pl-7522 cracking code cover - pacific learning · · 2013-03-14with many thanks to dr. paul...

James Driver

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© 2004 Pacific Learning© 2002 Written by James DriverPhotography: title page and p. 14 Ancient Art & Architecture; p. 4 Ancient Art & Architecture; p. 6 Science & Society Picture Library; p. 7 Science & Society Picture Library (all); p. 12 CorbisUK (top), Ancient Art & Architecture (bottom left & right); p. 15 British Museum; pp. 16, 17Ancient Art & Architecture; p. 18 Mary Evans Picture Library (top), Oxford ScientificFilms/Maurice Tibbles (bottom); p. 19 Mary Evans Picture Library; p. 20 Science Photo Library(top), Telegraph Colour Library (bottom); p. 21 SPL (top), Corbis UK (bottom); p. 22 Tropix(left), RNIB, Peterborough (bottom); p. 23 S. & R. Greenhill; p. 24 National Gallery; p. 25Ancient Art & Architecture (top right), OSF/G. MacLean (left), OSF/T. Heathcote (bottom); p. 26Map reproduced from Ordance Survey Landranger mapping with the permission of theController of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. © Crown copyright. Licence no. 100000249.Cover Photograph by Science & Society Picture Library; back Cover by Ancient Art &ArchitectureIllustrated by Martin Aston, Stefan Chabluk, and Martin McKennaU.S. edit by Alison Auch

With many thanks to Dr. Paul Stephens and Alex Dumestre for their expert and patientassistance.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form orby any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or anyinformation storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

This Americanized Edition of Cracking the Code, originally published in England in 2002, ispublished by arrangement with Oxford University Press.

08 07 06 05 0410 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Published by Pacific LearningP.O. Box 2723Huntington Beach, CA 92647-0723www.pacificlearning.com

ISBN: 1-59055-437-XPL-7522

Printed in China.

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IntroductionWhat Is a Code? 4Different Types of Code 5

Coding Machines 6Code-breaking Machines 7Making Your Own Code 8The Dancing Men 9Flag Codes and Semaphore 10Heraldry 11Writing Codes:

Pictograms to Phonograms 12The Alphabet 14

The Rosetta Stone 16Runes 17International Languages 18Morse Code 19DNA: The Code for Life 20Binary: The Code of the Computer 21The Braille Alphabet 22Signing 23Symbols in Art 24The Doctrine of Signatures 25Maps 26Slang 27Body Language 28Fire, Smoke, and Sound 29Numbers 30Glossary 31Index 32

CONTENTS

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4

If you can see and hear someone, it isvery easy to send that person amessage. As long as you both speak thesame language, you can talk to eachother, shout at each other, or whispersecretly.

If you can see, but cannot hear eachother, you can still communicate bymaking signals with your hands.

However, if you cannot see or hearthe other person, or if you want yourmessage to be a secret that no one elsecan understand, you will have to send itin a different way. You might use a code.

Secret Codes

Julius Caesar, the famous Romangeneral, often sent messages that he didnot want his enemies to read. To ensuresecrecy, he used a very simple code.

The Roman alphabet had onlytwenty-three letters, but when Caesarwanted to send a confidential message,he did not spell words with the usualletters, he counted three letters aheadand used those letters instead. So in acoded message, his name CAESARwould be FDHXDV.

WHAT IS A CODE?

You can asksomeone to stop.

You can ask someone to come toward you.

▲ Julius Caesar(102–44 BC)

▲ The Romans did not have the letters “J,” “U,” or “W.”

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What Is a Code?A code is a way of passing ideas orinformation on to other people. Acode only works if the person whosends the message and the personwho receives the message bothunderstand how the code works.

FACT BOX

See page 10

5

Not all codes are secret. In fact, manyhave been used by millions of people.

Writing

Writing is a code. If you are writing inEnglish, you use the twenty-six letters inthe alphabet. The letters often stand forthe sounds you make when you speak.

There are lots of different systems ofwriting, and they all use different codes.The ancient Egyptians wrote withpictures, called hieroglyphics, insteadof letters. They wrote “water” like this:

Semaphore

Before the invention of radiocommunication, sailors used to sendmessages from one ship to another byusing semaphore. By holding twoflags in different positions, they couldspell out all the letters of the alphabet.

