Talk:Johannes Trithemius

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[edit] Steganographia

His most famous work is Steganographia (written c.1499; published Frankfurt, 1606), a work superficially on cryptography, but containing a hidden treatise on black magic; this work lent its name to the modern field of steganography.

More or less copied from Talk:Steganography in the hope of greater exposure:

"I was under the impression that this claim - orginally made by the Catholic Church - had been refuted. It really is about cryptography - or more generally, 15th century information security, since it branches into peripheral areas such as training couriers to memorise messages. In particular, the so-called spells in Book III were shown by Jim Reed to be cryptograms. In fact many sites today invert the sense of the quote above, and say that it is ostensibly about magic but really about crypto. However I don't know all the details, so does anyone know if there are any parts of the book that are definitively about black magic?" Securiger 06:47, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The only stuff I've read about Trithemius is in David Kahn's The Codebreakers, where he says that Steganographia was in three books — the last one in particular contained no reference to cryptography but rather various occult things — and that Polygraphia was his major contribution to cryptography. I haven't heard of Jim Reed's work, is it online? — Matt 09:15, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Yes. Try [1] for links to articles, and [2] for a news article. Securiger 12:02, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)

In fact now I've gone and re-read Jim's article, my uncertainty evaporates; I will edit the article. Securiger 12:18, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)

OK Jsimtech

[edit] Sources?

There are no sources for any of the information presented in the main body of the article. If the text is to be at all useful some sources would be helpful. Can anyone help? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.192.88.252 (talk • contribs) 11:51, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

• Much of it is referenced at the Hill Monastic library site, which holds several Trithemius first editions. This was one of our external links; unfortunately, the page had moved on that site so the link 404'ed, but I have updated it and you should be able to have a look know. It is a fascinating site if you are interested in incunabula or palaeography. -- Securiger 09:31, 17 February 2006 (UTC)