Experiment 72
Sanborn's 2025 letter marks 'what's the point?' as a clue, and he chose the word 'directions' on purpose. The vocabulary held only the four cardinal points and NORTHEAST. Here the alphabets are rebuilt from all 32 compass points (EASTNORTHEAST, NORTHBYEAST and the rest) and from the hint's words (POINT, POWER, RESIDES, WITHOUT, DIRECTIONS, BEARING), and tested with a repeating key, the self-feeding autokey, and both together.
What the method does with the 24 known letters.
In his last open letter Sanborn wrote 'what's the point?' and marked it as a clue, and years earlier he said he used the word 'directions' on purpose. The known lettersthe known letters Sanborn has confirmed that positions 22 to 34 of the message read EASTNORTHEAST and positions 64 to 74 read BERLINCLOCK. already say EAST NORTHEAST, which is one of the 32 points of a compass. We build 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.'s scrambled alphabets from all 32 point names and from the words of that letter, and try the simplest ciphers with them. Scrambled coppers get the same treatment, so we can tell a real fit from luck.
Words in the margin are defined on the glossary page.
The carved letters go in at the top; the reading comes out at the bottom.
EASTNORTHEAST is a compass bearing, and Sanborn's letter asks 'what's the point?'. This builds alphabets from every compass point and from the words of that letter.
On the EASTNORTHEAST alphabet places 22 and 29 force F and T in the same slot: dead for a 7-letter word.
42 alphabets, 1,764 pairings, repeating keys to 52, ciphertext autokey and both together: survivors at the shuffled rate, no word in the fragments.
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.
Redo the method on a few letters with pencil and paper.
The same steps run by the code on the real letters.
alphabet EASTNORHBCDFGIJKLMPQUVWXYZ on both sides, Vigenere, 7-letter key
place known carved key slot
22 E F F 0
29 T R T 0
23 A L K 1
30 H N X 1
Family, key space, the constraint under test, and the clues it reads.
Family 1 re-entered with a new key source: C15(a) and (e) (open letter, sources/openletter-2025.txt: 'If they don't, then (CLUE) what's the point? Power resides with a secret, not without it') and C16 ('the word directions is, I use intentionally', 2010). EASTNORTHEAST is itself a compass point, so the boxing of the 32 points is a natural key source for a man who chose it as plaintext. Words: the 32 point names (NORTH, NORTHBYEAST, NORTHNORTHEAST, NORTHEASTBYNORTH, NORTHEAST, ... in the traditional boxing), SOUTHEAST, SOUTHWEST, NORTHWEST, POINT, POWER, RESIDES, WITHOUT, DIRECTION, DIRECTIONS, BEARING, TRUENORTH, ORIENTATION, OFFSET, COMPASSROSE, WINDROSE, AZIMUTH, DECLINATION; keyword-mixed alphabets, duplicates removed, plus standard and KRYPTOS. Systems: (1) periodic key, periods 1-52, every plain-cipher pair, Vigenere or Beaufort, exact crib consistency, fragments at periods up to 29 matched against the vocabulary and K1-K3; (2) ciphertext autokey with a constant shift, every lag, both alphabets the same word alphabet, key letter on it or on the standard; (3) the 0066 form, autokey plus a periodic key up to 26, same alphabets. Ten shuffled coppers through the same sweeps.
Written before the run; the result decides it.
No pair makes a periodic key of period 24 or less consistent; 25-26 survive at the shuffled-copper rate; no fragment at periods up to 29 matches a word; neither autokey form has a survivor with three or more redundant checks beyond the controls. Zero candidates pass.
The harness's record: candidates, gates, loss, and the negative result this experiment leaves behind.
42 alphabets, 1764 pairs. Periodic consistent at P <= 26: {'25': (0, 0, 2), '26': (87, 17, 393)}. Autokey (checks: K4, control min, max): {'1': (19, 7, 19), '2': (0, 0, 1)}. Autokey plus periodic: {'1': (998, 852, 1094), '2': (27, 15, 33), '3': (0, 0, 5)}. Word matches in 10671 fragments: 0.
What was searched, as the harness recorded it.
How this experiment sits among the others is on the lineage page; its family's open hypotheses are on the families page.