At a glanceKey from adjacent plaintext · partial (98% of the cipher)
- The letter
- Thomas Spinelly to Henry VIII, Brussels, 1 February “M.D.XVJ” (old style, so 1517). The catalogue listed it as a ciphered letter to an unknown recipient in London, 1516; it is a despatch in clear English except five lines on f. 40v.
- Where
- British Library, via four DECODE images; Unsolved Catalogue item 100. There is no contemporary decipherment.
- The cipher
- A substitution of invented signs with word division kept, plus a few word signs.
- How it was read
- A repeated nine-sign word fits “audensier”, spelled that way in clear on the same page, and gives the rest of the alphabet. Letters and Papers was checked only after the decipherment, and agrees.
- What it says
- The Audiencier and Luigi Marliano expect the King’s entry into Brussels at the end of the week, and the Emperor at Cambrai about the 15th.
- Credit
- Letters and Papers II no. 2862 (1864) already summarised the Cambrai clause, without the text or the Marliano and entry details.
- Still open
- Two word signs are identified only from context: the star is the Emperor, and one sign is probably the King.
01 The document
DECODE imaged four pages. In the order of the leaves they are P1 f. 40r, P3 f. 40v, P4 f. 41r and P2 f. 41v, which carries the end of the letter and the subscription “your most humble and … seruant Thommas Spynelly”. The dating clause reads “Written at Methlyn Bruxells the fyrst day of february M.D.XVJ”. The old foliation 33–34 is the one used by Letters and Papers. So DECODE’s place (London) and recipient (unknown) are wrong: the letter was written in Brussels to the King. The year is 1517.
Spinelly was Henry’s resident agent in the Low Countries. The despatch reports the meetings of Maximilian and Charles with Chièvres, the Chancellor, the Audiencier and Hans Renner, the French embassy, and the cession of Verona to Lautrec under the treaty of Brussels. It also covers Cardinal Schiner’s anger at that cession and the Emperor’s intention to keep his amity with England.
02 The cipher
The cipher is a monoalphabetic substitution. Most signs are Greek or Latin letter forms given other values. Word division is kept, and a few signs stand for whole words.
| plain | sign | plain | sign | plain | sign |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| a | φ | i, y | e | r | c |
| b | τ | k | λ | s | ʃ |
| c | 4 | l | triangle v; σ (?) | t | k |
| d | ʒ | m | y | u (w = δδ) | δ |
| e | o | n | b | p | q |
| h | ρ | o | 7 |
Word signs: ϑ = of; ꝁ = this; w with a bar = that; a star with a superscript = the Emperor; and a small sign after “the” at the end of line 2, probably the King.
03 The text
The clear text runs into the cipher mid-sentence (“and of this opinion is the”):
Audensier and misser Loys de Merlien. The whiche Audensier saythe that the [King] in the laterende of this wicke shall make his entree in to this town, and [the Emperor] about the xv day of the present monethe so to Cambray.
The Audiencier is the head of Charles’s chancery secretariat, named only by office throughout the letter (probably Philippe Haneton). “Misser Loys de Merlien” is Luigi Marliano, Charles’s physician and councillor, later bishop of Tuy. The clear postscript on f. 41v, written after the King came back from Vilvoorde and the Emperor went back to Mechelen, says that the coming of “his magestye” into this town is put off because he “loke[th] for certeyn princes oute of Almayne, the which he wol have at his entree”. “His majesty” there may be the Emperor, which leaves open whose entry the cipher means (see section 05). The Emperor did go to Cambrai, where the treaty with France was signed on 11 March 1517.
04 Method
The nine-sign word φδʒobʃeoc occurs twice, and its fourth and eighth signs are the same. “Audensier”, spelled that way in clear two paragraphs above, fits the pattern. It gives a, u, d, e, n, s, i and r; φbʒ is then and. The frequent kρo is the, and k7 is to. The remaining values follow from the words they complete: present monethe, entree, town, and 4φyτcφe = Cambray. Every value except p and b occurs at least twice. Letters and Papers was checked only after the decipherment, and its summary (“about the 15th of this month the Emperor will go to Cambray”) agrees with it.
05 What remains uncertain
- The star sign = the Emperor: H, from context and the calendar.
- xbʒφe = “xv day”, with b written for the numeral v: H, from the calendar’s “15th”.
- The sign after “the” at the end of line 2 = the King: C. It is the subject of “make his entree” and sits against the gutter. The Emperor has his own sign later in the same sentence, which favours the King.
- σ as a second sign for l in “Loys”: C.
- The Audiencier as Philippe Haneton: C.
- With the uncertain signs above counted as holes, the 38-word passage reads at 92.7% of its words (measured 24 October 2026): coherent sentences, but under the 95% a complete reading needs.
Full texts
The transcription and the decryption of every document on this page, so that the reading can be used and checked. Short files are shown here; all are in the repository.
R8416, Cotton Galba B V f. 40v, Spinelly to Henry VIII, Brussels, 1 Feb 1517 read in part
The one cipher passage in Thomas Spinelly's clear despatch from the Low Countries: the Audiencier and Luigi Marliano (misser Loys de Merlien) report that the King (Charles) will make his entry into Brussels at the end of the week and that the Emperor Maximilian will go to Cambrai about the 15th of the month. Letters and Papers II 2862 had summarised only the Cambrai sentence.
Builds coherent sentences, but under the read bar of 95% of words read as sense (93% here); the holes are marked in the reading.
Transcription
# Cotton MS Galba B V f. 40v (DECODE R8416 image 3), lines 17-21: the only cipher in the letter. # Signs transcribed as look-alike Unicode characters. / = the scribe's virgule. Line breaks as in the MS. # Clear lead-in: "and of this opinion is the" φδʒobʃeoc φbʒ yeʃʃoc σ7eʃ ʒo yoc veob / kρo δδρe4ρo φδʒobʃeoc ʃρφekρo w̄ kρo ʒ eb kρo vφkocebʒo ϑ ꝁ δδe4λo ʃρφδ̄ yφλo ρeʃ obkco eb k7 ꝁ k7δδb φbʒ ✱ φτ7δk kρo xbʒφe ϑ kρo qcoʃobk y7bbokρo / ʃ7 k7 4φyτcφe /
Decryption
audensier and misser loys de merlien / the whiche audensier saythe that the [king] in the laterende of this wicke shall make his entree in to this town and [the emperor] about the xv day of the present monethe / so to cambray /
Key: key.md
06 Sources
- British Library, Cotton MS Galba B V ff. 40–41; images on DECODE, record R8416 (login).
- J. S. Brewer (ed.), Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, vol. II (1864), no. 2862; British History Online, February 1517, 1–10.
Transcription, reading and notes: targets/spinelly1516/.