secular things G instructs G changeable things H commands H corruptible things I exhorts I vain things K exhorts K vanities L exhorts L earthly things M dissuades M carnal things on account of [unclear] N encourages N luxury O reminds O riches P taught P mortal things Q instructs Q transitory things R reminds R things that slip away S incites S lower things T stirs up T visible things V [unclear] V perishable things X provokes X pleasures Y illuminates Y riches Z enlightens Z honors W imitates W the lowest things. B ii
A love B affection C charity D reverence E honor F veneration G contemplation H memory I consideration K adherence L acquisition M affection N devotion O union P virtue Q choice R hope S faith T trust V confidence X delight Y attainment Z repayment W reward. A of the savior B of the redeemer C of the liberator D of the creator E of the founder F of the molder G of the author H of the maker I of the craftsman K of the mover L of the preserver M of the governor N of the emperor O of the maker P of the fabricator Q of the illuminator R of the enlightener S of the ruler T of the king V of the director X of the rescuer Y of the life-giver Z of the inspector W of the producer
A of heavenly things — A to contemn; B of things above — B to hold cheap; C of things above the heavens — C to reckon as worthless; D of angels — D to leave behind; E of human beings — E to abandon; F of the faithful — F to spurn; G of believers — G to cast away; H of those to be saved — H to despise; I of archangels — I to throw away; K of all things — K to desert; L of all collectively — L to esteem little, and also; M of everything — M to flee; N of eternal things — N to trample underfoot; O of temporal things — O to tread down; P of living beings — P to deny; Q of good things — Q to put after; R of future things — S to dismiss; T of divine things — X to neglect; X of holy things — V to detest; Z of human things — to disdain; W of salutary things — Y to be ignorant of; Z of immortal things — not to know; W to abhor. B iii
A good things B gifts C joys D a good thing E a gift F joy G light H advantage I kingdom K present L gifts M reward N recompense O enjoyment P victory Q life R glory S honor T splendor V pleasantness X riches Y banquets Z fellowship.
A of eternal B of everlasting C of heavenly D of sempiternal E of perennial F of future G of angelic H of celestial I of supercelestial K of immortal L of invisible M of promised N of promised in return O of most holy P of holy Q of prepared R of pre-prepared S of Christian T of perpetual V of shining X of ineffable Y of inestimable Z of unchangeable W of highest.
A of felicity B of pleasantness C of blessedness D of delight E of quiet F of dwelling G of sweetness H of habitation I of exultation K of brightness L of pleasure M of jubilation in every respect N of total gladness O of [unclear] P of honorableness Q of firmness R of security S of tranquility T of rest V of majesty X of peace Y of constancy Z of festivity W of solemnity A with care B with diligence C with solicitude D with vigilance E with zeal F with effort G with endeavor H with desire I with trust K with confidence L with thought, according to one’s strength M with thought, according to one’s ability N with assiduity O with longing P with desire Q with concupiscence R with affection S with devotion T with virtue U with patience X with humility Y with charity Z [unclear].
A to desire — A amendment B to seek — B penitence C to inquire after — C contrition D to search out — D discipline E to require — E instruction F to wish for — F doctrine G to long for — G holiness H to wish greatly for — H modesty I to ask for — I repentance K to seek eagerly — K correction L to desire — L continence M to wait for — M temperance, therefore O N to expect — N abstinence, and so you O to demand — O devotion P to think upon — P humility Q to think again upon — Q purity R to love — R chastity S to love exceedingly — S frugality T to esteem — T patience V to remember — V obedience X to remember again — X integrity Y to aspire to — Y providence Z to covet — Z cleanliness W to sigh for — W charity.