This is what the word “water” lookslike when it is sent by semaphore:

The ancient Sumerians startedwriting with picture shapes too, butthese gradually evolved into a set ofsigns called cuneiform. TheSumerians wrote “water” like this:

Morse Code

Some codes use sounds. The mostfamous of these is Morse code, whichuses two sounds: a short buzz, which iscalled a “dot,” and a long buzz, whichis called a “dash.”

Anyone using Morse code has tolearn how the dots and dashes are usedto represent the different letters of thealphabet.

When “water” is written in Morse

code, it looks like this:

See page 19

DIFFERENT TYPES OF CODE

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Being able to choose different letterrotors, different alphabet orders, anddifferent circuits meant that Enigma had an astounding 150,000,000,000,000different starting positions!

FACT BOX

6

In 1918, a German engineer namedArthur Scherbius created what manypeople thought was the perfect codingmachine. He gave it an ancient Greekname – Enigma – meaning “secret”or “mystery.”

Enigma operators were directed tofollow these instructions:

1. You, and the person receiving th

e

message, must decide which three

letter rotors you are going to u

se

today. (There are five to choose

from. Each one has the alphabet

on

it in a different order.)

2. Agree on the order the rotors ar

e

going to be placed in the machin

e.

3. Decide which electrical circuits

you are going to use. (You make

a

circuit by plugging short cables

into the sockets on the plugboar

d.

The circuits light up the lights

on

the panel.)

4. Start typing your message on the

keyboard.

5. Typing a letter on the keyboard

makes a light come on by a

different letter on the lightboar

d.

That is the coded letter for tod

ay.

▲ An Enigma coding machine

Letter rotors

Lightboard

Keyboard Plugboard

CODING MACHINES

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7

Enigma’s incredible number of startingpositions meant that the code could bechanged every day.

▲ Some Enigma machines held an extra letterrotor. This made it even harder to crack thecoded messages!

Colossus was designed by Tommy Flowers,a Post Office engineer.

Alan Turing

British mathematician Alan Turingrealized that the best way to beat oneingenious machine was to build another,more ingenious machine.

Turing had not enjoyed school, but he was fascinated by math, which hestudied at Cambridge University inEngland. When war broke out betweenBritain and Germany in 1939, he wassummoned to Bletchley Park in England,the secret base for code breakers.

With the help of Gordon Welchman,Turing designed the Turing Bombe.This huge machine could test thedifferent choices the Enigma operatorsmight have made that day. Their earlycomputer helped the British crack the Enigma code and uncover most ofthe German’s secret plans, which resulted in many lives being saved.

Colossus

Two years later, the Germans changedthe way they used their codes. A bigger,faster decoding machine was needed. In1943, the first programmable electroniccomputer, called Colossus, came into useas a code breaker.

▼

CODE-BREAKING MACHINES

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8

STEP 1 Choose a key phrase.

strangers on a desert island

STEP 2 Take out all the letters that appear twice.Write down the letters that remain.

strangeodil

STEP 3 Now, write down the rest of the alphabet,but do not use any letter that has alreadyappeared in your key phrase.

strangeodilbcfhjkmpquvwxyz

STEP 4 Confirm that you have twenty-six letters!

STEP 5 Write the alphabet beneath your code.

STEP 6 Write out the message you want to send.

see you in the library

STEP 7 To turn the message into code, find eachletter in the bottom line and replace it withthe letter in the line above.

pnn yhu df qon bdtmsmy

STEP 8 If someone sends you a message in code thatis based on the same key phrase, you canread it by finding the letter in the top lineand replacing it with the correspondingletter from the line below.

fdrn iht!

s t r a n g e o d i l b c f h j k m p q u v w x y z

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

MAKING YOUR OWN CODE

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9

▲ Sherlock Holmes was SirArthur Conan Doyle’s mostfamous fictional character.

▲ To find out more about thiscode, you will have to read SirArthur Conan Doyle’s“Adventure of the DancingMen” in The Return ofSherlock Holmes.

