Polygraphia Nova
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Polygraphia Nova
''Polygraphia nova et universalis ex combinatoria arte directa'' is a 1663 work by the Jesuit scholar Athanasius Kircher. It was one of Kircher's most highly regarded works and his only complete work on the subject of cryptography, although he made passing references to the topic elsewhere. The book was distributed as a private gift to selected European rulers, some of who also received an ''arca steganographica'', a presentation chest containing wooden tallies used to encrypt and decrypt codes. Background Kircher reported that the origin of the work was a request from Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III to develop "a kind of lingua universalis" which would allow written communication between all peoples. The Emperor knew of the earlier secret communication system developed by Johannes Trithemius in his 1518 work '' Polygraphia'', dedicated to the art of steganography, and wanted to know if such a system could be used to bridge different languages. Systems of cryptography had been ...
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Athanasius Kircher (cropped)
Athanasius Kircher (2 May 1602 – 27 November 1680) was a German Jesuit scholar and polymath who published around 40 major works of comparative religion, geology, and medicine. Kircher has been compared to fellow Jesuit Roger Joseph Boscovich and to Leonardo da Vinci for his vast range of interests, and has been honoured with the title "Master of a Hundred Arts".Woods, p. 108. He taught for more than 40 years at the Roman College, where he set up a wunderkammer. A resurgence of interest in Kircher has occurred within the scholarly community in recent decades. Kircher claimed to have deciphered the hieroglyphic writing of the ancient Egyptian language, but most of his assumptions and translations in the field turned out to be wrong. He did, however, correctly establish the link between the ancient Egyptian and the Coptic languages, and some commentators regard him as the founder of Egyptology. Kircher was also fascinated with Sinology and wrote an encyclopedia of ...
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Bonaventure
Bonaventure ( ; it, Bonaventura ; la, Bonaventura de Balneoregio; 1221 – 15 July 1274), born Giovanni di Fidanza, was an Italian Catholic Franciscan, bishop, cardinal, scholastic theologian and philosopher. The seventh Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor, he also served for a time as Bishop of Albano. He was canonised on 14 April 1482 by Pope Sixtus IV and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1588 by Pope Sixtus V. He is known as the "Seraphic Doctor" ( la, Doctor Seraphicus). His feast day is 15 July. Many writings believed in the Middle Ages to be his are now collected under the name Pseudo-Bonaventure. Life He was born at Civita di Bagnoregio, not far from Viterbo, then part of the Papal States. Almost nothing is known of his childhood, other than the names of his parents, Giovanni di Fidanza and Maria di Ritella. Bonaventure reports that in his youth he was saved from an untimely death by the prayers of Francis of Assisi, which is the primary mo ...
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Eduardo Paolozzi
Sir Eduardo Luigi Paolozzi (, ; 7 March 1924 – 22 April 2005) was a Scottish artist, known for his sculpture and graphic works. He is widely considered to be one of the pioneers of pop art. Early years Eduardo Paolozzi was born on 7 March 1924, in Leith in north Edinburgh, Scotland, and was the eldest son of Italian immigrants. His family was from Viticuso, in the Lazio region. Paolozzi’s parents, Rodolfo and Carmela, ran an ice cream shop. Paolozzi used to spend all his summers at his grandparents place in Monte Cassino and grew up bilingual. In June 1940, when Italy declared war on the United Kingdom, Paolozzi was interned (along with most other Italian men in Britain). During his three-month internment at Saughton prison his father, grandfather and uncle, who had also been detained, were among the 446 Italians who drowned when the ship carrying them to Canada, the ''Arandora Star'', was sunk by a German U-boat. Paolozzi studied at the Edinburgh College of Art in 1943, b ...
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Juan Caramuel Y Lobkowitz
Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz (Juan Caramuel de Lobkowitz, 23 May 1606 in Madrid — 7 or 8 September 1682 in Vigevano) was a Spanish Catholic scholastic philosopher, ecclesiastic, mathematician and writer. He is believed to be a great-grandson of Jan Popel y Lobkowitz, Lobkowicz. Life Juan Caramuel was born in Madrid in 1606, the son of Count Lorenzo Caramuele and Caterina Frissea von Lobkowitz, a descendant of a German princely family. He was instructed in oriental languages by Archbishop Juan de Esron (Ezron). By the age of 17, he was studying at the University of Alcalá, University of Alcalá de Henares, where he took his degree in the humanities and philosophy. He was a precocious child, early delving into serious problems in mathematics and even publishing Astronomy, astronomical tables at the age of ten, ''Camuelis primus calamus'' (Madrid 1617). He studied Chinese language, Chinese. He was received into the Cistercian Order at the monastery of La Espina, in the diocese of P ...
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Archduke Charles Joseph Of Austria
Charles Joseph (german: Karl Joseph) (7 August 1649 – 27 January 1664) was an Archduke of Austria and Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights (1662–64). He was also the bishop of Olmütz, and Breslau, Passau. Charles Joseph was born in Vienna as the son of Ferdinand III, Holy Roman Emperor and his first cousin, Maria Leopoldine of Austria. His mother died shortly after giving birth to him. Charles Joseph, himself, died in his early teens in Linz Linz ( , ; cs, Linec) is the capital of Upper Austria and third-largest city in Austria. In the north of the country, it is on the Danube south of the Czech border. In 2018, the population was 204,846. In 2009, it was a European Capital .... Ancestry References {{DEFAULTSORT:Charles Joseph, Archduke of Austria 1649 births 1664 deaths 17th-century House of Habsburg 17th-century Roman Catholic bishops in the Holy Roman Empire Grand Masters of the Teutonic Order Nobility from Vienna Pri ...