A wretched B most wretched C pitiable D to be pitied E most unhappy F unhappy G senseless H corruptible I changeable K most foolish L most stupid M most vain N poor little wretches O foolish P stupid Q vain R perishable S corrupt T most corrupt V disgraceful X slothful Y unjust Z lost W calamitous A human beings B little men C mortals D Christians E worldly people F earth-born people G worldly people H believers I orthodox people K fleshly people L pilgrims M exiles N those in exile O earthly people P sinners Q fleshly people R lovers S neglecters T contemners V mockers X human beings Y wayfarers Z the living W deserters. C
A receive B receive back C take up D undertake E begin F commence G assume H resume I learn K learn L take M love, in order that, to, that N preserve — N most delightful O observe — O desired P guard — P desirable Q hasten — Q blessed R put on — R happy S preserve — S prepared T practise — T pre-prepared V frequent — V celestial X celebrate — X supercelestial Y work — Y holy Z seek out — Z desired W search out — expected A everlasting B eternal C future D coming E supervening F promised G promised in return H heavenly I ineffable K inestimable L most blessed M most happy N [unclear] O desired P desirable Q blessed R happy S prepared T pre-prepared V celestial X supercelestial Y holy Z desired W expected.
A banquets B gifts C good things D joys E consolations F rewards G hidden things H secrets I dwelling-places K domiciles L receptacles M spectacles N hospices O feasts P rejoicings Q presents R fellowships S solemnities T shelters V festivals X jewels Y benefits Z pleasant things W kingdoms A of saints B of the just C of the elect D of angels E of archangels F of thrones G of powers H of dominions I of principalities K of virtues L of patriarchs M of prophets N of apostles O of martyrs P of innocents Q of the blessed R of those exulting S of friends T of servants V of attendants X of lovers Y of the faithful Z of imitators. C ii
The Second Book of the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Peapolis, of the Order of Saint Benedict, begins
The method of numbering mortals, by art imitating nature, admits no reckoning of the monad. Hence, although the arrangement of the preceding book of the Polygraphy, through the extension and metathesis of particulars, is, as it were, sufficient for the universals of this art in the infinite progressions of number, nevertheless a certain consideration has moved us to join one to the other. The condition of light is different in each; but night in both preserves inviolate the order of its course. The prudent reader, from these small inventions of ours, and not polished sufficiently to the exact rule, will easily be able, if he is strong in excellent talent, to discover greater and more polished ones. Whatever is visible, set within the whole circuit of the world, readily provides support for the service of this new art of ours. Air and fire, water and earth, springs and rivers, trees and fruits, flowers and grasses, words and names, accident and substance, stones and sand, dung and filth, things and terms, honorable and modest things, wood and metals, hard and liquid things, things existing and not existing, history and fable, beasts and brute animals, men and beasts of burden, each and all things which either speech can express or the soul can think, furnish a very wide field for our Polygraphy, and promise that, so far as it can be established among mortals, the art will be enlarged infinitely. For just as from unity, through the binary, the ternary generates a perfect number in the quaternary, so the consummation of this invention, through the quaternary, establishing its root in the twice-perfect binary, gives us an infinite number under the [unclear] of things and paraphrases of Polygraphy. For even if among us all our things are terminable, nevertheless many things often occur which, because of the slowness of our understanding, seem to us infinite. Who will be able to count the drops of the sea? And who will penetrate the inscrutable heart of man? Just as a finite and circumscribable number can, by progression, be led into infinity, so the arrangement of this art is enlarged to immensity by varied metathesis. Whatever is seen anywhere in the whole world is in every way conformed to our arrangement, nor is anything known to us which is devoid of mystery, if the method is understood from a master. But we, persuaded by reason, have halted under the service of the binary, and briefly explain the smallest part of the whole. Nor is occasion given to us to raise what has been begun to weightier matters; if it is offered to us acceptably, we shall not refuse to make better things manifest to those who desire them. For it is written: Where there is no hearing, never pour forth speech. Therefore, adding the second book of the Polygraphy to the first, we keep the same form of method: in the light of day, three hundred and eight paraphrases of the simple, which, if suitable time had been present, we could have given more elegantly, with sufficient broadening, wider in the open field. But studious posterity will easily provide both, adding brightness to the matter and sufficient progress to the form. The first inventor of any art transmits greater things to posterity, because, since the beginnings of an art are hard and unfamiliar, no subtle invention is found completed from its origin. From Peapolis, which is Herbipolis, a city of the Eastern Franks, on the twelfth day of the month of February, in the year of the Lord 1508.
