A collection of 57 encrypted letters sent by Mary, Queen of Scots, more than four centuries ago while she was imprisoned by Elizabeth I in England, has been discovered by an international team of scientists and, even more excitingly, decrypted.
The letters, hitherto thought to have been lost or destroyed, have appeared in just the kind of predictable place: the online archives for encrypted documents in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF). The team behind the discovery was already expected to search here, as part of the multidisciplinary Project DECRYPT, which aims to map, digitize, transcribe, and decipher historical ciphers.
But the team didn’t find it as if he had put the encrypted letters by hand. The letters were stored in the archive as significantly mislabeled. The BnF catalog listed the letters dating from the first half of the 16th century and dealing with Italian affairs.
In fact, the letters were written in French between 1578 and 1584 and have nothing to do with Italy. The team was able to find the letters, thanks to the author’s mention of being in captivity and the name “Walsingham”, Queen Elizabeth’s chief spy chief.
Computer scientist and cryptographer George Lasry said: “When I deciphered the letters, I was shocked and felt surreal.” Mary), we found that we have a large number of unpublished letters deciphered.”
Who is Mary Queen of Scots?
When Mary Queen of Scots was born in 1542, England was in its tenth year of adopting Protestantism. In 1558, when Elizabeth I came to the throne, there was a country torn between Anglicanism and Catholicism by various monarchs. Each of these rulers was ruthless in proselytizing; for example, the Catholic Queen “Bloody” Mary spent 5 years in the VIII reign.
Queen Elizabeth I was less aggressive in this regard than her predecessors. He repealed the laws of heresy and commuted the punishments of those who refused to obey the church. However, many Catholics in the country still believed that a Protestant monarch such as an Elizabethan could not be legitimate, and they were willing to fight for a Catholic to replace him. This is exactly what they did in 1569.
“Rise of the North” was a failed rebellion, but it was enough to shake Elizabeth and her advisers. This was an attempt by Northern Catholics to dethrone the English Queen and replace her with what they saw as the legitimate Catholic monarch: Henry VII’s granddaughter and Elizabeth’s cousin, Mary, Queen of Scots.
But at the time of these events, Mary was already in captivity. She was imprisoned by the rebellious Scottish nobility after a scandal surrounding her marriage to the man who was thought to have killed her first husband. He had managed to escape to England, hoping that Elizabeth would help him reclaim the throne, but the English queen was hesitant. He demanded a thorough investigation into the murder and mutiny that led to Mary’s dethronement and imprisoned the Queen of Scots.
With Rise of the North, Elizabeth realized that Mary was a real threat. He commissioned his adviser, Walsingham, to watch him carefully while he was in captivity in England, planting spies among his household staff, and capturing many of his letters to the outside world.
And letters come into play.
Here, the newly discovered letters belong to the next period. So letters that were coded so that they wouldn’t be understood by Elizabeth and Walsingham’s spies…
The content of the letters ranges from mundane issues, such as complaints about his ill health and conditions in captivity, to serious ones, such as his views on international relations and negotiations for his release. Most of the letters were addressed to Michel de Castelnau de Mauvissière, who was then the French ambassador to England and a supporter of Mary. New rebellions were also mentioned in the letters.
In the end, however, Mary’s extraordinary cryptic letters failed to prevent her downfall. During the 19 years the Queen of Scots was imprisoned, many unsuccessful plots emerged to dethrone Elizabeth and replace her with Mary. But Amry came to an end when someone in particular – the Babington Conspiracy – went so far as to assassinate the Queen.
Although Mary had encrypted letters to her collaborators, Walsingham’s spies had at one point cracked her encryption system. Less than seven months after Mary wrote the letter signing the murder of Elizabeth I, she was executed for treason at Fotheringhay Castle in Northamptonshire.
Thanks to the controversy and drama surrounding her life, Mary has become a tragic romantic heroine in the eyes of many, and with the new treasure trove of letters, researchers hope to uncover more of Mary’s troubled life.
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