17-04-2019, 03:53 PM
Some comments on JKP's cipher, based on my study of it so far:
Since the cipher word boundaries do not necessarily correspond to plain text word boundaries, I removed all cipher text spaces and took a look at the running cipher text. Some peculiar letter sequence properties emerge:
[t] occurs 9 times, but 8 of those are as part of the sequence [ot] ! This is not typical for a one-to-one substitution of a natural language. Now if Koen is right, [o] could just be the null character, explaining this and other sequences. But I find the number and location of potential vowel and consonant characters don't pattern so well without [o]. (In particular, I find a lack of a sufficient number of distinct sufficiently frequent characters to represent all of the distinct frequent vowels of a natural language, if [o] is a null and not a vowel. In short, I can't find good candidates for each of "a", "e", "i", and "o", and still have enough consonants left in the text, if [o] is not one of the vowels.) The text seems more plausible with [o] as a vowel of some type. Alternatively, [t] could be the null character. But [t] actually fits smoothly as a potential consonant between potential vowels, so this is not my preferred hypothesis either.
More remarkably, the unusually frequent repeated sequences extend beyond just [ot]:
5 of the 8 [ot] occurrences are as part of [ainot], and they are all in the first two lines!
[ot] further occurs to begin the second line, and possibly to begin the first line, if [f] is a pilcrow and not a letter.
Finally, most remarkably of all, there is a very long almost repeated sequence, with only a few letters between them, in the second line:
[aryky(y)painot]
This is the full sequence in the second line, with my own spaces to highlight this sequence:
[ otecth arykyypainot yat arykypainot ]
The end of the second line is striking as well:
[ acthainain otiry cthainoaiin ]
I highlight [otiry] with spaces because it also occurs to begin the first line, if [f] is a pilcrow.
[k] has some unusually frequent sequencing properties as well:
5 of its 9 occurrences are as part of [yk], including the 2 times in the long almost repeated sequence in the second line above. 2 of the others are as part of [yyk].
[k] also occurs 3 times as part of [ok], and once as part of [eek]. The double characters (long vowels?) before and after [k] in the cipher text are striking. There is also the [kyy] in the first long repeated sequence above, and [kaa] near the end of the fourth line is the only [aa] in the whole text. In the first line there is even [eeyyk].
And all of this occurs in a basically one-to-one substitution cipher!
Geoffrey
Since the cipher word boundaries do not necessarily correspond to plain text word boundaries, I removed all cipher text spaces and took a look at the running cipher text. Some peculiar letter sequence properties emerge:
[t] occurs 9 times, but 8 of those are as part of the sequence [ot] ! This is not typical for a one-to-one substitution of a natural language. Now if Koen is right, [o] could just be the null character, explaining this and other sequences. But I find the number and location of potential vowel and consonant characters don't pattern so well without [o]. (In particular, I find a lack of a sufficient number of distinct sufficiently frequent characters to represent all of the distinct frequent vowels of a natural language, if [o] is a null and not a vowel. In short, I can't find good candidates for each of "a", "e", "i", and "o", and still have enough consonants left in the text, if [o] is not one of the vowels.) The text seems more plausible with [o] as a vowel of some type. Alternatively, [t] could be the null character. But [t] actually fits smoothly as a potential consonant between potential vowels, so this is not my preferred hypothesis either.
More remarkably, the unusually frequent repeated sequences extend beyond just [ot]:
5 of the 8 [ot] occurrences are as part of [ainot], and they are all in the first two lines!
[ot] further occurs to begin the second line, and possibly to begin the first line, if [f] is a pilcrow and not a letter.
Finally, most remarkably of all, there is a very long almost repeated sequence, with only a few letters between them, in the second line:
[aryky(y)painot]
This is the full sequence in the second line, with my own spaces to highlight this sequence:
[ otecth arykyypainot yat arykypainot ]
The end of the second line is striking as well:
[ acthainain otiry cthainoaiin ]
I highlight [otiry] with spaces because it also occurs to begin the first line, if [f] is a pilcrow.
[k] has some unusually frequent sequencing properties as well:
5 of its 9 occurrences are as part of [yk], including the 2 times in the long almost repeated sequence in the second line above. 2 of the others are as part of [yyk].
[k] also occurs 3 times as part of [ok], and once as part of [eek]. The double characters (long vowels?) before and after [k] in the cipher text are striking. There is also the [kyy] in the first long repeated sequence above, and [kaa] near the end of the fourth line is the only [aa] in the whole text. In the first line there is even [eeyyk].
And all of this occurs in a basically one-to-one substitution cipher!
Geoffrey