A of the intact B of the most blessed C of the undefiled D of the uncontaminated E of the most innocent F of the most splendid G of the most radiant H of the most modest I of the health-bearing K of the salvation-bearing L of the inviolate M of the blessed Virgin Ma- N of the sacred treasury, Mary O of the holy virgin P of the consecrated Q of the most holy R of the most chaste S of the most pure T of the most beautiful V of the most pious X of the most benign Y of the most serene Z of the sweetest W of the gentlest
A of the mother B of the nurse C of the suckling nurse D of the parent E of the begetter F of the conceiver G of the bearer H of the carrier I of the bringer-forth K of the receiver L of the educator M of the bridal chamber N of the cabinet O of the sanctuary P of the nourisher Q of the temple R of the ark S of the bride T of the nursing woman V of the shepherdess X of the tabernacle Y of the workshop Z of the treasury W of the chief steward’s chamber
A of the coequal B of the coessential C of the consubstantial D of the impassible E of the immutable F of the unchangeable G of the incomprehensible H of the unthinkable I of the inestimable K of the unfailing L of the everlasting M of the ineffable Son N of the coeternal Word O of the eternal P of the beloved Q of the perennial R of the unbegotten S of the only-begotten T of the coexistent V of the immortal X of the most loving Y of the dearest Z of the sweetest W of the strongest
A from the kingdom B from the palace C from joy D from empire E from dominion F from a dwelling G from a tabernacle H from a habitation I from a receptacle K from a dwelling-place L from exultation M from the sanctuary N from the inheritance O from the mansion P from principality Q from the consistory R from solemnity S from delight T from rejoicing V from the house X from gladness Y from the hall Z from the buildings W from the midst.
A of the heavens B of the blessed C of the elect D of the just E of the heavenly ones F of the saints G of the angels H of divinity I of the things above K of blessedness L of pleasantness M of everlastingness, amen N of eternity, let it be O of happiness P of deity Q of piety R of rest S of peace T of light V heavenly X of the devout Y of the good Z of fruition W of tranquillity.
With the help of our Lord Jesus Christ, savior of faithful souls, who lives in the sacred ternary unity with the Father and the Holy Spirit, threefold in persons and one God in substance, incomprehensible, almighty, and everlasting, from whom, in whom, and through whom every good, beautiful, and true thing proceeds, we have brought this second book of the Polygraphy to its end. To him be praise, honor, power, and glory: he who through the innocence of his death freed our race from the destruction of eternal perdition, and in perpetual mercy opened again the entrance to eternal life for all who believe in him with a pure conscience. We set down, line by line, three hundred and eight paraphrases, deliberately avoiding more lengthy digression. For at the beginning of this night-work it seemed enough to us if we gave to those who wished it a reason for seeking out fuller things, since both time and method were lacking to us for them. Farewell, friendly reader. From Würzburg, on the penultimate day of the month of February, in the year of the Lord 1508.