British author Sir ArthurConan Doyle (1859–1930)made his great detectivecharacter, SherlockHolmes, solve one verydifficult case by cracking acode that looked like a lineof dancing figures.

Holmes starts with the vital piece of knowledge

that the most frequently used letters in the English

language are:

e t a o i n s h r d l uSo he assumes the figure that appears most often

could be the letter “e.”

For a while he is puzzled that some of the figures

in the longer messages carry flags.

Then he realizes that these might not be letters,

but simply show the gaps between words.

Next he looks for words that use “e” more than

once. As the name of the woman who is receiving

the coded messages is “Elsie,” he guesses that this

is her name:

That gives him “l,” “s,” and “i.”

Reading as “never”

gives him three more letters: “n,” “v,” and “r.”

His solution is almost complete!

THE DANCING MEN

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10

On October 21, 1805, the mostfamous signal in naval historywas flown during the Battle ofTrafalgar from the rigging ofHMS Victory – the flagship ofAdmiral Horatio Nelson. It wasmade up of thirty-one flags.

Nelson was going to use theword “confides,” but the officerin charge of signaling, FlagLieutenant John Pasco, pointedout that “expects” was alreadyin the naval code book andcould be sent using only threeflags. “Confides,” like the word“duty,” would have to be spelledout letter by letter.

Semaphore

Semaphore also uses flags to

send messages. Yet unlike a

flag code in which different

combinations of flags

represent different words

and letters, semaphore

relies on the person sending

the message to spell out

each word by holding the

flags in different positions

for each individual letter.

ENGLAND EXPECTS THAT EVERY

MAN WILL DO HIS

D U T Y

FLAG CODES AND SEMAPHORE

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11

Battles in the Middle Ages were oftenconfused, brutal events, with soldiersusing swords, daggers, axes, and clubsto attack their enemies.

THE COLORS OF HERALDRY

Argent

Or

Azure

Gules

Sable

Vert

Purpure

A Knight’s Shield

The surface of the shield is the field.Anything placed on the field is called acharge. The simplest charges werecalled ordinaries.

▲ To describe a heraldic device youname the field first, then the charge.So this shield is “azure, a pale or.”

Field

Unfortunately, it was all too easy tomistake a friend for an enemy.

To help knights identify each other,in peace and in war, an elaborate codeof heraldry was developed. No wordswere involved. Heraldry used patterns,symbols, and colors.

Like many codes, heraldry developedan elaborate jargon of its own andneeded specialists, the Heralds ofthe College of Arms, to ensure thateveryone followed the rules.

Charge

HERALDRY

THE HONORABLE ORDINARIES

Pale

Bend

Saltire

Pile

Chevron

Chief

Bar

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The Long Room in the Old Libraryat Trinity College,Dublin, containsmore than200,000 books.

12

If you can write, you can record whatyou observe and how you feel. Youroriginal ideas and deepest thoughts canbe kept safe, and, if you wish, passed onfor other people to read.

Writing allows you to inventimaginative worlds and to fill them withpeople, places, and events that can beenjoyed by anyone who has cracked thecode by learning to read.

For more than 20,000 years, humanshave painted pictures, carved sculpturesin stone, sung songs, and told stories tocommunicate. They only began writingabout 5,000 years ago.

▼

WRITING CODES:PICTOGRAPHS TOPHONOGRAMS

▲ Cuneiform writing on a clay tablet fromabout 3000 BC

▼ Hunting scene in a cave painting

The first writing was used solely forrecord keeping. Shapes were impressedon wet clay with a pointed stick or reed.When the clay hardened in the sun, itcould be stored away safely as apermanent record.

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Picture of an ox’s head

Cuneiform symbol foran ox’s head

Phonograms

In about 2800 BC, the symbols thescribes were using for individual wordsbegan to be used for the sounds peoplemade when they spoke that word. Thiswas the most important step in theentire history of writing.

The Sumerian word for “ox” was“gu,” so whenever another wordcontained the “gu” sound, the scribecould use the ox symbol to show thereader that was the way to pronouncethat portion of the word. A soundsymbol that helps to make a new wordis called a phonogram.

Egyptian Hieroglyphics

The same system was used in ancientEgypt. The ancient Egyptians’ use ofsymbols as both pictograms andphonograms was called hieroglyphics.The Egyptians took the strongest soundfrom a word and used the pictograph ofthat word as the phonogram.

