Curious observation on AP frontpage

[Oystein]

The last page of AP is well known to contain a classic Chronogram, known from Jewish/Hebrew and Christian tradition.

Marlene Schiffman writes:

Chronograms are often used as a dating method for classical Hebrew books. They are constructed from a phrase or biblical verse which yields a numerical value when the letters are added up. They are meant to yield a year, but often ALSO GIVE ANOTHER MESSAGE!

She gives an example: "My Day Closed Is In Immortality"
This is a chronogram commemorating the death of Queen Elizabeth I of England.
The capitals read MDCIII, which corresponds to 1603, the year of Elizabeth's death.

Marlene Schiffman is Judaica Cataloger at the Mendel Gottesman Library at Yeshiva University, past President of the New York Metropolitan Area chapter of AJL, occasional contributor to Judaica Librarianship, and co-author (with Leslie Monchar) of an AJL publication, Creating a Collection: A Basic Book List for Judaic Libraries (6th ed. Charleston, SC: Create Space, 2016).

In 1711, Joseph Addison compared chronograms to "anagrams and acrostics".

Some fabulous acrostic chronograms and anagrams, arranged as acrostics, are found in the reference book Militia Immaculatæ Conceptionis, published in Brussels in 1663.
https://folk.ntnu.no/krill/numberwords.pdf

The chronogram in AP last page:

http://theorffyreuscode.com/html/apolog ... ogram.html
Copied from John Collins web-page: "Taking the several Latin uppercase letters D, I, D, V, C, C, V, V, D and I, from within the quotation, and assuming they also represent Roman numerals, added together they total the figure 1717, the year of publication. (D = 500, I = 1, V = 5, and C = 100.)

So why is 1717 only on the last page, and not the first page as is the tradition? Or is it?

On the Apologia first page, the word ArG stands out as a small group of letters with "miss-typed" Latin uppercase letters. The sentense reads: der ArG Wutende Bose freund

In A Winter Dreame of James Howell (1649) there is a chronogram on the front page. This chronogram is of another style, where also alphabetic letters. For example one word is printed as "ReX", (R is just a alphabet letter, and X is also a roman numeral). Looking just like Bessler's "ArG" on his frontpage. (se picture)

We have discussed before that the initial meaning of the letters "AG" could be the Initials of Andreas Gartner (Bessler's enemy), just as Wagner and Borlach's last name initials.. But could the reason for choosing to add Latin uppercase font on A (and not only G) also have to do with a third hidden meaning? Because the word "ArG" suddenly looks like a small chronogram, as "ReX" certainly was. If so, It must be possible to create a Chronogram-like value from alphabet letters too! If so, this is called Gematria, and is a method Bessler surely had to know. I have proposed that Bessler used Gematria with a variation of the 24 letter alphabet before. Let's look closer..

Wikipedia on Gematria:

According to Aristotle (384–322 BCE), isopsephy, based on the Milesian numbering of the Greek alphabet developed in the Greek city of Miletus, was part of the Pythagorean tradition, which originated in the 6th century BCE. The first evidence of use of Hebrew letters as numbers dates to 78 BCE; Gematria is still used in Jewish culture. Similar systems have been used in other languages and cultures, derived from or inspired by either Greek isopsephy or Hebrew gematria, and include Arabic abjad numerals and English gematria.

The difference between "ArG" on the front page, and the Roman numeral acrostics on the last page is only one thing. The letters are not roman numerals at all, but simply alphabet letters. A nd G is written in Latin uppercase. Their alphabetic equivalent values are
A = 1
G = 7
Then what about the remaining letter r? Guess what, r is the 17th letter of the 24 letter alphabet, taught up to the 1700s.. Used in numbering of parts in Bessler's drawings, in MT and also used in AP for writen the caesar cipher. So the ArG grouped by font type say AG and r and by alphabet values it becomes: 1,7,17.

A = 1
G = 7
r = 17

1 7 17 The year of publication! As Bessler wrote in AP. This year written by the number 17, twice.

Could this be more evidence towards accepting that Bessler did not use only Roman numeral chronograms, but also applied English/German Gematria in his writings?

And could such numbers be used to say other things than dates? What about angles? Wouldn't it be just a perfect method to describe secret geometric shapes? As Marlene Schiffman wrote: They are meant to yield a year, but often ALSO GIVE ANOTHER MESSAGE!

Lastly, could "ArG"function as a way to say 3 things?

1. A Gematric "chronogram". 1 7 17
2. A way of saying that Andreas Gartner is "ArG" (bad)
3. Confirming that Bessler hid numbers by using Alphabet-Gematria, and used the 24 letter alphabet.

If we accept that as possible.. what more could be hidden on the frontpage?

More to come..

Best
Øystein