END OF THE SECOND BOOK of the Polygraphy
The third book of the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, abbot of Würzburg, of the Order of Saint Benedict, begins
What, from the beginning of human creation, confounded the unity of language? Was it not the division of bodies and the variety of minds? For as Truth declares in the Gospel: out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. For the tongue is the instrument for bringing outward those conceptions which the mind has thought within itself in its inner parts. Yet there are several modes of this service of the mind’s secrets to sense, whose properties vary both by use and by art. Use, introduced at will, is common to many; art, however, to few. Finally, even the unregulated use of speaking itself, how much it has varied among the Theutons alone in six hundred years, no one will readily estimate who has not rather often reread Otfried, the monk of Weissenburg, in his poems in the German language. The sea flows and ebbs; human beings, once dying, do not return again to the present life. Customs succeed customs, and the vigor of mortal minds always falls away toward softer things. Who today among the Germans, the ancient imitators of the Greeks, retains knowledge of the old idioms? In chronicles and old histories of the Franks, Hunibald, Doracus, and the other writers who preceded us by a thousand years mixed into their compositions many things spoken both in ancient verse and in prose of the Theutonic language, which today are understood by few. Why do I speak of ancient times, when our own proper idiom among the East Franks, Swabians, Bavarians, Rhinelanders, Mosellans, Cologne people, Saxons, and Thuringians undergoes notable variation every day? Human beings change over time, and customs vary,
A damas A hara Apai B abdias B abora B abai C acras C acora C acelai D edelaa D adora D adonai E menas E melora E belai F afrapas F efora F efai G agiras G egera G agai H choras H theora H thomai I dimas I lipara I rimai K akias K akomyra K akai L alapas L glomera L gladai M omeras M ambra M umbrai N anyras N andria N antai O poneras O morendia O morai P upupas P spanedria P spatai Q aquilas Q aqueutia Q equai R atropas R dromancia R aremai S asteras S asara S asadai T athyras T ethyria T athenai V cucufas V cularia V culectai X aximas X axioma X axipani Y tyrifas Y myparia Y rypai Z azarias Z ezaphria Z azafai W euuanas W ouuepila W auuadai
Now that the demonstration of the possibility of our new invention has been shown briefly, and no less sufficiently, I do not think that I myself should be wearied any longer on this same occasion, since the route and method extends to infinity, if anyone should need an example for further matters. Nor do I think it at all necessary to recall to memory the things that have been recited in the preceding sections, since the keen reader, if he is studious, will also be able, with the Lord’s help, to discover the greater things that lie hidden in these matters. We have handed over to the wise and studious man both the material and the cause; if he wishes to use them prudently, he will surpass us by his own talent. But whoever desires this path to be more beautiful in the shade, let him join hand and mind to talent, and let him make for himself a route more beautifully adorned by paraphrase. If these things delight anyone, let him keep it fixed in memory that he must always remain within the prescribed circle; if he passes beyond it in any way, the whole operation vanishes uselessly. There are many names of men; indeed there are almost infinite words for things, villages, cities, provinces, trees, stones, and words, all of which serve our purposes. From these it is clear that a book and a method can be made, not impossibly, if talent is present together with diligence, which may surpass our inventions infinitely. But he who is of such dullness that he cannot understand these childish things of ours, when will he penetrate the subtler things that remain? We set an end to the fourth book of the Polygraphy, to which we join the fifth, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
End of the Fourth Book of the Polygraphy
Johannes Trithemius, abbot of St. James the Apostle at Wurzburg. The Fifth Book of the Polygraphia: the beginning
Those things which, with the help of our Lord Jesus Christ, we have set forth, in whatever manner, in the four preceding books for the completion of our Polygraphia, reasonably require that we briefly treat, in the fifth, the remaining precepts and methods of this instruction which are left. Therefore in it we shall give a sufficiently concise method by metathesis, that is, by transposition of letters, by which a friend may write to a friend securely, safely, and most secretly whatever he wishes. We read that Caesar Augustus used this mode of writing in secret matters. And although this method of communication is secure in many ways, nevertheless it is always regarded with suspicion by those who look at it: for as soon as a transposition of letters is perceived, anyone curious at once suspects that something lies hidden beneath them. Now the methods of this invention are almost infinite; from them, for the necessary introduction, we have marked out the following for the reader, leaving the rest to be investigated by his own ingenuity. First, therefore, we have placed before him the canonical table of this craft, to which we have added beneath another, reversed one. In these two tables the root and foundation of the aforesaid transposition is wholly set down, upon which the structure of the whole edifice is placed. For when these two tables have been duly known and understood, no transposition of letters will be able to remain hidden from one working carefully. To these we have joined twenty-four alphabets in order, so that we might furnish the reader with an abundance for transposing letters. The use of these, according to one’s wish, consists in each single one, or, if you prefer, even in all of them. If you have secret dealings with many people, assign the individual alphabets to your individual intimates, and commit to memory what you have handed over to each.