Pictograph Phonogram

sound

mouth r

house pr

face hr

Pictographs

The very earliest records used werepictographs. If oxen were beingrecorded, the scribes drew a littlepicture of an ox’s head. People soonfound it quicker to turn the picture intoa shape that was simpler to draw andthat all the other scribes would use andrecognize.

This early, wedge-shaped style ofwriting is called cuneiform.

▼▼

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The Sumerians needed hundreds ofphonograms because their language,like every spoken language in the world,had a huge number of possible sounds:“ba,” “be,” “bi,” “bo,” “bu,” and so on.

However, the alphabet with which weare familiar has only twenty-six letters.

a b c d e f g h i j k l m no p q r s t u v w x y z

In about 1800 BC, someone,probably living near the coast ofPalestine, had the idea that the simplestway to organize writing was to giveeach major sound its own letter.

The Sphinx in Egypt, with letters from an earlyalphabet carved on its base

We will probably never determine who invented the first alphabet, althoughthe ancient Greeks said it was Cadmuswho brought them their alphabet. Still,we can figure out a likely scenario.

Inventing the Alphabet

1. The inventor looked at thepictographs of a word in a languagewe now call West Semitic.

2. That pictograph was used as a letter to represent the very first sound in that word.

Not all the pictographs matched theletter of our modern alphabet so closely.

Pictograph Pronunciation First sound

mayyuma m

tawwu t

Pictograph Pronunciation First sound

kappu k

wawwu w

▼

WRITING CODES: THE ALPHABET

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An inscription inancient Greek,from the city ofThessaloniki

▼

Another major difference is thatvowels (“a,” “e,” “i,” “o,” “u”) did notappear in the earliest alphabets.

Rdng ths wtht vwls shld ntb tht hrd!

The first alphabet with vowels wasthe one used by the ancient Greeks.Although it is possible to read and writewithout them, with a language such asancient Greek or modern English, inwhich many words begin with vowels, itbecomes much more difficult.

How the Alphabet Spread

The Greeks based their alphabet on theone used by the merchants who came totrade with them from the coast ofPhoenicia. When the Greeks reachedItaly, they passed their version on to theEtruscans, who were then conquered bythe Romans, who in turn went on toconquer much of the rest of Europe.Explorers from Europe then ferried thealphabet to other parts of the world,such as North and South America andAustralia.

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The Rosetta Stone was discovered in1799. It supplied written information inthree different forms: ancient Egyptianhieroglyphics, later Egyptian demoticscript, and ancient Greek.

When the stone was found, nobodyknew how to read hieroglyphics. Therewas some understanding of demotic,but every one of the ancient Greekwords could be translated.

The French scholar Jean-FrancoisChampollion (1790–1832) realized thatif he could match a known Greek wordwith an unknown hieroglyph, he mightbe able to crack the long-forgotten codeof ancient Egypt.

▲ The Rosetta Stone, now in theBritish Museum, London

He started with the cartouche – aset of hieroglyphs put inside a long ovalbox. After studying the Greek section,Champollion decided this must be thename “Ptolemy.” He compared it with acartouche from another Egyptianinscription, thought to be the name“Cleopatra.”

The first symbol in “Ptolemy” andthe fifth in “Cleopatra” were the same.The fourth in “Ptolemy” and thesecond in “Cleopatra” were the same.Champollion figured out that the firstletter in the “Cleopatra” cartouche was“K” (Kleopatra is the Greek version ofher name), and that the bird hieroglyphmust represent “a.”

Champollion had found his way intothe code!

Section 3AncientGreek

THE ROSETTA STONESection 1 Ancient Egyptianhieroglyphics

Section 2Egyptiandemoticscript

▲ The Egyptian name “Ptolemy,”featured on the Rosetta Stone

P

▲ The Egyptian name “Cleopatra”

L

PL

AK (or C)

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These magicrunes werecarved on anancient tomb in Norway. They admonishthe living tokeep away!

