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Add MS 10035
- Record Id:
- 032-002107836
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002107836
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000042.0x000119
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Add MS 10035
- Title:
-
Collection of verbs from a Calepino dictionary, written in cipher
- Scope & Content:
-
This manuscript contains a collection of verbs from a Calepino dictionary, named after the Italian lexiocographer Ambrogio Calepino (b. c. 1440, d. 1510), who initially compiled it in 1502. Calepino's dictionary was reprinted many times during the 16th century. The edition this version of the text is based on seems to have been printed in the middle of the 16th century, between 1547-1553. It is principally written in Latin, with some words and phrases in Middle Dutch. The text is written in a simple substitution cipher, some of the letters replaced with numbers and others with symbols.
For a full description and discussion of the manuscript, its date and origin, as well as a decryption key for the cipher, see Hagebeuk and Mueller, 'A Reformation Era Cipher Mystery' (2022).
Contents:
Inside upper and lower covers: parchment fragments used as pastedowns, originally from a manuscript of Hervaeus Natalis' Quodlibet II.
f. 1v: an added title and date, 'The Subtlety of Witches by Ben Ezra Aseph 1657'.
ff. 2r-201v: a collection of verbs from a Calepino dictionary in Latin, with some words and phrases in Middle Dutch, written in cipher.
Decoration:
Paraph marks in black ink.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Additional Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "032-002107836", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Add MS 10035: Collection of verbs from a Calepino dictionary, written in cipher" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002107836
- Is part of:
- not applicable
- Hierarchy:
- 032-002107836
- Container:
- not applicable
- Record Type (Level):
- Fonds
- Extent:
- 1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- Languages:
- Cipher
Dutch, Middle
Latin - Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1550
- End Date:
- 1574
- Date Range:
- 3rd quarter of the 16th century
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Material: Paper.
Watermark: a shield above the inscribed name 'P PRICARD', a match with Briquet, Les Filigranes (1968), no. 9613.
The mark corresponds to the product of a French paper maker, Pierre Perricard, who operated a paper mill in Troyes, France, in the mid-16th century.
Dimensions: 133 x 75 mm (written space: 90 x 50 mm).
Foliation: ff. 201 (+ 8 unfoliated paper flyleaves at the end); parchment pastedowns affixed to the upper and lower cover covers; originally paginated.
Script: Gothic cursive (written in cipher).
Binding: Post-1600. Brown leather calf-skin binding, blind-stamped with a bust of a woman in profile with braided hair and a high forehead on the upper and lower covers.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
? Southern Netherlands
Provenance:
Purchased by the British Museum from Thomas Rodd the Younger (b. 1796, d. 1849), February 1836, together with Add MSS 10022-10040: see inscription (f. 1r).
- Publications:
-
The British Museum Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts, 1836-1840 (London: British Museum, 1843), p. 4.
C. M. Briquet, Les Filigranes: Dictionnaire historique des marques du papier dès leur apparition vers 1282 jusqu'en 1600, A Facsimile of the 1907 edition with supplementary material, ed. by Allan Stevenson, 4 vols (Amsterdam: The Paper Publications Society, 1968), no. 9613.
Rian Hagebeuk and Katherine Mueller, '"The Subtelty of Witches": A Reformation Era Cipher Mystery', in HistoCrypt 2022:Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Historical Cryptology, 20-22 June 2022 Amsterdam, ed. by C. Dahlke and B. Megyesi (Sweden: Linköping Electronic Press, 2022).
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Names:
- Rodd, Thomas, bookseller, 1796-1849
- Places:
- Southern Netherlands
- Related Material:
-
From The British Museum Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts, 1836-1840 (London: British Museum, 1843), p. 4:
'THE SUBTELTY OF WITCHES, by Ben Ezra Aseph;" written in cipher, 1657. Duodecimo.'