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TRITHEMIUS, JOHANNES. Polygraphie et Uniuerselle escriture Cabalistique. Title within woodcut ornamental border incorporating scientific instruments, publisher's devices, and French royal arms; 12 woodcut cipher wheels and 11 (of 12) volvelles, missing the last one. [18], 300 leaves (lacking e5-8, with facsimiles tipped in). 4to, 254x198 mm, later 19th-century vellum with calligraphic spine title in ink; light marginal dampstaining through much of volume, old scored inscription and 19th-century stamps on title, blank outer corners of title and lower outer corner of last several leaves restored. Paris: Jacques Kerver, 1561
First edition in French of the earliest treatise on cryptography, originally published in 1518 in Latin, describing both substitution and transposition ciphers. Arnold Semeiology Collection 8; Caillet 10850; Harvard/Mortimer-French 528. With the bookplates of the occult bookseller and bibliographer Albert Caillet and the Nostradamian collector and scholar Daniel Ruzo.