Hand over the first alphabet to the first man, the second to the second, the third to the third, and so let it be done in sequence with the rest. But if, because of the multitude of affairs or of one’s household, the alphabets which we have marked out should not suffice for everything, or if some of them seem too open and plain, we shall be able to introduce various new transpositions, of which both the number is very great and the method of the secret may always remain perpetually hidden. Let us set down an example of this matter: let B be a, f be b, l be c, p be d, t be e, z be f, c be g, m be h, and so consequently let it be done through the whole usual alphabet, so that between any assumed letter three idle and transposed letters may intervene. Afterwards four, then five, more or fewer, yet in such a way that the whole alphabet, as though turned around in a circle, comes together, and no letter at all is omitted, but each is placed for another in its own order in the same series. In whatever way you have written it, it must be committed firmly to memory, lest, having fallen into forgetfulness, you yourself can no longer read what you had written. For the transposition of letters can be varied in as many ways as, according to the estimation of the human intellect, which, enclosed in a mortal body by temporal operation, does not properly grasp infinities, an innumerable mortal number will arise. Hence anyone who wishes to have more methods of writing by metathesis, and ones removed from our instruction, if he is even a little ingenious and diligent, will obtain an easy result in his work. For the human intellect can do very great things if it is aided by study and art. But he who despises the smallest things will never attain to greater ones. I know that there will be very many who will deride these studies of ours as empty and childish; to them we give as a reply that we shall be wholly content, provided they please those at whose insistence they have been composed by us.
The straight table follows
We have brought the sixth and last book of our Polygraphy to its conclusion, by God’s mercy. In it, as we end our discourse with the wandering stars, we give the reader warning on certain points.
First, whenever he uses an alphabet, let him prudently add the character or mark of whatever sign or planet it is, for the sake of a double utility. For by this a great deal of labor is spared the friendly reader, and the mystery will remain secret, since anyone ignorant of the art will think that a table written with numbers and marked beforehand with the characters of signs or planets pertains to the science of astronomy, and will suspect that no mystery at all lies hidden. For this reason we have not taken the official matter for the letters from unity, but from a distance, lest we furnish anyone with a mark of suspicion. Prudence, nevertheless, must be used by writers, since a shrewd reader who is touched by suspicion of something hidden, if he detects the function of one number, will easily calculate the whole alphabet.
Second, remember, whoever you are who desire to be a skilled practitioner of this matter, that whenever in any word a letter is doubled, as very often happens, it is to be written only once and marked above with a point. For example, I wish to write from the alphabet of Aries “Ioannes,” not doubling the letter which is n, but I write thus: 14. 16. 7. 18. 10. 23. Or “abbas”: 6. 7. 6. 23. “Ioannes, abbas,” so that every mark of suspicion may be removed. In similar cases one must proceed with similar caution, because unless the practitioner is endowed with skill and knows how to discover greater things from small ones, he will not be fit for these least matters of ours to be disclosed to him. Not all things are to be communicated everywhere to everyone, especially those whose use is capable of being turned to good and to evil.
Moved with reason by that consideration, we have plainly handed down many things in these six books of the Polygraphy for those who wish to know, but we have allowed far more secret things to lie hidden beneath what is plain. Finally, we have written a key that lays open the whole work, explaining how it is to be understood in each metaphor; yet by the advice of certain persons we have ordered it to remain hidden at home, so that students may not lack material for exercising the memory, and that the cause of knowing it may be taken away from the wicked, who are not willing to use it well. In every passage many mysteries lie hidden, and the greater things you discover from them, the greater remain to be discovered.
