Post by Origanalist on Jun 23, 2014 5:45:35 GMT -8
If literary history teaches us one thing, it’s that people were just as confused and immature in the Middle Ages as they are now. From unsolvable codes to 13th-century penis doodles in the margins of bibles, history is like an all-encompassing high school cliche that never comes to an end. These books span the course of written history, and they’re all utterly bizarre.
Written in a language that no one understands and filled with illustrations of surreal, impossible things, Codex Seraphinianus is possibly the strangest encyclopedia in the world. When Italian architect Luigi Serafini published the book in 1981, he presented it as a factual, scientific work. One look at theoutlandish potpourri of images, however, reveals that Codex Seraphinianusis anything but scientific.
The entire book is handwritten, and the illustrations are all hand drawn and colored by Serafini himself, a task that he labored over for two years. Scholars have spent years trying to decipher the book, but the only thing we’ve figured out is that “Seraphinianus” is just a variation of Serafini’s name. As for the book’s language, the “alphabet” has about two dozen characters, and relates to absolutely nothing else humanity has ever created.
On March 10, 1552, mathematician John Dee had a conversation with an angel. As a firm believer in both science and the occult, Dee’s life straddled the line between reality and the spirit world. He had already amassed the largest library in London, but it was the anonymous Book of Soyga to which he devoted his most attention.
The book was a conundrum—over 40,000 letters covered its pages, but they were arranged in a haphazard fashion that made little sense. As Dee worked tirelessly to translate the code, he slowly realized that the Soygawas an in-depth list of magical incantations. The biggest mystery of all was contained in the last 36 pages. Each page was devoted to a table of letters—a code which Dee never managed to crack. So he decided to go beyond our world for the answer.
On a trip to continental Europe, Dee enlisted the help of a spiritual medium to summon the Archangel Uriel. Dee opened the conversation by asking if the book meant anything. Uriel replied that the Book of Soyga had been given to Adam in the Garden of Eden. When Dee asked for help translating the tables, Uriel replied that he didn’t have the necessary clearance; only Archangel Michael knew the secret.
Dee never managed to reach Michael, and after his death, the book was lost for nearly 500 years. There are now two known copies of the Book of Soyga—one in the British Library and one in Oxford’s Bodleian Library. The code is still unsolved.
continued at....http://ninetymilesfromtyranny.blogspot.com/2014/06/10-of-most-bizarre-books-ever-written.html
Written in a language that no one understands and filled with illustrations of surreal, impossible things, Codex Seraphinianus is possibly the strangest encyclopedia in the world. When Italian architect Luigi Serafini published the book in 1981, he presented it as a factual, scientific work. One look at theoutlandish potpourri of images, however, reveals that Codex Seraphinianusis anything but scientific.
The entire book is handwritten, and the illustrations are all hand drawn and colored by Serafini himself, a task that he labored over for two years. Scholars have spent years trying to decipher the book, but the only thing we’ve figured out is that “Seraphinianus” is just a variation of Serafini’s name. As for the book’s language, the “alphabet” has about two dozen characters, and relates to absolutely nothing else humanity has ever created.
On March 10, 1552, mathematician John Dee had a conversation with an angel. As a firm believer in both science and the occult, Dee’s life straddled the line between reality and the spirit world. He had already amassed the largest library in London, but it was the anonymous Book of Soyga to which he devoted his most attention.
The book was a conundrum—over 40,000 letters covered its pages, but they were arranged in a haphazard fashion that made little sense. As Dee worked tirelessly to translate the code, he slowly realized that the Soygawas an in-depth list of magical incantations. The biggest mystery of all was contained in the last 36 pages. Each page was devoted to a table of letters—a code which Dee never managed to crack. So he decided to go beyond our world for the answer.
On a trip to continental Europe, Dee enlisted the help of a spiritual medium to summon the Archangel Uriel. Dee opened the conversation by asking if the book meant anything. Uriel replied that the Book of Soyga had been given to Adam in the Garden of Eden. When Dee asked for help translating the tables, Uriel replied that he didn’t have the necessary clearance; only Archangel Michael knew the secret.
Dee never managed to reach Michael, and after his death, the book was lost for nearly 500 years. There are now two known copies of the Book of Soyga—one in the British Library and one in Oxford’s Bodleian Library. The code is still unsolved.
continued at....http://ninetymilesfromtyranny.blogspot.com/2014/06/10-of-most-bizarre-books-ever-written.html