The angular shape ofrunes meant they couldbe easily carved in stone,antler, wood, ivory, orother hard materials.Runic alphabets wereused in northern Europefrom about AD 200 to500. The early alphabetshad twenty-four letters.Then around AD 800,the Vikings developedone with only sixteenletters.

The runes on the Franks Casket are not actuallyrelated to the story shown in the carvings. Instead, theyspell out a short poem about a whale being stranded anddying on a beach.

Secret runes, for casting spells, cursing an enemy, orbestowing special powers upon a weapon, were oftenmade by adding or taking away some of the usual lines sothat only the person writing knew what was being said.

The broken blue lines indicatewhere there are lines missing.

The unbroken blue lines indicatewhere there are extra lines.

▼

RUNES▼ The Franks Casket dates from the 8th century AD. It is carved from whalebone.

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German, English, Russian,Polish, and Greek.

Zamenhof wanted hislanguage – now knownas Esperanto – to bea code that everyonecould share. Hethought that when twopeople met it would bemore fair if they spoke

a language that they hadboth had to learn, rather

than one of them havingthe advantage of speaking it

from birth.

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Esperanto

In 1887, a Polish doctor,Dr L. L. Zamenhof,invented a language that could be usedthroughout the entireworld. He based hislanguage mainly onthe words andgrammar used in Latinand French, but he alsoincluded ideas from

Latin Hungarians call a trout pisztrang,

Spaniards call it trucha, and the Dutch

call it forel. Yet when biologists in

these and other countries write about

trout they all use the same Latin

name – Salmo trutta. Latin is an

ancient language utilized by Western

scholars for hundreds of years.▲ The Brown trout – Salmo trutta

INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGES

American EnglishThe Internet was developed in the UnitedStates, so much of the information on itis written in American English. Because

the Internet can be accessed fromanywhere in the world, many peoplethink that American English will becomethe first truly international language.

FACT BOX

Dr. Zamenhof called himself“Dr. Esperanto.”

▼

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The Titanic sank beforethe Carpathia came to its rescue. John Phillipsfroze to death in thefrigid water.

The American painter and inventorSamuel Morse (1791–1872) designed hisinnovative code to work on his electrictelegraph. To operate the telegraph, anelectric current was passed along milesof wire. By pressing and releasing thehandle of the telegraph key, the electriccircuit along these wires could becompleted or broken.

Holding the key down for a short timeproduced a short buzz – a dot; holding ita long time made a dash. Morse’s codeput dots and dashes together to makethe letters of the alphabet.

An Italian, Guglielmo Marconi,invented a way of transmitting soundwithout wires – wireless telegraphy. In1901, he used Morse code to transmit amessage 2,000 miles (3,218 km) acrossthe Atlantic.

Morse Code

In 1912, when the Titanic hit aniceberg and began to sink, one of thewireless operators, John Phillips, stayedat his post sending messages for help.His Morse code messages were heardon a ship called the Carpathia.

▼

MORSE CODE

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bases inpairs

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All plants and animals contain asubstance called DNA. It is made up offour chemicals, or bases: guanine (G),adenine (A), thymine (T), and cytosine(C). These bases can be linked togetherin different ways, and these patterns, orcodes, generate the differences in theway we look and act.

Almost every cell in your bodycontains three billion bases! The basesin the DNA are grouped together tomake genes. There are about 100,000genes in each cell.

Each gene makes a different protein.Proteins get things done – they givecolor to our eyes, make our musclesmove, and digest our food.

Everyone’s DNA is slightly different.It is a mixture of both parents’ DNA.Because the code of everyone’s genes isslightly different, we are all unique inlooks and behavior.

DNA: THE CODE FOR LIFE▼ The four bases pair up to make whatlook like the rungs on a twisted ladder.This shape is called a double helix.

Because everyone’s DNA is a littlebit different, detectives alwayssearch the scene of a crime verycarefully. If they find a speck ofblood, or even a single hair, they cancheck if its DNA matches the DNA ofthe person they suspect.

FACT BOX

▲ We inherit our genes from our biologicalparents, but everyone looks slightly different.

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Many number systemsuse ten digits – probablybecause most of us havehands with a total often fingers and thumbs!Computers do not havefingers and thumbs, butthey do have millions of transistors. Atransistor can either beon or off. By writingprecise instructions thatstop and start theelectrical currentpassing through thetransistors, a computer programmer can make a computer store and process data.

