The Most MYSTERIOUS BOOKS In History!
So let's jump right into it. These are the 10 most mysterious books in history.
Number one is the Book of Soyga.
Also known as Aldaraia, the Book of Soyga is a legendary book that exists right now in the UK that is said to have been presented to Adam himself by the angels of God in the Garden of Eden. The 197 pages of the book consists of everything from spells, rituals, and information on other magics, demonology, and astrology. The first known owner of this book was John Dee, a well-known Elizabethan mathematician, astrologer, and consultant to the court of the queen. He possessed over 3,000 books, which was the largest library in England at the time. After his death, however, the book seemed to vanish from existence only to suddenly resurface in not one but two different places in 1994. One was the British Library in London and the other was the Bodleian Library in Oxford.
Number two is the Rohonc Codex.
All 448 pages of this book are written in a language that to this day is still indecipherable. The Rohonc Codex's words are written from right to left on each page and are accompanied by 87 illustrations of military battles, landscapes, and other images that may have religious influence. Scholars have noted that the number of symbols used in the book are 10 ten times those in any known alphabet. The codex was discovered in 1700 in Hungary and since then many have tried to decipher it with wildly different translations. The fact is this mysterious book may never be truly understood.
Number three is the Great Omar Book.
Francis Sangorski was a bookbinder from London who started a firm in 1901 and created the first of what many claims to be the most cursed book of all time. The book that Sangorski made found its way to the bottom of the Atlantic when it sank with, of all things, the Titanic. Then there was a second copy made usingSangorskii's original drawings which was destroyed soon after completion in the early days of World War II when London was bombed during the Blitz. It then took 40 years to finish the third copy, which was donated to the British Library after its maker, Stanley Bray, died.
Number four are The Prophecies of Nostradamus.
Possibly the most famous book on this list, The Prophecies of Nostradamus is one that is widely claimed to have predicted several major events in human history. These include the rise of Napoleon and Adolf Hitler, the Great Fire of London, the dropping of the first nuclear bomb, and even the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City. People seem to consistently be linking every disaster, both those that occur naturally and those that are man-made, to the words that Michel de Nostradame wrote 400 years ago. Now this is highly contested with many believing that these predictions are 100% accurate and some that just call them out as false.
Number five is the Ripley Scroll book.
Named after the 15th century Augustinian monk and alchemist George Ripley, the Ripley Scroll reads almost like a journal and it's essentially a real life wizard's spell book. It chronicles the man's travels across Europe as he combed the land in search of immortality and the secrets behind transmutation. Legend has it that he was able to change lead into gold with a spell contained within the pages by creating the philosopher's stone. This, of course, in turn was used to make the elixir of life, which many claims had made the monk immortal.
Number six is the Popol Vuh.
According to a tale told by Francisco Ximenez, a Dominican priest, the Popol Vuh was a manuscript given to him when in 1701 he visited a small town in Guatemala. The Popol Vuh, which translates to the Book of the People, contains an elaborate creation story involving four deities, a brief history of the planet, and cosmology teachings. Though he cites his source as a parishioner in the town, no similar manuscript has ever been found. There are some scholars who argue that he should never have been given access to the pages since it was considered a closely guarded secret. The Popol Vuh is definitely a book shrouded in mystery.
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Number seven are the Beale Ciphers.
The Beale ciphers are basically like the beginning of a real-life national treasure. The pages are actually a trio of ciphers which lead to a massive hidden treasure of gold, silver, and jewels worth nearly, brace yourself, $63 million. As legend has it, in 1820 the pages were given in a box by Thomas Beale to an innkeeper in Virginia named Robert Morris. The box was given with the instruction that he should only open the box if Beale did not return within 10 years. And of course Beale disappeared so naturally Morris opened the box and began trying to break the code written on the papers inside. In all of history, only one of the pages has ever been deciphered and it took, believe it or not, the Declaration of Independence as a key to unlock it.
Neither of the codes have ever been broken to this day and many claims that the treasure is still out there waiting to be found.
Number eight are the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Discovered in 11 caves across the shore of the Dead Sea, starting with one that two goat herders found, the Dead Sea Scrolls are considered the greatest manuscript discovery of modern times. They were found between 1947 and 1956 and contain, amongst other things, the oldest collection of Old Testament manuscripts ever discovered. These included prophecies by Ezekiel, Daniel, and Jeremiah that had never been found in the Bible before. The scrolls themselves are unbelievably over 2,000 years old and at least one of them is an ancient treasure map to 64 different buried treasures.
Number nine is the Liber Linteus.
The Liber Linteus only contains 1,200 words written on 230 lines but what makes it truly unique is what those words are written on and also what it was used for later. The ancient text refers to the Etruscans, people who populated Italy before the rise of the Roman Empire. It's scribed on linen, making it the only known example of a book made that way. Interestingly after the Etruscans fell their Roman conquerors would have destroyed the text if for not how it was preserved and hidden. The Liber Linteus was written on wrappings covering an Egyptian tailor's mummified wife, which is how it was discovered in the 1800s when the mummy was donated to a museum.
Number 10 is the Voynich manuscript.
This final one is vastly considered the most mysterious book on the planet. The Voynich manuscript is so old and confusing that many an argument has been had to how exactly it needs to be studied. Written by an anonymous author, the manuscript is almost impossible to translate but some people claim that it's actually a puzzle. The book, which in the 1800s was part of a Jesuit library, is named after Wilfred Voynich, a Polish book dealer who came into its possession in 1909. It's an illustrated, handwritten codex penned in a language that was previously unknown. To this day it's still not known exactly what the manuscript is or even what's said on its pages.