Et in arcadia ego.

[zotz]

A few months ago there was a news article about some ex-Bletchley park people considering a mysterious inscription on a monument in Staffordshire, reputedly containing information about the Holy Grail. Well, they don't think so. This is entirely unsurprising. The Holy Blood And The Wholly Specious has a lot to answer for, even if it has managed to indirectly pay for the Roslin Chapel's restoration.

There's a page about the Poussin in question here.

Rather more practically, here's an article about a possible treatment for rabies, previously 100% fatal once it became symptomatic (bar one single person in the sixties, I believe).

Comments

[taoist-goth.livejournal.com]

I would think that anyone would want a cryptic religious message to show the resting place of the grail - that is after all the most interesting thing that any cryptic message could say. Except for "We apologise for the inconvenience" of course.

So whenever you actually *find* such a cryptic message, people will inevitably postulate that maybe it provides the information necessary to recover said item of tableware. 'Tis a great work of optimism, is it not? Like anyone that knows where the holy goblet lies is gonna write down its position instead of going and getting it. Sheesh.

[zotz]

Maybe. The interest in the grail does seem to wax and wane, though. There's been a glut of conspiracy theory recently, ranging from the Good (Foucault's Pendulum) through the Bad (The da Vinci Code) to the Ugly (Holy Blood, Holy Grain, inevitably).
Whether the Grail is part of the local mindset depends enormously on where you are. Some churches and places do relics. Others don't. There's been a bit more interest in them lately than for a good while before, and of course they were huge in the middle ages. Take the Shroud, for instance. Relatively obscure for probably centuries until the seventies, when someone made a TV documentary abut it. Suddenly it was big business again.

[taoist-goth.livejournal.com]

And then there was Monty Python.

[zotz]

Ah, but they had a more intellectually rigorous approach to the subject.

[deliberateblank.livejournal.com]

Headline:

Code points away from Holy Grail

In that case all they need to do is follow the *opposite* of the instructions and they're bound to find it!

[zotz]

Good God, Holmes, that's amazing! I'll hail a hansom immediately.

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

I'm always slightly bemused by things like that; "We don't know what it says, but we think it's about the grail". Well, if you don't know what it says, what on earth makes you think you know what it's about? That's just bloody silly, that is.

[zotz]

In this case, it's the Poussin picture. Holy Blood, Wholly Bollocks says that the picture's about the Grail, because there was one just like it in Rennes-le-Chateaux, and they push the line that a priest there found treasure belonging to the Priory of Sion, who were guarding the bloodline of Christ's descendants et cetera ad nauseam. The fact that the priest got rich after it became well-known he was on the take doesn't seem to bother them. Neither does the fact that the tomb postdates the "finding" of "treasure" that they allege.

But yes, it's all bollocks. Apophenia in action. Apophenia still isn't in the OED, you know.

[steer.livejournal.com]

*Grin* I've played so many computer games with this as the plot. The broken sword series springs to mind and I think it was Gabriel Knight III (one section of which had you finding geometrical shapes and anagrams in that Pouissin picture).

[zotz]

Well, games designers know a good gimmick when they see one. And as a game or as fiction, it's harmless, entertaining and involving.

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Isn't there some theory about the geometric proportions in the picture creating a map, or something equally insane?

Apophenia still isn't in the OED, you know.
You shock me. It isn't on dictionary.com either; what does it mean?

[zotz]

Isn't there some theory about the geometric proportions in the picture creating a map

Oh, hundreds of mutually-incompatible theories, I would guess.

what does it mean?

Right up your street, I'd have thught. In use since the fifties, apparently, to name the tendency to impute apparently-meaningful patterns and connections to entirely random data.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Good word. I don't know if you remember the Simon Singh book and TV series "The code book" which had a cryptographic challenge and a cash prize. I set about solving them. For one exercise, I assumed that the code was of a certain type and started to break it using that assumption. I'd got about a quarter of a message about A stargate opening, something about the time being right and a message being sent -- apocalyptic stuff. The key with which it was encoded seemed to be a bunch of gibberish three letter words though which made no sense. Eventually I discovered that the code was a different type and I'd been seeing these messages in the random noise. This probably says something about my subconscious but I am not sure what.

[zotz]

Probably just that you're normal, I'm afraid.

Yes, it's an excellent word. recently popularised by Bill Gibson in Pattern Recognition.

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Excellent word, I shall try to slip it into conversation whenever possible!
Did you see the recent article about the image of the Virgin Mary on someone's toasted cheese sandwich?

[zotz]

Yes. Case in point, of course.

Whenever I see the photo, I think of those little kitchen blowtorches you use to scorch puddings. Can't imagine why.

$28 000? Excuse me, I have some puddings to scorch . . .

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

*grin* same thing occurred to me, actually.
Some years ago, an ex of mine gave me, as a birthday present, a pen-sized (well, if your pens are large-ish) blow-torch, specifically for the purposes of addressing toast, and cooking steak. I never got round to doing the former, but I did try the latter. It was fine for _one_ steak, but if you're doing two, you have to stop and re-fill it half way through, which is not do good.