To instruct the computer, theprogrammer uses a simple, but verypowerful number system, called thebinary code. The binary code usesonly two digits: 0 and 1. When thetransistor reads 0 it switches off;when it reads 1 it switches on.

Using only two digits keeps the entireprocess simple. This means that thetransistors are easy to make, cheap,reliable, and can be built very small.

BINARY:THE CODE OF THE COMPUTER

▲ A twenty-first century handheld notebook: astechnology advances, computers are getting smallerand smaller.

▲ The calculating machines and earlycomputers, used before electronic computers, were very large.

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The braille alphabet is used by peoplewho are blind or visually impaired.

Braille was developed by aFrenchman, Louis Braille (1809–1852),who was blinded after an accident in hisfather’s workshop at the age of three.

The basic building block of braille isthe six-dot cell, arranged and numberedlike this:

Braille books are meticulouslyproofread by blind people who, whilelistening to audiotapes of the text, checkthe braille version with their fingers.

Various combinations of the six dotsmake the alphabet. They also stand forcommon words, such as “and,” “for,”“the,” and “with”; common parts ofwords such as “ch,” “gh,” “sh,” “ed,” and“ing”; punctuation marks; and signs toshow capital letters, accents, and numbers.

Capitalletter sign

▲ People read braille by running theirfingertips over a series of dots that areraised up from the surface of the page.

J U L I E

THE BRAILLE ALPHABET

▲ Braille pages are printed by punching theraised dots on paper running over metalprinting plates that have the pattern ofraised dots molded on them.

1 4

2 5

3 6

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23

For hundreds of years,people who are deaf orhearing impaired havecommunicated by usinghands, fingers, facialexpressions, and overallbody language. There aresigning alphabets, soindividual words can bespelled out – but far morecommon is the use of gestures torepresent whole words.

Sign languages are not international.Just as spoken languages differ acrossthe world, so do sign languages. Whatsurprises many people is that countriesthat have very similar spoken languages,such as Britain and the United States,

▼ The ASL signs for the alphabet (top), and a message in BSL (bottom).

have completely separate signlanguages.

One of the primary differencesbetween American Sign Language(ASL) and British Sign Language (BSL)is that you use only one hand to sign theASL alphabet, but people use twohands to spell out letters in BSL.

▲ These girls are using signing to help them communicate

SIGNING

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This is a skull! Look at it fromthe right-hand edge of the page.It is a symbol of death. Holbein is warning that life is too shortto argue.

SYMBOLS IN ART

This sundial shows twodifferent times! Holbeinwanted to illustrate how thequarrel had disturbed whateveryone had always agreedon in the past.

A string on this lute is brokenand needs to be repaired.Holbein was hoping that thetwo countries would mendthe rift that was keepingthem from working together.

This is a Protestanthymnbook, but it is open so it looks like the twoFrench Catholic men havebeen using it. Holbein isshowing that it is possible for both religions to sharethe same ideas.

Hans Holbein (1497–1543) painted this portrait oftwo Frenchmen who visited the English king, HenryVIII, in 1533, when the two countries were arguingover religion. The French wanted England to remain aCatholic country, but King Henry broke away from the Catholic Church. This dispute eventually led toEngland becoming a Protestant country.

Holbein added symbols to help anyone looking atthe picture understand the controversy.

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During the Middle Ages,most people living inEurope believed that theplants and animals theyencountered every daywere exactly the same asthe first plants andanimals God made forAdam and Eve. Theyalso believed that Godhad left them clues as tohow they could use theseplants. His code wascalled the Doctrine ofSignatures.

Hound’s-tongue

Eyebright

▲ This stained glass window from a churchshows Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

THE DOCTRINE OF SIGNATURES

Because the plantcalled hound’s-tonguehas leaves that look andfeel like the tongue of adog, it was believed thatif a person were bitten bya dog, putting theseleaves on the woundwould heal it.

The brilliantly coloredflowers of eyebright areso bright that peoplebelieved the plant couldbe made into a potionthat would cure badeyesight.

