01 The letter
| Shelfmark | BnF Portugais 33 · Letter of20April1667 |
|---|---|
| Sender | King of Portugal (Eu El Rey) |
| Recipient | The Conde, Viceroy of India |
| Date | 20April1667 |
| Language | Portuguese |
| Report status | Transcribed; Deciphered |
| Ciphertext | 257 elements with readings; 6 readings marked ? |
02 The key
33 letter forms; one complete cipher passage.
03 The decipherment
f59r, cipher lines 9–15
prudencia. Com tudo me pareceo lembrarvos que com aquelle rei se deve trata[r] com todo o segredo por que os Olandezes se nam dem por ofendidos.
Translation. …prudence. Nevertheless, it seemed right to remind you that dealings with that king must be conducted with complete secrecy so that the Dutch do not take offence.
04 Plaintext and other sources
Where a decipherment or clear copy already existed, as George Lasry gives it:
- Plaintext in another folio of the same volume
- Separate historical decipherment on f60r/PDF127 and copied text on f119r/PDF245. Names and date variants remain distinct from original f59r.
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 B. Image checked: none (no Gallica link; Portugais 33 ark not resolvable offline)
- Folio matches the report: unclear; cipher present: yes
- What we checked: decoded from his f59r crop with his table: 70.f.x.40.50.26.82.35.ss.82.29.20.700.x.40.29.20.50 = p-r-u-d-e-n-c-i-a c-o-m t-u-d-o m-e; next row 70.ss.500.50.g.50.29.202.50.20.24.500.ss.f.x.29.62.28 = pareceo lembrarvos q = his excerpt
- Verdict: confirmed (method read from existing decipherment, extent complete). The check is a sample, not a re-solution.
- Notes: Sample decodes exactly, but folio not checked on Gallica. A historical decipherment exists on f60r and a copy on f119r, so the reading rests on it. Simple numeric/letter substitution.
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. 112; his other items are listed on his contributor card.
- The working folder:
targets/portugal1667/(his entry as extracted from the report, our spot-check,profile.json).