“Two secret words in two passes, on tables rebuilt from the solved messages' words”
Experiment 43 ran the exact two-word test on tables rebuilt from the puzzle's vocabulary. Here the tables come from every word of the three solved messages and of Sanborn's 2025 letter, with the same lengths and the same exact test.
Two short secret words used one after the other on the tablethe table The right-hand half of the sculpture, 26 rows of the alphabet each shifted one place further, starting from the word KRYPTOS. act like one longer secret word with a pattern. Experiment 43 asked whether any two words could explain the 24 known lettersthe known letters Sanborn has confirmed that positions 22 to 34 of the message read EASTNORTHEAST and positions 64 to 74 read BERLINCLOCK. on tables rebuilt from the puzzle's word list, and none could below a combined length of 22. Here the tables come from every word of the solved messages instead, and the question is asked again for every pair of lengths that leaves spare known letters to check.
Words in the margin are defined on the glossary page.
1.1
The method at work
The carved letters go in at the top; the reading comes out at the bottom.
the slots
Two secret words used one after the other on the table add up: each place uses one slot of each word, and each known letter forces their total.
the tables
Drawn for SHADING on the message and INVISIBLE on the copper; the experiment tried all 102 x 102 pairs built from K1 to K3 words and the 2025 words.
the bound
1,747,872 cases: 2,042 pairs of lengths survive, none with a total below 21, which is what chance leaves; no survivor is made of puzzle words.
2
Best candidate against the known letters
This experiment produced no candidate: the search ruled everything out before a full text was built. Its product is the bounded negative in section 7.
3
Walkthrough, by hand
Redo the method on a few letters with pencil and paper.
Build the message alphabet from SHADING and the carved alphabet from INVISIBLE.
Lengths 7 and 8, Vigenere both passes: place 22 needs a total key that sends E (9 in the first alphabet) to F (10 in the second): 1.
Place 22 uses slot 0 of the 7-letter word and slot 5 of the 8-letter word, so x0 + y5 = 1.
Place 29 uses slot 0 and slot 4: x0 + y4 equals its own total, so y5 - y4 is fixed.
Walk all 24 places; every loop must close.
One contradiction kills this pair of lengths for this pair of alphabets.
the worksheet: the first steps by hand, on squared paper
4
Worked example, generated
The same steps run by the code on the real letters.
plain SHADINGBCEFJKLMOPQRTUVWXYZ
cipher INVSBLEACDFGHJKMOPQRTUWXYZ
lengths 7 and 8, Vigenere: totals and slots
pos plain carved total x slot y slot
22 E F 1 0 5
23 A L 3 1 6
29 T R 0 0 4
30 H N 0 1 5
64 B N 20 0 7
5
Hypothesis, for a cryptanalyst
Family, key space, the constraint under test, and the clues it reads.
Two periodic keys composed through two tableau passes, t[i] = x[i mod a] + s y[i mod b] mod 26 (0014, Scheidt's combined keys, family 3), with plain and cipher alphabets keyword-mixed from the K1-K3 plaintext words and the C13/C14 words (102 alphabets with standard and KRYPTOS), both plaintext signs, both combiner signs, every length pair a < b with a + b <= 24 and lcm outside the dead periods. Weighted union-find over the 24 crib equations; a + b - 1 unknowns leave 25 - a - b redundant checks. Survivors with at most three free components are enumerated and their words matched against the vocabulary, the word pool and K1-K3 windows. Bounds: complete for these alphabets and lengths.
6
Prediction
Written before the run; the result decides it.
No length pair with a + b below 21 survives under any alphabet pair; survivors at 21-24 appear at chance rates, none spelling a known word. Zero candidates.
7
Method
Build the alphabet pool.
For each plain and cipher alphabet and sign, compute the forced total at each crib.
For each length pair and combiner sign, add the 24 difference constraints to a weighted union-find; reject on contradiction.
Count survivors by a + b.
Enumerate survivors with at most three components and match words.
8
Result and bounds
The harness's record: candidates, gates, loss, and the negative result this experiment leaves behind.