[zotz]

Addressing toast? Are we getting back to us posting you stuff? Or did you just mean writing people's names on the toast to make sure they don't steal each other's slices?

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

I was intending to send someone some toast, but never got around to it. Although having gone out with childeric for almost four years, I'm amazing that i never thought of addressing food in that way!

[zotz]

You'd have thought that under those circumstances it would be obvious.

[zotz]

He'll be along in a minute to complain about being maligned. But he likes it really.

[darkstones.livejournal.com]

I believe the theory you are referring to is outlined in 'The Holy Place', by Henry Lincoln - co-author of Holy Blood Holy Greed.

Quote form the sleeve blurb - "What is now revealed is an immense geometric temple ..... a sparkling constellation of pentacles, circles and hexagons, whose engineering complexity far exceeds that of the Pyramids "

In other words, a map of the south of France with some triangles drawn on it.

Personally, I much prefer the 'soup line' project of Bill Drummond - he will come and make you soup if your house lies on a straight line drawn through Belfast & Nottingham.
(http://www.penkiln-burn.com/jobs/job7.html).

[steer.livejournal.com]

I don't know if you noticed but the Poussin page you ref is actually part of a site about the rather excellent Tom Stoppard play "In Arcadia" (which I've read but disappointingly never seen acted). Interesting site in fact, and after a little clicking about I found:

http://www.skidmore.edu/academics/lsi/arcadia/glossary.html

Click on the last link there and you get a "Congratulations! You found the target page. " thingy (which is disappointingly broken). The idea of burying an easter egg in a web site about "In Arcadia" greatly appeals to me.

[zotz]

I hadn't noticed any of that, actually. Thanks. Not bad at all.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Do we assume that the methods etc used by the Bletchley Gang to decipher it are Way Too Secret to explain ?

Without a little backplot or explanation, I find it difficult to believe that a dozen letters can be deduced to mean anything in particular. There may be valid reasons for it being likely that it's the sect they say, but without further details it could just as well be a careless sculptur's shopping list reminder.

[zotz]

I'd guess it'll be published somewhere. If I were them, I'd have been looking into the background of the people who built it for clues.

[shaunotd.livejournal.com]

Ahah, but how do we know the Bletchley guys aren't part of a secret society who now finally know where the Grail is AND ARE COVERING THEIR TRACKS!!! mumblemumbleTemplarsmutterRosicruciansmutterIlluminatichicken noisesetc...

[ex-lark-asc.livejournal.com]

'Et in arcadia ego' - "And me in the shopping centre"?

[zotz]

I've heard that. It's a Chris Rea album, isn't it?

[ex-lark-asc.livejournal.com]

*snort*

[devilgate.livejournal.com]

Notice that the rabies girl got infected by a bat in a church. That must be where the grail is. The girl found out, and the killer bats were sent to defend it.

You see, it all ties up!!!

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Good thing we have free health care, as most insurance companies won't pay up for acts of God, which this clearly was.
(Did they pay up when York Minster was hit by lightning?)

[darkstones.livejournal.com]

I met the authors of HBHG once. I asked the if the book was some kind of obscure satire and they weren't too amused.

Using their unique methodology, here is the synopsis for my next blockbuster expose.

Roslin Chapel is owned by Baron Sinclair, who just happens to be a Police Superintendent. As all policemen are Masons, and Baron Sinclair is a descendant of the St Clair family, then Baron Sinclair is actually the current Grand Master of the Priory Of Sion.As Roslin Chapel has survived for 500 years without needing a protective canopy,it is obvious that the cover over Roslin Chapel must be serving some hidden purpose. I pondered for years what this hidden purpose could be, until one day, there it was - it had been right in front of me all along - Roslin Chapel lies near the curiously named Roslin Glen. Everyone knows that Glens only exist in the Highlands, so why was this little valley called a glen? It must be a code I thought, and after many long nights of study, I deciphered the hidden meaning. G.L.E.N - Grail Lies Extremely Near. My theory was confirmed when I went into the cafe in the Chapel and the dish of the day was poussin.

You want the rest, you'll have to buy the book. All it needs is a catchy title. Let me see, um, I know, 'The Roslin Shroud'

Convinced?

[zotz]

Yes - because of the missing link. There has been an astonishing lack of public discussion (indeed, a conspiracy of silence) concerning the amazing proximity of Rosslyn Chapel to the Roslin Institute, pioneering headquarters of cloning research. Clearly the secret Templar knowledge which was decoded from the Apprentice Pillar and used to clone Dolly the sheep (and doubtless many other secret endeavours also) was only a small part of the effort to maintain the bloodline of Christ's descendants by cloning when necessary to avoid the loss of the Holy Family from the world. The use of this knowledge by the illuminated élite will be used to bring in a new age of enlightened and sacred society where nature will be harnessed for the glory of God and the service of humanity. This clearly implies that informed investors will buy shares in the relevant biotech companies immediately in order to maximise return on their investment.

Here endeth today's sermon.