Tolkien's Pictorial Code Letters

[truehobbit]

A few weeks ago I started a thread on this topic on TORC, and got some excellent help during the first few days, but then things came to a standstill before the riddle could fully be solved.
I thought that maybe we could have a look at it together here.

The thread on TORC is here: Pictorial Code Letter

When I was attending the Birmingham Tolkien gathering this summer I bought a postcard reproduction of a "pictorial code letter" that Tolkien wrote in the summer of 1904 (i.e. at 12 years of age!) to Father Francis.
At that time, Tolkien's mother went through the remission phase of diabetes and the family was spending the summer in a cottage in Rednal in Worcershire, just outside Birmingham.

Unfortunately, the reproduction on the postcard seems to end in the middle of the letter, and I was unable to find a pic of the whole thing anywhere. It's not even mentioned in the "Artist & Illustrator" book.
The postcard informs us that the letter is in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, MS. Tolkien drawings 86, fol. 1 verso - just in case someone gets a chance to go there and could have a look at the rest of the letter!

Here is the letter:


This is the text of the letter as far as we've figured it out on TORC:

Woodside
Cottage, Rednal

My dear wise owl/ole (?) Father Francis

You are to be _ _ _

not to_ _ _ _ _ _me in

spite of Father Dennis

I am so sorry you

did not like the _ _

word "piano" in my

last letter so I

... (here ends the reproduction of the letter on the postcard)


I'd really love to fill the gaps, so if any of you could help, that would be great!

If you read the TORC-thread, you'll see that there is another pictorial code letter, which is printed in a book called "The Tolkien Family Album".
Roccondil posted a link to a picture of this letter and we started transscribing this one, too, but didn't get to finish it either.
Of course I'd love to decipher the rest of this letter, too, but I'd prefer not to do this without Roccondil's knowledge and ok. I hope to post about this on TORC, because I don't have a contact addy for him!

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Hobby, that is really fascinating. I don't know how much help I will be in deciphering it (I am notoriously bad at puzzles and such), but I think it says something very interesting and illuminating about Tolkien himself that he created this at the age of 12. I'm just not sure what that thing is, or at least how to describe it. I hope you don't mind if I/we continue to try to explore that a little even as we attempt to decipher the letter(s).

[truehobbit]

Yes, it's amazing, isn't it?

Of course we can investigate in anything connected to that (although I don't rightly understand what you mean )!

I'm pretty sure (though I don't know, and would like to have some further information) that a rebus of this kind would have been a "standard" riddle to do at the time - I mean, the rules for a rebus are still pretty much the same, we just don't amuse ourselves anymore today composing them!
Still, even if Tolkien just used tools of a popular game, I think it's awesome how this 12-year-old worked with them!
I think it also says a lot about Tolkien's affinity to language, his talent at understanding how its elements work and the way his mind worked in general.
(Mark also the painstaking detail he used!)

So, yes, I'm hoping that some of the brilliant minds here will just see the sunset pic or the leaves/pod on a twig thing and find the word or syllable it is meant to represent - but apart from that I'd love to discuss everything else in the context, too!

[Jnyusa]

Oh, Hobby! I clap my hands and jump up and down!

I saw this thread on Torc and was so fascinated. Sat for an afternoon figuring out what I could but it seemed that you and Brian had already gotten so much farther.

I was going to ask you to please post it over here, and look! - you have!

I think that more than the bottom is missing. Part of the right side is missing as well. Let me start over on this and see if I can remember the parts I managed to solve a few weeks ago.

Jn

[truehobbit]

Thank you, Jny!

Part of the right side is missing as well

You really think so?
Because I thought of that possibility, too - it looks rather cut off, and that might explain why some things are impossible to make sense of!
But then I thought as the date is usually in the right hand corner, the right hand corner probably is what we see.