A way is prepared for beginners; for those setting out upon it, it will not be difficult in the course of time to discover many things, both [unclear] and very great. Here one who did not know will learn to write Latin, and prudently to wrap all the mysteries of his will in foreign speech. But that the unlearned man may be able to understand not only his own mysteries which he wraps up, but also open speech of which until now he has always been ignorant, is not a task of great labor, if the interpreter has fully grasped our intention in this volume. For beneath the bark lie the kernels of our Steganography, buried for a just reason, lest they lie open to unworthy babblers. It was worth the labor, finally, that one work should not prejudice another, but that its own right should be distributed to each unimpaired.
Wearied after a long voyage, we here cast anchor in the sea, under the name of JESUS CHRIST, the Savior of the faithful, on the twenty-first day of the month of March, in the year of the Lord’s nativity 1508, in the eleventh indiction of the Romans, at Würzburg, a city of the eastern Franks, which they call both Würzburg and Herbipolis.
End of the Polygraphy of Johannes Trithemius, abbot at Saint James in Würzburg, formerly of Sponheim, of the order of the divine father Benedict
Correction.
The fair reader must be warned that the order of the books of this Polygraphy is especially to be observed, lest the division of the signature which occurred in the first alphabet perhaps give rise to error. For there the Key of the Polygraphy ends at c; after the remaining books, however, the fifth book begins again at d.
At Frankfurt, from the workshop of Cyriacus Jacobus.
In the year 1550.
Diplomatic Latin OCR
Loading aligned Latin…
Special scholarly renderings
Parallel presentations for cipher tables, grids, untranslated passages, and damaged prose. They keep uncertainty visible and should be read alongside the Latin. See Methodology §10.
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Cipher-key tables
68 chunks
Substitution-table chunks: each plaintext letter maps to a Latin cipher-word, rendered as an alphabet-down / columns-across markdown table with positional OCR repair.
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Cipher-grid matrices
15 chunks
Bigram-pair tables, alphabet-rotation grids, and the numerical Orchema, rendered as markdown matrices with OCR-illegible cells marked.
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Damage-preserving review renderings
1 chunk
Difficult prose chunks rendered conservatively so OCR damage, embedded tenors, and uncertainty remain visible for review.
Cite this translation
A machine translation should be cited as one, and checked against the Latin before quotation (see the limitations). A repository-level CITATION.cff is also available; a Zenodo DOI will be added at the v1.0 release.
Fabin, Ian Carlos (2026). “Six Books of Polygraphy” [Polygraphiae libri sex]. Machine-assisted English translation of the Francofurti, 1550 (BSB) edition. In Trithemius Corpus. https://trithemius-corpus.github.io/Trithemius-Corpus/works/prdl-24389_polygraphiae-libri-sex-ioannis-trithemii-abbatis.html
Artifacts
- Side-by-side Latin / English viewer
- Passage and annotation index (1399 stable English passages)
- Special scholarly renderings (cipher tables and damaged passages, beside their facsimiles)
- EPUB 3.3 reading edition
- Print-ready reading edition (paged with Vivliostyle)
- Download as PDF (typeset via your browser’s print dialog)
- Original source record / PDF (BSB)
- Repository folder
Editorial corrections
This work has recorded editorial corrections. Click to view.
2026-06-10 — crypto-cluster prose re-translation (Fable 5, facsimile pass)
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Re-translated from scratch against the source page-scans, superseding the earlier machine rendering, and independently re-graded against the Latin; the superseded text is retained in version control.
What was wrong: The prior public rendering ended with a genuinely truncated, opaque clause ("'When she asks for papers to be hidden, tied to the leg,' and [unclear]") that misrepresented the segment boundary, and it silently normalized a print misprint without recording the crux. The segment is ordinary continuous prose: a chain of steganography anecdotes from Pliny (tithymalus/invisible milk-writing), Theodorus Bibliander's hyphasmaticon/hyphalmicon note, Herodotus on Demaratus' wax tablets and Gorgo's interpretation, Gellius 17.9 on Histiaeus' tattooed slave, Herodotus 1.123 on Harpagus' gutted hare to Cyrus (cf. Justin 1), the Mutina carrier-pigeons (Hirtius/Decimus Brutus), and secret inks, closing on an Ovid quotation. None of the prose was fabricated, but the ending and several proper names needed repair against the scans.