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Public footpath

Public telephone

Farm

Woodland

Historical sites

The Clubhouse forthe golf course

Golf course

Road bridge

Railroad track

Orchards

Row of houses

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Mapmakers turn three-dimensional objects,such as mountains, rivers,roads, forests, railroads,highways, cities, towns, andlakes, into an easy-to-usetwo-dimensional format.Maps show us what is out ofsight, what is hidden away,and help us to find our wayto where we want to go.

To read a map you need to know the code. To help you crack the code, mapmakers usually include ahelpful key.

The dam keeps the water in thereservoir fromflooding BoughBeech Village.

The railroad goesthrough a cuttinghere, and along an embankmenthere.

The symbols that make up the keyson these two maps are often used inBritish maps. Once you understand thesymbols for a map from anywhere inthe world, you can plan a journey.

▲ Part of the standard Ordnance Survey key, used in Britain,showing railroads and water features.

▲ Key

MAPS

Part of an OrdnanceSurvey map of Kent,England

▼

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27

Slang is one of the most dauntingcodes to crack. One week a word istrendy, the next week anyone using it islaughed at for being out-of-date.

Lots of different groups of people useslang. Australian children might “dob”on their “mates.” Computer usersdiscuss “flamers” and “surfing the net.”Soccer players “nutmeg” opponentswhen they fool them by passing the ballbetween their legs.

SLANG

In the seventeenth century, slang wasused by criminals to disguise what theywere talking about. Thieves’ slang wascalled “cant.”

“Bring a waste, you prigger of prancers!

If we don’t budge a beak the only cony-catching we’ll do will be in the counter.”

If you crack the “cant” code, thismeans:

“Get out of here, you horse thief ! If wedon’t escape from the police the only crimes

we’ll do will be in prison.”

Moll Cutpurse was a well-known thief in London inthe seventeenth century. She disguised herself as a man.

▼

“Surfing the net”

“Nutmeg”

Old West SlangBone orchard – CemeteryHoosegow – JailGet a wiggle on – HurrySound on the goose – True, reliable

FACT BOX

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Humans are the only members of theanimal kingdom who have developedthe extraordinary code of speech.There are more than six billion peoplein the world, and more than 5,000languages are spoken.

In addition to speech, we use anothercode that many scientists believe wasused by our ancestors long before theydeveloped the power of speech.

By using signs and gestures, bymoving and positioning our hands,eyes, eyebrows, lips, arms, legs,shoulders – practically every part of ourbody – we send explicit messages thattell anyone watching us how and whatwe are feeling. This code is callednonverbal communication (NVC).

▼ This gesture uses the face, hands, andshoulders to send the message:

▼ It is easy to guess how this man feels!

BODY LANGUAGE

In Roman times, this handgesture was used byspectators watchinggladiators fighting todecide whether thegladiator would live or die.

▼

“Ssshhh!”

“I don’t know!”

▼ This gesture means “quiet.”

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Messages without Words

FIRE, SMOKE, AND SOUND

BEACON CHAINS

What? A line of bonfires

Why? To warn of invasion

How? If enemies appear, light a beacon. Smoke or

flames are seen by the next community who in turn

light their beacon, and the warning spreads across

the country.

Where and when? Southern England, 1588, for the

Spanish Armada. Hadrian’s Wall, AD 120–440

SMOKE SIGNALS

What? A fire of grass and leaves

Why? To send simple messages across open country

How? Light a large fire and feed with damp grass or

green leaves to produce a huge plume of smoke. Soak

a blanket in water. Cover the fire to trap the smoke.

Whip away the blanket. A huge puff of smoke rises

into the sky.

Where and when? North American plains, nineteenth

century

WHISTLES

What? Lips; wooden, metal, and plastic tubes

Why? To send simple instructions

How? Long, short, high-pitched, low-pitched blasts.

Can all have different meanings, for instance, “stop,”

“sit,” “stay,” “go.”

Where and when? Herders, animal trainers, referees

and umpires, lifeguards.

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Thousands of years ago, nomadicpeople lived by hunting and gathering.No one used numbers because no onereally needed them. Nomadic peoplesimply talked in quantities: “There isplenty of water, we’ll stay here.” “Thereare not enough kangaroos here, weshould move on.”