*jumps up and down, too, in hope of new insights*

[Jnyusa]

"You did not like the word 'piano' in my last letter"

the written page = word
+ pea + note minus T

possibly because the rebus was too hard to figure out?

Jn

[truehobbit]

That makes perfect sense to me!

It is a difficult word - as we've noticed ourselves!
I think it's quite possible that Father Francis would have deciphered the letters and commented on how Tolkien used the sounds and syllables in his pictures.
If pea + note - t makes "piano" it is indeed a mix of syllable/letters/sounds that is hard to fit in the standard logic of a rebus.

Now, if we could see the previous letter we'd know whether he indeed used the same word there!

Oh, and

[MaidenOfTheShieldarm]

That's so neat!

Perhaps the bike means "icicle" (Bicycle -b) and the musical bit is "save" or "safe. (A stave minus the t?) I realise those don't make much sense in context . . .

Really, I have no idea. Very cool, though. Never seen this before.

[truehobbit]

Maiden, so good to see you here!

I think the "bicycle - icicle" reading is brilliant, only I think not so very likely, because the 50 in front of it stands for an L, so we need to add an L in front of the word.

[MaidenOfTheShieldarm]

Then it's like.

Ooh. I wondered what those numbers stood for!

edit: you already figured that out. I am so slow. I am going to slink ashamedly out of this thread now. Just one more reason why I need to learn how to count.

[truehobbit]

Maiden, please don't feel bad!
You know, at first, the only thing I could figure out on my own was the "webspeak" part (u r 2), followed by "bee" = be.
I was able to solve a few more things later, but lots of the ideas others had I would never have thought of!
The thread had been up on TORC for several weeks, you can follow the link to see the discussion there, and what seems the solution so far is in the text underneath the image.

Yes, all the numbers represent the letters that stand for them in the Roman numerals.

[truehobbit]

I posted a link to this discussion on TORC and have asked Roccondil if he would agree to having the letter he provided discussed here.

He replied that that's fine by him, after all we want to figure out these letters, so I'm here inserting the picture of the letter Roccondil provided on TORC:



Reading for this letter as posted on TORC so far:

Line 1

Line 2

Line 3
we each (?) have
Line 4
found two lovely
Line 5
walks to take you
Line 6
when you do! Come
Line 7
(?) tea here which we hope
Line 8
will be soon.
Line 9 (on right)
Your (?) ing
Line 10 (on right)
Ronald

Which is also by way of bumping this and hoping for more input on this!

(Come on folks, if a twelve-year old could do it, then we can, too, can't we? )

[Jnyusa]

Middle line 2, spilling over to line 3:

We [ ] have found ... [2 + L + Bird - B + L + y]

wall + keys - ey = walks, so ... walks to take

We [ ] have found 2 [Lbirly] walks to take you when you do!

____

Sun over the ocean appears in both letters, and I take it to be "dawn" which might stand for "done." But I can't connect it to the pics before and after in either letter. The first one looked like "not to be done" or, I thought it might be "you are not to be outdone" but couldn't find anything for 'out.'

Jn

[truehobbit]

Ooooh - dawn/done is a good idea!

Yes, the fact that this image appears in both letters has been tickling me so much more for the fact that I couldn't figure it out in either!

About the walks - we'd already figured that out, and someone had found that the bird might be a dove, making it "lovely walks".
I'm sorry I forgot to enter this into the solution! I just copied the solution as Roccondil had it in one his posts, only he hasn't updated it, but reposted updates in a new post!
(Off to update the solution so far.)

(Good job, nevertheless, Jny! )


Edit: Earendilyon and areanor on TORC suggested "ready" for the "red A and D" in the first letter.
Again, not sure if that makes sense, but something to consider.

areanor suggested a verb like "set" or "rise" for the sunset pic.

[BrianIsSmilingAtYou]

Middle line 2, spilling over to line 3:

We [ ] have found ... [2 + L + Bird - B + L + y]

wall + keys - ey = walks, so ... walks to take

We [ ] have found 2 [Lbirly] walks to take you when you do!

