Mary, Queen of Scots' cryptic prison letters finally deciphered

Researchers have cracked the code used to write a collection of "lost" letters once owned by Mary, Queen of Scots.

Penned between 1578 and 1584 with a "sophisticated cipher system" that involved a mix of letters and symbols, the letters were written to and from the former Queen of Scotland (also known as Mary Stuart) while she was imprisoned by her cousin, Elizabeth I of England, according to a statement.

A team of international decryptors "discovered" the mysterious texts by searching the archives of the national library of France, the national library of the country in Paris, according to the press release.

"This is a truly exciting discovery," study first author George Lasry, a computer scientist and cryptographer who is a member of the DECRYPT Project, an organization that decrypts historical manuscripts, said in the statement. 'We have already broken the secrets of kings and queens, And they're great, but with Mary, Queen of Scotland it was amazing because we had so many unseen letters deciphered and because she is so famous."

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With the help of computer techniques and a manual comparison of texts written in other historical manuscripts, researchers deciphered a total of 57 letters, 50 of which were previously unknown to historians. It was published in February. 7 in the journal Cryptologia. 

Stuart was taken into custody because of an alleged conspiracy, known as Babington's conspiracy, to murder Elizabeth i. many letters from Stuart were written to Michael of Mauvissiere castelnau, Ambassador of France to the United Kingdom, that stood up for Catholics against Protestants, on the basis of the declaration.

Mary used verbs and adverbs in the female form and frequently referred to the name "walsingham" or sir francis walsingham, who was principal secretary to Queen Elizabeth I, on the basis of the declaration.

Mary's correspondence also included details on the manner in which her health was suffering while in prison, the prison's poor living conditions and the details of its ongoing negotiations with Queen Elizabeth i for his release, even by invoking the conviction that they were not carried out in good faith, according to the declaration.

"Together, the letters constitute a voluminous body of new primary material on Mary Stuart — about 50,000 words in total, shedding new light on some of her years of captivity in England," Lasry said.

The decipherment "is the most important new find on Mary, Queen of Scots for 100 years," John Guy, author of "Queen Of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart" (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2004), who was not involved in the new research, said in the statement. 

In 1587, Mary, Queen of Scotland, was decapitated for treason at the age of 44.