06.01.2019 What's the Real Secret Mag c n the Mag c Square?

What's the Real Secret Magic in the Magic

Square?
Elizabeth

Text copyright © Aug 27, 2012 Dr. Elizabeth A. Garner, All Rights
Reserved

BUY THE BOOK! CRIMES IN THE ART: THE

SECRET CIPHER OF ALBRECHT DÜRER

www.amazon.com/Crimes-Art-Secret-Cipher-Albrecht-
ebook/dp/B00FNWKYMO

Dürer’s Melencolia I is the most debated image in all of art history, one of
his most magical, and one of his most heavily encoded.

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06.01.2019 What's the Real Secret Mag c n the Mag c Square?

Durer's Melencolia and the secret

code in the magic square

The 1514 Melencolia I

One of the fascinating symbols in Melencolia is what is known as the

Magic Square, which is found in the upper right hand corner of the print
on the wall, under the bell, above the winged woman.

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06.01.2019 What's the Real Secret Mag c n the Mag c Square?

The Magic Square

WHAT IS A MAGIC SQUARE?

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An example of a numeric magic square

Numeric Magic Squares consist of a series of numbers arranged in a

square in such a manner that the sum of each row, each column and of
both the corner diagonals adds up to the same amount, which is called the
Magic Constant.

Numeric Magic Squares may be divided into two categories:

1. “Odd” Magic Squares, which means that there is an odd number of

cells on each side of the Magic Square.
2. “Even” Magic Squares, which means that there is an even number of
cells on each side of the Magic Square. “Even” Magic Squares may be
further divided into two sub-categories:
“singly even” Magic Squares, which means that the number of
cells on each side of the Magic Square is evenly divisible by two,
but not by four (e.g. 6 x 6 and 10 x 10 Magic Squares)
“doubly even” Magic Squares, which means that the number of
cells on each side of the Magic Square is evenly divisible by both
two and 4 (e.g. 4 x 4 and 8 x 8 magic squares)

The magic square

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06.01.2019 What's the Real Secret Mag c n the Mag c Square?

Dürer’s magic square is a doubly even 4 x 4 square whose magic constant

is 34. Dürer’s magic square has the additional property that the sums in
any of the four quadrants, as well as the sum of the middle four numbers,
are all 34 (Hunter and Madachy 1975, p. 24). It is thus a gnomon magic
square. In addition, any pair of numbers symmetrically placed about the
center of the square sums to 17, a property making the square even more
magical.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11gwCkF80xY

Here’s a YouTube video link that explains it in more detail. Unfortunately

the math teacher did not know the difference between a painting and an
engraving.

DAN BROWN’S LOST SYMBOL

Anyone who has ever commented on Dürer’s magic square seems to

believe that it’s inclusion in this composition has something to do with
alchemy or Freemasonry or some occult phenomenon.

Dan Brown’s inclusion of Dürer’s magic square as part of the symbol clues
in his book the Lost Symbol was fiction. Nothing could be further from the
truth. The Lost Symbol was a great FICTION story but it has done nothing
but confuse the real coding that is held in Dürer’s Magic Square.

MEDIEVAL SUDOKU

Do you like to play Sudoku or do you know someone who does? Of course
you do! People in the Renaissance loved to play games as much as
everyone does today.

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06.01.2019 What's the Real Secret Mag c n the Mag c Square?

Example of a sudoku puzzle

Magic squares were common in medieval times and everyone loved them
and many people owned them. They were sold at market fairs all over
Europe, and their availability was common. They were considered
amulets against disease, which was rampant in Europe. They were
manufactured in tin for the masses and in silver or gold for the wealthy.

But the most important point is to understand that anyone who saw the
magic square in this print in Dürer’s lifetime would not have connected
the symbol with alchemy or something arcane. They were games and
amulets and fun. Pilgrims often bought them, they were commonplace
and would attract buyers.

One of Dürer’s famous depictions of a medieval pilgrim.

And anyone who saw the magic square in the print Melencolia was not
going to suspect that Dürer was using steganography, the art and science

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06.01.2019 What's the Real Secret Mag c n the Mag c Square?

of hiding messages in plain sight, to get a message across about what

Melencolia is really about.

Dürer did do something unusual with the numbers in this magic square,
which gives us a hint as to the message he was giving. He rearranged the
numbers from their usual order. Agrippa
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Vipsanius_Agrippa) wrote much
about magic squares in his Occulta Philosophia and claimed that the
Tabula Jovis (http://www.scribd.com/doc/65262304/Adam-McLean-Dr-
Rudds-Treatisse-on-Angel-Magick) had magic properties. The Tabula
Jovis configuration of the 4 x 4 square was as follows:

4 14 15 1

9 7 6 12

5 11 10 8

16 2 3 13

We can see that Durer changed his configuration dramatically from

Agrippa’s.

WHAT CAN BE SEEN HAS BEEN IGNORED

The first thing that we must know about the Melencolia magic square is
that Dürer originally created this composition with the “9” in the third row
backwards. We know this because there is one existing copy of the
backwards “9” magic square in the British Museum.

Based upon how many copies of Melencolia are still existent, we can
assume that Dürer changed his mind very quickly about how obvious the
clue of the backwards “9” really was, and changed the copper plate to
represent a forward “9.”

People don’t often understand that artists made mistakes and were very
competent at fixing errors in woodblocks or copperplates in the
Renaissance. No one was perfect. In woodblocks, the mistake would be
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cut out and a plug would be inserted and the correction made. In
engraved copperplates, the area would be buffed out and re-engraved.

So it wasn’t that big of a deal for Dürer to change the backwards “9” to a
forwards “9.”

OOPS!

Look closely at the “6” under the correction of the “5” in the first
box at left, third row from bottom. The “6” is clearly visible under
the “5.”

But no one pays attention to the correction of the “5” above the “9.” Dürer
had originally place the number “6” into that block and historians seem to
think that OOPS, he made a mistake. Not likely. Dürer was also known as
a famous scientist and mathematician during his lifetime, so the likelihood
that this master of math and master of engraving just happened to OOPS!
Put a “6” where a “5” should go is somewhat ludicrous.

What IF Dürer was actually leaving us a message with this “mistake?”

What if he meant to have the image of the “6” visible to all when he
corrected it to a “5?” What IF THAT WAS THE MESSAGE: whatever the
#6 represented was somehow hidden? If this is true, we don’t truly have a
magic square, because another number has been entered into the
equation.

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But it’s a great way to hide a message! Something that most people in his
lifetime would just ignore, being delighted with “magic” of the numbered
square adding up to 34.

WHERE TO START?

And what no one has ever contemplated is this: HOW is this magic square
to be read? Do we start at the upper left hand corner? The lower left?
The upper right? Or the lower right? If Durer is passing a message
steganographically, e.g. hidden in plain sight, the people who are
supposed to get the message have to know how to read the code.

The reading of the magic square starts at the lower left hand corner. What
does that tell you?

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