Actually this bit was worked out to "lovely"

L + dove (a specific kind of bird) - D + L + Y = lovely

-----------

As I mentioned in the TORC thread, I like the idea of the sun as "done", but it needs to work in both letters, so the surrounding stuff needs to get worked out.

BrianIs AtYou

[Jnyusa]

In the second letter the sunset is followed by the teapot,

dawn + T = don't?

Then it would be 'done' in the first letter and 'don't' in the second letter.

But I can't make heads or tails of the first-line pictures in the second letter, much less what words they stand for. What is that mess of stuff following the hourglass, that ends with -ing?

Looks like and L on top of a fire and a teapot on top of an open door?

And the very first thing - is that a ham on a hook?

Jn

[truehobbit]

Hi Brian, good to see you here!

Jny, the right hand half of the paper is actually the next page, so the first line of the letter ends at the screwdriver thingy. The rest is part of the closing of the letter, line 9!

The first pic someone identified as a map of the river Wye!
So, this plus the hour - h made "your" in line 9.

No one yet had an idea about the "mess" after that, though. I agree it looks like some kind of fireplace or stove and a pot or lamp on a sideboard - LOL!

As I'm writing this I think if must probably make "loving" and I think it might: an L, an oven and "ing" - although it's a strange oven, admittedly.

And the very first thing - is that a ham on a hook?

That's a brilliant idea!
I couldn't even tell whether it belonged to the twig underneath it or not!

Something that also occurs in both letters is that weird circle thingy! Here, it got translated as an "o" simply - but I don't think that works in the other letter, where it follows the sunset pic.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I wanted to say I'm very much enjoying watching the way you guys' minds work. I, unfortunately, am completely useless at this type of thing. But I at least wanted to encourage y'all by pointing out that I am keeping up with this with great interest, even if I don't have anything tangible to add.

[Jnyusa]

V., we're all little kids trying to solve the pirate map!

Hobby, Aha! now the pages make sense.

L-oven-ing = loving was the first thing I thought of, too. I'm thrown by the teapot, which he uses in other places for the letter T. And the handle on the door doesn't look like an oven.

I thought possible the door plus '-ing' was "opening" but then I haven't a clue about the L , the first and the T.

The door actually looks like a cupboard or cabinet door, but that makes no sense with -ing.

Jn

eta: ah - the twig thing, a "bud" possibly, so bud + eye = buddy?

The more I think about that last line, I think you must be right, Hobby. The teapot just shows that the surface is hot, and the door is open to show that the first goes inside. Thus, oven. And it's "Your loving Ronald"

[BrianIsSmilingAtYou]

I think that there is something missing to the right.

Notice that the G has a stem that almost looks like it is another letter, such as another I.

Not only that but the text in the box below is cut off.

However, there must not be much that is cut off because the limerick even further below has "Frances" on the first line wrapping the text, but the second line has "cla[sses]" going off to the right and cut off in mid word, so we must be very close to the edge of the original paper.

Just for the heck of it, I will try to reproduce my reading of the limerick:

There was and* old priest named Francis [* a common error, should be "an"]
Who was so fond of "cheefongy"* cla[sses] [* best guess, perhaps a mock-French word]
That he sat up too late
And worried his pate
Arranging these Frenchified Prances

Does this indicate that there could be some French-related etymology involved in the rebus?

This is follow by a parenthetical note:

(This is to pay you out for not coming:~ sending Father Edmu[nd]
instead)

I wonder if any of this could have a bearing on the rest of the content of the note.

BrianIs AtYou

PS

If the first image is a "ham", then the first part could be

"Am sending you one..." where the "H" on "ham" is silent, as in ceratin English dialects.


Sending is S + "end" written out in the thread coming from the spool. -ing is hypothetical based on the large "letter" that could be a very large script lower-case g.

U = you
1 = one