Cryptography Reference
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to King Henry IV (Henry de Bourbon-Navarre) of France, and a Huguenot
sympathizer. (The Huguenots were the Protestants in France in the six-
teenth and seventeenth centuries.) Henry had come to the throne in 1589,
but it would take him almost a decade to secure his kingdom. The problem
was
La Sainte Liguea
, or the
Holy League
, a French Catholic faction opposed
to the
protestant
king. Philip supported the Holy League for which reason
Henry declared war on Philip in January of 1595. Viete was brilliant in his
cryptanalysis of Spanish letters from Philip, destined for the Holy League.
When Philip found out about Viete's
cryptanalysis of his letters to com-
manders in France, he was absolutely
stunned, having had the firm belief that
his ciphers were unbreakable. He looked
for other reasons, even going so far as to
complain to the pope that “black magic”
was being used against him and Spain.
He was rebuked, since the pope had Gio-
vanni Batista Argenti in his employ (see
page 58), who was a powerful cryptana-
lyst, so he understood the real nature of
the cryptological world, something that
Philip sorely lacked. This lack would
come back to haunt him.
Ultimately, Henry defeated the Holy
League and their Spanish allies at
Fontaine-Francaise in Burgundy in June
of 1595, and retook Amiens from Spanish
control in September of 1597. On May 2
of 1598, the
Peace of Verins
was reached
between France and Spain on May 2 of 1598. In that year, Henry ended more
than four decades of persecution against the Huguenots, by putting forth the
Edict of Nantes
, which was their charter of religious and political freedom.
Figure 2.1: Francois Viete.
From Galerie Francaise, ouCollec-
tion des Portraits (Didot, 1842), I,
plate 24.
Mary, Queen of Scots
Philip was going to encounter even more trouble, largely due to his inabil-
ity to understand the powerful cryptanalytic techniques available. Philip had
a dream to overthrow Queen Elizabeth I of England, establish a marriage with
Mary Queen of Scots, and thereby secure a shared Catholic throne with her.
However, letters written between Philip and his half-brother Don Juan of Aus-
tria, detailing his invasion plans for England, were intercepted by William of
Orange, who was leader of the Dutch and Flemish revolt against Spain. William
gave the missive to his cipher secretary, Philip van Marnix van Sint Aldegonde
(1540-1598), a brilliant cryptanalyst, whose decryption of the correspondence
revealed Philip's planned invasion of England. William then gave the plain-
text to an English agent in the employ of Sir Francis Walsingham, Principal
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