The Shakespeare Ciphers Examined: An Analysis of Cryptographic Systems Used as Evidence that Some Author Other than William Shakespeare Wrote the Plays Commonly Attributed to Him
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1957.
First edition. An important association copy signed by the code breaking couple William F. Friedman and his wife Elizebeth Smith Friedman on the front free endpaper and warmly inscribed to Burton A. Milligan, editor of Three Renaissance Classics and a scholar of literature who is mentioned on p. 5, "To Professor Burton A. Milligan, to whom we are grateful for the reason given on p. 5 fn 3 ~ with cordial greetings and best wishes [signed] William F. Friedman Elizebeth Smith Friedman Washington 4 October 1957." [xvii], 303 pp. Bound in publisher's variant grey cloth with spine lettered in gilt. Near Fine, lightly worn, bookseller's ticket at front free endpaper. In a Very Good+ unclipped dust jacket, light wear at spine ends, small closed tear to front joint near crown and small corner crease at front flap; moderate foxing to verso. A Jewish immigrant from Russia, William joined Fayban's Riverbank Laboratories in 1915 and shortly began work on a pet project with American educator Elizabeth Wells Gallup where he courted his future wife and assistant to Gallup, Elizebeth Smith, an experienced codebreaker herself. The duo would begin a quest of nabbing bootleggers for the Coast Guard, busting Latin American Nazi spy rings, code breaking for the U.S. Government's Signals Intelligence Service and later debunking the Baconian theory that Francis Bacon was the author of Shakespeare's ouevre in this work; uncommon signed.
Price: $1,500