Re: About Turkish (what is the importance to the VMS)

[Dennis <ixohoxi@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Julie Porter wrote:

> >One of the standard "kiddie" encryption techniques is to write the letters
> >of a message in specified physical locations on a page, and then add
> >random garbage all around to conceal it.  That's decrypted by placing a
> >template over the page with cutouts in the places where the message was
> >supposed to be written.  I wonder if something like that could be involved
> >in the VMS.  It seems like the sort of concealment that might be invented
> >by someone in the time and place the book was written.  The flowing nature
> >of the writing could be explained by it being copied from an original by
> >someone who didn't understand the concealment, and the word patterns we've
> >observed could be explained by a human trying to invent randomness on the
> >fly.  This theory isn't terribly convincing, and unfortunately I haven't
> >(yet) thought of a way to test it, but the underlying concept may be worth
> >investigating: that the physical locations of characters on the page may
> >be important to their meaning.
> Conan Doyal used this in the Boar war. And I think in WWI. I can not
> remember if Sherlock himself used it?

    This is a "grille cipher".  There's also a "turning grille" cipher where a
quarter of the message is written, then the grille is turned 90 deg. etc.  This is
in HF Gaines' book.   It's a "regular transposition" cipher, and as such not very
secure, not a lot better than simple substitution.  I remember breaking some of
these as a teenager.  I don't know how old it is.

    As for the VMs...  One would see a single-letter frequency count like normal
language, like the VMs, but there would be very few repeated digraphs, trigraphs,
etc., quite unlike the VMs.

Dennis