Key corrections (verified against the scan): - Recovered the truncated ending from the scans: the segment closes mid-couplet on the hexameter only, 'Cum poscit cruri chartas celare ligatas,' = Ovid, Ars Amatoria 3.621; rendered it faithfully and reserved [unclear] for the deliberate mid-couplet cut (the pentameter 'Et iuncto blandas sub pede ferre notas' is the catchword 'Et iun-' on p.68 and belongs to segment 34), instead of the prior vague paraphrase 'papers to be hidden, tied to the leg'. - Flagged the print crux at the Gorgo passage: the 1518 print itself reads 'Chromenis filia' (so the OCR is a faithful witness), a typographical error for 'Cleomenis'; restored the historically correct 'Gorgo, daughter of Cleomenes and wife of Leonidas' and recorded the misprint in the note (prior text emended silently). - Verified and restored proper names against the print: Theodorus Bibliander, Demaratus, Susa, Xerxes, Histiaeus, Darius, Aristagoras, Astyages, Harpagus, Cyrus, Tithymalus; and noted that the print's 'Hyrcius'/'Decius Brutus' (siege of Mutina) are Hirtius and Decimus Brutus. - Italicized the two run-in lemma headings per house style: 'The second kind: hyphasmaticon.' and 'Letters are likewise written in various other ways.'; tightened the Harpagus/Cyrus and Histiaeus passages for fidelity (e.g., 'tattooed the smooth head with the forms of letters', 'most trusted household huntsmen').
Surviving cruxes: - Print reads 'Chromenis filia' — a 1518 misprint for 'Cleomenis' (Cleomenes); historical name restored, misprint noted. - Segment 33 deliberately ends mid-couplet after the Ovid hexameter (Ars Am. 3.621); [unclear] marks the intentional cut at catchword 'Et iun-', not illegible print — the pentameter continues in segment 34. - Print's 'Hyrcius' and 'Decius Brutus' = Aulus Hirtius and Decimus Brutus; restored with print forms noted. - Pliny citation printed as 'lib. 26' for the tithymalus/invisible-writing detail; rendered as 'book 26' following the print.
2026-06-19 — [unclear] resolution pass (historical fact-checking)
Editorial note: The following [unclear] markers were resolved through historical fact-checking against Trithemius scholarship and primary sources. These are editorial completions, not translations — the original OCR could not read the damaged text, but the names, dates, and places were identifiable from context.
Sources: Klaus Arnold, Johannes Trithemius (1462-1516) (Würzburg: Schöningh, 1991); Trithemius, Nepiachus (autobiography); VD16 records; standard ecclesiastical history.
full_chunk_0025
Key corrections: "abbot of [unclear]" → "St. James’s Abbey, Würzburg"
full_chunk_0004
Key corrections: "Wimpfeling of [unclear]" → "Schlettstadt" (Wimpfeling’s birthplace, now Sélestat)
2026-07-09 — digitization-artifact cleanup (latin-ocr.txt)
- Removed a generation fill artifact (an asterisk run of ~4,000 characters) from [segment 122] of latin-ocr.txt. The run length (~4096) marks it as a model/pipeline artifact, not page content. Segment structure unchanged.
2026-07-09 — structural: removed-chunk placeholders restored
- Chunks [123, 124] were source-digitization boilerplate removed during the quality sweep; the files were deleted outright, leaving numbering gaps and dangling grade/chapter references. Restored them as standard removal-marker placeholder files (the same convention build_work_artifacts.py uses), so chunk numbering, chapter anchors, and the grade ledger resolve. No translation content was added; the reading text (english.md) is unchanged.
2026-07-11 — crypto-occult spot-check fixes
- Applied the previously documented resolution "abbot of [unclear]" -> "abbot of Saint James of Würzburg" to the chunk 0025 colophon line (the 2026-06-19 entry described this fix but it had not landed in the file).