Lot n° 12
Estimation :
1200 - 1500
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 4 160EUR
TRITHEMIUS (Johannes Heidenberg, known as Johannes Tritheim - Lot 12
TRITHEMIUS (Johannes Heidenberg, known as Johannes Tritheim or).
Polygraphie, et universelle escriture cabalistique. [On the title:] A Paris, pour Jaques Kerver, 1561. [On the colophon, f. 243 v°:] printed in Paris, by Benoist Prevost, 1561. In-4, (18)-300 ff. including 2 intermediate title ff., printed in places in red and black; stiff parchment, smooth spine with brown title-piece; ink stains to title (modern binding in 18th-century style).
ORIGINAL EDITION OF THE FIRST FRENCH TRANSLATION, by Gabriel de Collange, of this treatise originally published in Latin in 1518 by the itinerant bookseller Johann Haselberger, and probably printed in Basel (Polygraphiæ libri sex).
LIVRE A SYSTEMES COMPRISING 13 ARTICULATED PRINTED WHEELS.
WOOD ENGRAVED ILLUSTRATION: framing repeated three times, on the general title and 2 intermediate titles (with the arms of France, the mark of Jacques Kerver and the emblems and motto of Gabriel de Collange); portrait of the translator (woodcut on verso of each title); ornamentation on and around each rouelle; typographical mark of Jacques Kerver on last page.
THE FIRST WORK EVER PRINTED ON CRYPTOGRAPHY, AND AN IMPORTANT MILESTONE IN THE HISTORY OF THIS SCIENCE. Applying rigorous mathematical logic, Trithemius elaborates a system of substitution ciphers with different variations: a polyalphabet consisting of associations of one letter with another letter or a cipher, sometimes using ancient, exotic (e.g. Amharic) or invented alphabets; Latin words corresponding to letters and placed in a prayer (known as "Trithemius' Ave Maria"); invented words each substituting a letter; words in which every second letter must be used to write an encrypted message. Taking all techniques together, Trithemius describes a total of almost 2,000 cryptographic alphabets with countless permutations. These permutations are to be performed in a variety of ways, and for the first time in the history of cryptography, by means of hash tables, precursors of the "Vigenère cipher" (Blaise de Vigenère would add the principle of a key), some of which take the form of articulated wheels.
GERMAN HUMANIST, ABBE BENEDICTIN JOHANNES HEIDENBERG (1462-1516), born in Trittenheim and known by the name of Tritheim, was head of the convent of Spanheim from 1483 to 1506, then of that of Würzburg. He was the author of important works of history, hagiography and theology, most of which were published after his death, but were distributed in manuscript form during his lifetime. A great scholar, he frequented the court of Emperor Maximilian, and was in contact with intellectuals such as Johannes Reuchlin, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim and Jakob Wimpfeling. Nevertheless, some of his work was controversial: his Polygraphie, which was rational but sometimes used signs unknown to the reader, his Steganography, which envisaged communication via supernatural beings, and his treatise Des Sept causes secondes, which evoked the spirits that move the world after God. He also took a keen interest in alchemy, with its essentially spiritual outlook, as can be seen from his correspondence with Paracelsus. These unorthodox aspects of his intellectual activity led to him being accused of witchcraft, notably by the French humanist Charles de Bovelles, and to a revolt by the monks of his abbey at Spannheim, forcing him to relinquish his directorship.
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