VMs: Translating Cicco Simonetta's "Regule"...?

[Nick Pelling <incoming@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Philip,

If you want something short, meaty, yet extraordinarily relevant to 
translate, may I suggest Cicco Simonetta's "Regule ad extrahendum litteras 
ziferatas sine exemplo"?

A while back, I mentioned P.-M. Perret's French-language article on Cicco 
Simonetta's cryptologic rules, from Bibliotheque de l'ecole des Chartes 
(1890), pp. 516-525. I'm now pleased to note that a scanned PDF version of 
these pages is now freely accessible online on the BNF website. The article 
includes a clean (though scanned) Latin transcription of Simonetta's 
original set of rules (pp. 523-525), and this is what I'd suggest would be 
good to translate.

If you go to the following page, and click on [516] in the left-hand frame, 
the arrow navigation buttons at the top will then take you through all the 
pages of the paper. Alternatively, you can just enter 516 (or any other 
page number) in the "Aller a la page [  ]" dialog box at the top and press 
Enter (or click on "Aller...").
        http://gallica.bnf.fr/scripts/ConsultationTout.exe?O=12426

Also, if someone wants to take on a job to help Philip out, transcribing 
the scan into a document or a web page would probably be a good assistance 
- it would be excellent to be able to put the two side by side on a final 
web-page anyway.

BTW, the original document's full title is:-
        "Regule ad extrahendum litteras ziferatas, sine exemplo", Paris,
        Biblioteque Nationale, Fonds Italien, Cod. 1595,
        fol. 441r-441v-442r-442v

There are also some (poor resolution) microfilm pictures of the document 
itself from the Vincent Ilardi Collection at Yale:-
        http://www.library.yale.edu/Ilardi/pic10.htm
        http://www.library.yale.edu/Ilardi/pic11.htm
        http://www.library.yale.edu/Ilardi/pic12.htm
        http://www.library.yale.edu/Ilardi/pic13.htm

Perret also mentions (p.517) that Simonetta prepared a treatise on 
Francesco Sforza's Chancellery in 1465 entitled "Constitutiones et ordines 
cancellariae secretioris illustrissimi principis et excellentissimi d. d. 
Francisci Sfortiae Vicecomitis ducis Mediolani", which was catalogued by 
Filippo Argelati (in "Bibliotheca scriptorum mediolanensium", Milan 1745, 
Vol II, col. 2167) - but he does not know what became of it. Intriguingly, 
Perret then suggests that the "Regule" might well have formed part of that 
earlier document, but were never been made public. If true, that would push 
the starting date for modern cryptology back by at least seven years.

And according to...
        http://members.xoom.virgilio.it/nino50/SIMONETTA/Relazione.htm
...Simonetta wrote the "Costitutes et ordines" [sic] in 1456 (which would 
be a further 8 years' earlier), so tracking these down might well be a good 
task for me to take on. There have actually been some recent seminars 
focusing on Simonetta, so this might prove easier than you might imagine. :-o

FWIW, to my eyes, the "Regule" seems less like a work in progress, and more 
like a neat copy (or slight development) of earlier work: but that's just a 
superficial observation.

Cheers, .....Nick Pelling..... 


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