Book Review: Cryptic

Gary J. Shaw, Cryptic: from Voynich to the angel diaries, the story of world's most mysterious manuscripts. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2025. ISBN: 9780300266511. 

Genre: antiquarian, books, esoterica

Subgenre: history 

Format: hardcover

Source: Hutchins Library, Berea College 

 

This book is a history of mysterious and puzzling texts; it focuses on nine medieval and early modern European works. Very often these texts were partially or fully written in cipher or code. Some are real, and others may be a hoax. The authors often had reasons ranging from vanity to professional necessity for hiding their content in the texts. Some codes could be broken easily but others to this day remain a mystery. Along the way the author presents the history of coded writings, magical and esoteric texts, medieval science and medicine, and more. If you like a good mystery, and you like reading about esoteric texts, this may be a book for you.

The book features an introduction, 10 chapters, extensive notes, and a bibliography plus a list of illustrations. The book has a variety of black and white illustrations plus a set of color plates. Some of the texts included are: 

• Sister Hildegarde's writings. 
• The Voynich Manuscript. 
• John Dee's Angel Diaries.

As a whole, this is an interesting book. The author looks at a text, and then we get to look at the text writer's life followed by a look at the context of the time and history around a document or book. By looking at the historical context we can better understand the books discussed. The author does a very good job helping us see how people lived at the time and how that helped inspire the text creators. 

What the book focuses on: 

"Consequently, Cryptic focuses less on the methods and used by people in the past to hide information, and more on the individuals themselves and what they chose to keep secret. As we shall see, their hidden knowledge covers a wide variety of themes, from the occult, alchemy, and religion, to science, engineering, and medicine" (1).

 The Voynich Manuscript remains a mystery to this day. Naturally this book's author feels the need to present his theory about it. In doing so, he provides an image of what a 15th century educated reader and book collector was like, what they likely knew and read. That part I found particularly interesting. 

But wait, there is more. John Dee and Edward Kelly swapping wives because the angels told them to do it, in 1857, is certainly worth the price of admission so to speak.  

While the book is a solid scholarly work, and interesting to read, it can feel a little repetitive towards the end as the author is wrapping up the book. 

This may be a book more for academic libraries, especially libraries in liberal arts colleges and large research institutions with strong collections in the humanities. It may also be of interest to medieval history and studies programs. Some library and information science libraries may find it of interest. 

Some larger public libraries may see this as optional. For smaller public libraries, this may be a bit too esoteric for most of their readers. 

Overall, I really liked it, and if you find the topic interesting I recommend it. 

4 out of 5 stars. 

Additional reading notes: 

Items from the book's bibliography I may want to read later, adding to my TBR list: 

• Arianrod, Thomas Harriot: a life in science. Oxford UP, 2019. 
• Fanger, Invoking Angels: Theurgic ideas and practices, thirteenth to sixteenth centuries. Penn State University Press, 2012. 
• Laycock, The Complete Enochian Dictionary. Weiser, 3rd. ed. 2023. 
• Peterson, John Dee's Five Books of Mystery. Weiser, 2003. 
• Pettegree, The book in the Renaissance. Yale UP, 2010. 

  

This book qualifies for the following 2025 Reading Challenge: