01 The letter
| Shelfmark | BnF Clairambault 460 · reciprocal alphabet |
|---|---|
| Sender | Darnétal (catalogue attribution for manuscript p103; not every unsigned letter established) |
| Recipient | Unestablished for the checked selections |
| Date | Bordeaux, 8 September 1650 for p103; dates of the other selected letters unestablished |
| Language | French |
| Report status | 5/5 pages transcribed; 5/5 pages deciphered |
| Ciphertext | 888 visible elements, 887 identified; additional ciphertext hidden in the binding |
02 The key
22 symbols, 22 letter signs
03 The decipherment
p107 — complete cipher paragraph
jusques à Neufchastel Mais au lieu de le faire passer la riviere, les Espagnolz luy ont envoyé six cens chevaux, parce qu'il avoit (disent ils) peu de cavalerie et luy ont faict demeurer. Ce qui fait croire qu'ils ont tousiours la pensée de faire quelque siege.
Translation. as far as Neufchâtel But instead of making him cross the river, the Spaniards sent him six hundred horsemen because, they say, he had little cavalry, and they made him remain there. This suggests that they still intend to undertake a siege.
04 Plaintext and other sources
Where a decipherment or clear copy already existed, as George Lasry gives it:
- Interlinear plaintext
- Interlinear historical decipherments on selected PDF50/59/61 passages.
- Plaintext in the margin or below
- Some glosses are displaced above earlier lines or at the bottom of the facing page.
- Plaintext in another folio of the same volume
- Facing manuscript p106 supplies gloss context for selected p107 (PDF61).
05 Our check
This result is George Lasry’s. This project did not re-solve the cipher: it checked one sample against the Gallica image and recorded what it found.
- Batch A. Image checked: none (no Gallica link in entry; Clairambault 460 checked only via his p107 crop)
- Folio matches the report: unclear; cipher present: yes
- What we checked: p107 crop: "h l e e h b g p h b 9 g n K i t l g t t" with his reciprocal alphabet (h=o, l=n, e=t, b=u, g=s, p=i, 9=r, n=l, K=a) = "ont tousiours la pensee", matching interlinear and his excerpt
- Verdict: partly confirmed (method key recovered based on adjacent plaintext, extent complete). The check is a sample, not a re-solution.
- Notes: Folio identity not checked on Gallica. Simple reciprocal monoalphabet; interlinear decipherments on the page. Same volume as bouillon1650 (pp53-55) - overlap of volume, different cipher.
06 Sources
- George Lasry, with ChatGPT Astra 6 and Anthropic Opus 5.5, BnF cipher research, 10 October 2026 (sent to Daniel Bourdeau on 13 October 2026 for publication here), p. 67; his other items are listed on his contributor card.
- The working folder:
targets/clair460alpha/(his entry as extracted from the report, our spot-check,profile.json).