Theban alphabet

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Glyph	Transliteration
	A
	B
	C
	D
	E
	F
	G
	H
	I/J
	K
	L
	M
	N
	O
	P
	Q
	R
	S
	T
	U/V
	W
	X
	Y
	Z
	End of sentence

The Theban alphabet is a writing system with unknown origins. It was first published in Johannes Trithemius' Polygraphia (1518), in which it was attributed to Honorius of Thebes. Trithemius' student Agrippa (1486-1535) attributed it to Pietro d'Abano (1250-1316).^[1] It is also known as the Honorian Alphabet or the Runes of Honorius after the legendary magus (Theban is not, however, a runic alphabet), or the Witches' Alphabet due to its use in modern Wicca and other forms of witchcraft as one of many substitution ciphers to hide magical writings such as the contents of a Book of Shadows from prying eyes. The Theban alphabet bears little resemblance to other alphabets, and has not been found in any previous publications prior to Trithemius'.

There is one-to-one correspondence between Theban and the letters in the old Latin alphabet. The modern characters J, U and W are not represented, and in modern usage these are transliterated using the Theban characters for I, V and VV. Theban letters only exist in a single case. The Theban character set also contains an 'end of phrase' character, or full stop, with no other punctuation being specified either in Agrippa's original publication, nor any publications drawing on subsequent documents. This suggests an origin for Theban as a cipher calqued on Latin, along with the various alphabets described by Trithemius and Agrippa, based on either Latin or Hebrew.