(26-03-2026, 01:47 PM)Yavernoxia Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (26-03-2026, 12:40 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I have very recently been contacted by two different researchers wanting to look at my very large 15th/14th century cipher archive. However, I would really like to be contacted by researchers wanting to help me expand my cipher archive.
Last year I visit the Milan State Archives to see if I could locate more ciphers. This was interesting, although I was unable to locate any surviving ciphers from a period 1425-1439 that I am particularly interested in. I intend to visit the Biblioteca Bonetta in Pavia and the University Library in Pavia later this year unless someone else does the work beforehand.
I think it would be of value for someone to search the Vatican Apostolic Archives for early 15th century ciphers. I intend to do this at some stage if nobody does it.
There are other archives which may well be worth searching.
Is there anyone else who is up for doing archival research in Italian archives?
I live in Italy, more precisely in Padua. I travel a lot around the country, so if you have any specific requests involving an archive near a major city, I can probably help 
Honestly, a few weeks ago, the only place I was thinking of visiting in Italy was the Chiesa di San Barnaba, the location used for the fictional Venetian library in the third Indiana Jones movie (1989): You are not allowed to view links.
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I thought it would be funny if I ask the receptionist if they would play along with to pretending to stamp a book with a due date while I search for the catacomb, but then I realize they probably get a lot of tourists who ask the same thing.
(26-03-2026, 01:47 PM)Yavernoxia Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I live in Italy, more precisely in Padua. I travel a lot around the country, so if you have any specific requests involving an archive near a major city, I can probably help
Thank you very much for both your offers of assistance in expanding our collective knowledge of primo quattrocento cifrari(early 15th century ciphers).
I have quite a lot of experience with the Archivio di Stato(State Archives) in Italy. I have some experience with the Archivio Storico Diocesano(Church Archives) and some experience with Biblioteca (Regional library archives). There are also other archives such as University archives, Comune Archives and Monastic Archives. I have little knowledge or experience of researching in the Vatican Apostolic Archives.
Generally if one knows of a specific document or manuscript in a specific archive or library then one can request to be emailed photoreproductions from that archive or library. They will charge a fee per page for those photoreproductions. This is relatively inexpensive unless there are a very large number of page of photoreproductions that one wants. Nevertheless even in this situation it works out cheaper in most instances than visiting the archive oneself and taking photos. The presence of specific documents can be determined from references in book, archive/library inventories, Google searches etc. For documents such as cipher ledgers there are normally references that one can find elsewhere. However for individual enciphered letters or individual cipher keys this is less likely to be the case. Normally, archivists have little knowledge of what they have in their archive other than what is listed in their inventories as archives tend to be so large that it is unlikely archivists have very detailed knowledge of their contents.
Where work needs to be done I think is in searching for enciphered letters in particular. I have found enciphered letters in archives which were not documented anywhere including in archive inventories. Some archive inventories are very detailed listing every document in a given box or group of boxes. Unfortunately, some other archive inventories are lacking detail merely specifying that there are, for example, Ducal correspondence from 1434 to 1444 in box number 1187. In such a case, one needs to look through every letter in a given box to see if there are any ciphers amongst them.
Archivio di Stato inventories tend to have been scanned and are available for download from their website. Some of these inventories are in digital format and so one can search for words like "cifra" to see if they have any ciphers listed. However, other inventories can be scans of older typed documents which have not been digitised and so potentially, without OCR, one has to manually search through the entire document for references to "cifra". Some inventories may even be handwritten, which makes looking for references to ciphers very laborious.
So, it seems to me when researching in Padua or Turin or anywhere else in Northern Italy one must start by identifying a box or boxes that one thinks would be most likely to contain a cipher or ciphers. Making an arrangement to come and search that box with an archive tends not to be very difficult from my experience.
More information to follow...
Padua was part of the Republic of Venice in the early 15th century. We have very limited knowledge of Venetian State ciphers from this period, probably due to the 1483 fire in the Doge's Palace which destroyed a large number of documents including ciphers. The only definitive known cipher from that period is the 1411 enciphered letter of Doge of Venice, Michele Steno. Although, there are a couple of other ciphers that I suspect have Venetian origins, but I will leave that discussion to another time or place. Paolo Bonavoglia, who has a particular interest in Venetian ciphers, tells me that he has searched the archives in Venice and not found any early 15th century ciphers other than the Steno letter. However, it seems possible that there are Venetian ciphers surviving in the archives of other cities of the Republic of Venice. I would be inclined then to look in the correspondence of the Venetian Cancelleria or the Doge in those archives for the early 15th century. This can be very hit or missed, but finding just one enciphered letter would make a big difference to our understanding of Venetian ciphers of that period.
My own particular interest is Milanese ciphers from the early 15th century as I believe them to be the most advanced. Unfortunately, due to the 1447 fire in the Castello di Porta di Giovia most of the Milanese ciphers from before that time have been destroyed. I have searched the Milan State Archives and I am planning to search the archives in Pavia. Unless, I can find someone in Pavia willing to do the search.
More information to follow...
If you are wondering how to recognise what is a cipher and what is not then I have a very large archive of ciphers on my OneDrive that you can consult.
My best discovery is the 1424 Milanese enciphered letters which were intercepted by the Republic of Florence and can be found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze. Although, I was also pleased to see the 1397 intercepted Milanese enciphered letter in the Chronicles of Lucca by Giovanni Sercambi. Finding out about the Albertoni cipher ledger in the Cremona State Library with ciphers dating from 1444 was interesting as was the 1421 enciphered letter of Archbishop of Genoa, Pileo de Marini and the Milanese enciphered letters in the Library of Paris amongst other finds.