As people began to settle inpermanent places, they needed to keeptrack of many things, such as animalsand crops. Counting, weighing, andmeasuring became important.

Modern arabic 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Early arabic

Roman I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX X

Mayan

NUMBERSPeople in different places developed

different number systems. Our modernarabic number system is actuallybelieved to have been created in India. From there, it was transmitted to the Arabs, who developed it furtherand carried it to Europe. By 1300,the arabic system was used throughout Europe.

Number Systems

▼ For hundreds of years, farmers have used rhymesto keep a verbal record of the number ofanimals in their flocks and herds. This one wasstill being used in the Lake District in Englandless than fifty years ago!

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alphabet – a set of letters that representsounds

Battle of Trafalgar – famous naval battlein which a British fleet defeated Spanishand French fleets

binary code – a number code that usesonly two digits – 0 and 1

cartouche – a set of hieroglyphs, usuallyrepresenting an important name,surrounded by an unbroken oval line

charge – a design painted on a knight’sshield

cuneiform – a style of early writing thatused simple, wedge-shaped lines

demotic – a style of writing that simplifiedthe hieroglyphic system used in ancientEgypt

DNA – the substance that carries the codethat determines what individual livingthings will look like

electric telegraph – a machine that sendsmessages along a wire by completing orbreaking an electrical circuit

Esperanto – an artificial internationallanguage

field – the surface color of a knight’s shieldgene – a vital part of the DNA codeheraldry – a code used by knights in the

Middle Ages to identify each otherwithout using words

hieroglyphic – a system of writing basedon pictures

jargon – special words used by a group ofpeople, such as scientists

key – the part of a map that explains all thedifferent symbols

Morse code – a code that represents theletters of the alphabet through short andlong bursts of sound or light

nomadic – a lifestyle in which people movearound without settling in one place

number – a symbol that represents individual,or groups of, objects

ordinaries – simple shapes used in heraldryPhoenicia – an area that is now the coastal

region of Syria, Lebanon, and Israelphonogram – a shape used to represent a

sound in early writingpictograph – a picture used to represent a

word in early writingrune – a letter used in early northern

European writingscribe – a person who writes down what

someone else sayssemaphore – a code that represents the

letters of the alphabet through flags held indifferent positions

signing – a way of communicating used bypeople who are deaf or hearing impaired

slang – an informal code used by groups ofpeople who invent words to describe thingsthat are a big part of their lives

symbol – a sign or a shape that stands forsomething else

transistor – a tiny electronic device thatcontrols the flow of electricity

GLOSSARY

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INDEXalphabet, 4, 5, 6, 8, 14, 15,

17, 22, 23

beacon, 29binary, 21Bletchley Park, 7Braille, Louis, 22

Cadmus, 14Caesar, 4cartouche, 16Champollion,

Jean-Francois, 16charge, 11Colossus, 7computers, 7, 21cuneiform, 5, 12, 13

demotic, 16DNA, 20Doctrine of

Signatures, 25

Egyptians, 5, 13, 14, 16electric telegraph, 19Enigma, 6–7

Esperanto, 18

fields, 11flags, 5, 9, 10Flowers, Tommy, 7Franks Casket, 17

genes, 20gestures, 23, 28Greeks, 6, 14, 15, 16heraldry, 11hieroglyphics, 5, 13, 16

Holbein, Hans, 24Holmes, Sherlock, 9

knights, 11

Latin, 18

maps, 26Marconi, Guglielmo, 19Middle Ages, 11, 25Morse code, 5, 19

Nelson, Admiral Horatio,10

Norway, 17

numbers, 21, 22, 30

ordinaries, 11

Pasco, John, 10Phillips, John, 19phonograms, 12, 13, 14pictographs, 12, 13, 14

Romans, 4, 15, 28, 30Rosetta Stone, 16runes, 17

semaphore, 5, 10shields, 11signing, 23slang, 27smoke signals, 29Sumerians, 5, 13, 14symbols, 11, 13, 16, 24, 26

Titanic, 19Turing, Alan, 7

whistles, 29

Zamenhof, Dr L. L., 18

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pl-7522 cracking code cover - pacific learning · · 2013-03-14with many thanks to dr. paul...

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