Review article
https://doi.org/10.17234/Croatica.42.22
Cryptogram – a Very Short Introduction
Krešimir Bagić
orcid.org/0000-0002-5757-2451
; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The term cryptography stands for a scientific discipline that studies the techniques of encrypting and dispatching secret messages as well as the artistry of encrypting itself. Cryptogram is a message which has been encrypted in a secret type of script, a code only its addresser and addressee share. The first part of the paper sums up the history of secret communication by retracing its manifestations from the 7th century BC until present day. Some of these practices include: steganography (hiding the message), transposition and substitution cryptograms (devised by classical cryptography) and the asymmetrical RSA cryptosystem (which marks the beginning of modern cryptography). The second part of the paper focuses on the roles cryptogram plays in different cultural practices, primarily in enigmatography and literature. In these cases cryptogram does not seek to establish secret communication but motivates aesthetic and ludic enjoyment as well as the appeal of a quest. Finally, the paper defines cryptogram in literature as a figure of speech (writing) which explicitly signifies crypticness as an important quality of literary communication.
Keywords
cryptography; cryptogram; figure of speech; riddle
Hrčak ID:
206765
URI
Publication date:
30.10.2018.
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