More information to follow...
I am quite interested in which ciphers survive in the Vatican Apostolic Archives.(There are Urbino cipher ledgers that survive in the Vatican library). I have photoreproductions of some cipher key material from this archive. However, I suspect there are enciphered letters here. I know that in 1431 the Papacy intercepted Milanese enciphered letters sent to the Milanese Ambassador to the Pope. If these survive they would be of great interest to me. There appears to be quite a lot of Ducal correspondence in the Biblioteca Bonetta in Pavia from the early 15th century and I think therefore it is very possible that there might be one or two enciphered letters amongst this material(Unfortunately, the inventories are not detailed enough to tell and the archivists there don't know what they have).
Of course, the difficulty is that ciphers can turn up almost anywhere in the world. There is an Italian Sforza enciphered letter from 1449 in the St.Peterburg Archive in Russia. However, the archives of Northern Italy seen to be the best places to search.
More information to follow...
(28-03-2026, 01:30 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If you are wondering how to recognise what is a cipher and what is not then I have a very large archive of ciphers on my OneDrive that you can consult.
My best discovery is the 1424 Milanese enciphered letters which were intercepted by the Republic of Florence and can be found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze. Although, I was also pleased to see the 1397 intercepted Milanese enciphered letter in the Chronicles of Lucca by Giovanni Sercambi. Finding out about the Albertoni cipher ledger in the Cremona State Library with ciphers dating from 1444 was interesting as was the 1421 enciphered letter of Archbishop of Genoa, Pileo de Marini and the Milanese enciphered letters in the Library of Paris amongst other finds.
More information to follow...
A couple years ago, I read about a historian, Ioanna Iordanou, who did research on the Venetian Secret Service: You are not allowed to view links.
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Quite interesting: You are not allowed to view links.
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(28-03-2026, 05:47 PM)hatoncat Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (28-03-2026, 01:30 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If you are wondering how to recognise what is a cipher and what is not then I have a very large archive of ciphers on my OneDrive that you can consult.
My best discovery is the 1424 Milanese enciphered letters which were intercepted by the Republic of Florence and can be found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze. Although, I was also pleased to see the 1397 intercepted Milanese enciphered letter in the Chronicles of Lucca by Giovanni Sercambi. Finding out about the Albertoni cipher ledger in the Cremona State Library with ciphers dating from 1444 was interesting as was the 1421 enciphered letter of Archbishop of Genoa, Pileo de Marini and the Milanese enciphered letters in the Library of Paris amongst other finds.
More information to follow...
A couple years ago, I read about a historian, Ioanna Iordanou, who did research on the Venetian Secret Service: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
Quite interesting: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
Yes. I know of her. In fact, she contacted me as she was interested in my research. I live in Oxford myself, so I probably should have arranged to meet up with her. Her book covers similar ground to that in the late Professor Paolo Preto's book "I servizi segreti di Venezia". I discussed the subject with Professor Preto before he died. However, these works tend to cover a later period not the early 15th century.
(28-03-2026, 05:47 PM)hatoncat Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (28-03-2026, 01:30 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If you are wondering how to recognise what is a cipher and what is not then I have a very large archive of ciphers on my OneDrive that you can consult.
My best discovery is the 1424 Milanese enciphered letters which were intercepted by the Republic of Florence and can be found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze. Although, I was also pleased to see the 1397 intercepted Milanese enciphered letter in the Chronicles of Lucca by Giovanni Sercambi. Finding out about the Albertoni cipher ledger in the Cremona State Library with ciphers dating from 1444 was interesting as was the 1421 enciphered letter of Archbishop of Genoa, Pileo de Marini and the Milanese enciphered letters in the Library of Paris amongst other finds.
More information to follow...
A couple years ago, I read about a historian, Ioanna Iordanou, who did research on the Venetian Secret Service: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
Quite interesting: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
I'm trying to get hold of this but can't seem to buy the pdf
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Look at what it covers... But it confirms only 2 ciphers survive.. the 1411 Steno and a later Cifra Costantinopoli from 1484
(26-03-2026, 02:44 PM)hatoncat Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I would be, although I am visiting Italy (Torino) for only a few days in late April/early May. I would be open to more long term research, and I do have a place to stay, but am currently unemployed.
There may be something of interest in the Turin archives. Not so much survives from the Duchy of Savoy and so the prospect of finding ciphers is not great I fear. The Duke of Savoy was Amadeus VIII, who was also known as the Antipope Felix V. There are some documents of Felix V in the Vatican archives, so I would be tempted to search those for ciphers as I already know the cipher ledger and some enciphered letters of one of the Avignon Antipopes survive in the Vatican archives. Also Felix V lived near Geneva, I believe. Nevertheless, Turin is main archive for documents from the Duchy of Savoy. The first archive to consider would be the Archivio di Stato di Torino. However, I am aware of there being late 15th Milanese enciphered letters in the Archivio Storico della Città di Torino.
However, there may be something worth searching for in the Turin archives or indeed in archives near Turin. You might want to peruse the inventories for the various Turin archives to see if you find a reference to documents worth searching through.
(28-03-2026, 06:35 PM)DG97EEB Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I'm trying to get hold of this but can't seem to buy the pdf
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Look at what it covers... But it confirms only 2 ciphers survive.. the 1411 Steno and a later Cifra Costantinopoli from 1484
It redirects to the homepage after I added it to the cart, so it appears you need to register and create an account before it will take you to the checkout page. There doesn't seem to be a "guest" checkout option like major e-tailers offer.