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Pope Alexander VII
Pope Alexander VII ( it, Alessandro VII; 13 February 159922 May 1667), born Fabio Chigi, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 7 April 1655 to his death in May 1667. He began his career as a vice- papal legate, and he held various diplomatic positions in the Holy See. He was ordained as a priest in 1634, and he became bishop of Nardo in 1635. He was later transferred in 1652, and he became bishop of Imola. Pope Innocent X made him secretary of state in 1651, and in 1652, he was appointed a cardinal. Early in his papacy, Alexander, who was seen as an anti-nepotist at the time of his election, lived simply; later, however, he gave jobs to his relatives, who eventually took over his administration. His administration worked to support the Jesuits. However, his administration's relations with France were strained due to his frictions with French diplomats. Alexander was interested in architecture and supported various urban projects in Rome. He als ...
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Maximilian Henry Of Bavaria
Maximilian Henry of Bavaria (german: Maximilian Heinrich von Bayern: 8 October 1621 – 3 June 1688) was the third son and fourth child of Albert VI, landgrave of Leuchtenberg and his wife, Mechthilde von Leuchtenberg. In 1650, he was named Archbishop-Elector of Cologne, Bishop of Hildesheim and Bishop of Liège succeeding his uncle, Ferdinand of Bavaria. He worked throughout his career with the French to limit the authority of the Holy Roman Emperor, and participated in the Franco-Dutch War on the opposite side from the Empire. Early life Around 1640, Maximilian was attending the Gymnasium Tricoronatum, and there he met Franz Egon of Fürstenberg and his brother Wilhelm Egon von Fürstenberg. This friendship would guide all three careers. Before 1650, Maximilian was elected coadjutor in Cologne, which made him the clear successor for his uncle. By that time, the Egons of Fürstenberg had joined the privy council of the Archbishop-Elector, and they assisted their friend w ...
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Archduke Leopold Wilhelm Of Austria
Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria (5 January 1614 – 20 November 1662), younger brother of Emperor Ferdinand III, was an Austrian soldier, administrator and patron of the arts. He held a number of military commands, with limited success, and served as Governor of the Spanish Netherlands, before returning to Vienna in 1656. Despite being nominated as Holy Roman Emperor after Ferdinand's death in 1657, he stood aside in favour of his nephew Leopold I. His main interest was in art, and he patronised artists including David Teniers the Younger, Frans Snyders, Peter Snayers, Daniel Seghers, Peter Franchoys, Frans Wouters, Jan van den Hoecke and Pieter Thijs. His collection of 17th century Venetian and Dutch paintings are now held by the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Life Born at Wiener Neustadt on 5 January, 1614, he was the sixth of seven children born to Emperor Ferdinand II (1578-1637) and his first wife, Maria Anna of Bavaria (1574–1616). His elder brother becam ...
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Ferdinando II De' Medici, Grand Duke Of Tuscany
Ferdinando II de' Medici (14 July 1610 – 23 May 1670) was grand duke of Tuscany from 1621 to 1670. He was the eldest son of Cosimo II de' Medici and Maria Maddalena of Austria. He was remembered by his contemporaries as a man of culture and science, actively participating in the Accademia del Cimento, the first scientific society in Italy, formed by his younger brother, Leopoldo de' Medici. His 49-year rule was punctuated by the beginning of Tuscany's long economic decline, which was further exacerbated by his successor, Cosimo III de' Medici. He married Vittoria della Rovere, a first cousin, with whom he had two children who reached adulthood: the aforementioned Cosimo III, and Francesco Maria de' Medici, Duke of Rovere and Montefeltro, a cardinal. Reign Ferdinando was only 10 years of age when his father Cosimo II died. Because he had not yet reached maturity, his mother Maria Maddalena and paternal grandmother, Christina of Lorraine, acted as joint regents. His two rege ...
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Slide Rule
The slide rule is a mechanical analog computer which is used primarily for multiplication and division, and for functions such as exponents, roots, logarithms, and trigonometry. It is not typically designed for addition or subtraction, which is usually performed using other methods. Maximum accuracy for standard linear slide rules is about three decimal significant digits, while scientific notation is used to keep track of the order of magnitude of results. Slide rules exist in a diverse range of styles and generally appear in a linear, circular or cylindrical form, with slide rule scales inscribed with standardized Graduation (instrument), graduated markings. Slide rules manufactured for specialized fields such as aviation or finance typically feature additional scales that aid in specialized calculations particular to those fields. The slide rule is closely related to nomograms used for application-specific computations. Though similar in name and appearance to a standard ruler ...
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Vigenère Cipher
The Vigenère cipher () is a method of encryption, encrypting alphabetic text by using a series of interwoven Caesar ciphers, based on the letters of a keyword. It employs a form of polyalphabetic cipher, polyalphabetic substitution. First described by Giovan Battista Bellaso in 1553, the cipher is easy to understand and implement, but it resisted all attempts to break it until 1863, three centuries later. This earned it the description le chiffrage indéchiffrable (French language, French for 'the indecipherable cipher'). Many people have tried to implement encryption schemes that are essentially Vigenère ciphers. In 1863, Friedrich Kasiski was the first to publish a general method of deciphering Vigenère ciphers. In the 19th century, the scheme was misattributed to Blaise de Vigenère (1523–1596) and so acquired its present name. History The very first well-documented description of a polyalphabetic cipher was by Leon Battista Alberti around 1467 and used a metal cipher ...
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