The “FAE-EFB” Cipher in Variation XIII (✡ ✡ ✡)

Joseph Joachim (circa 1890)

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Carl Sagan

The English composer Edward Elgar excelled at cryptography, the science of coding and decoding secret messages. His obsession with ciphers merits an entire chapter in Craig P. Bauer’s book Unsolved! Bauer devotes much of the third chapter to Elgar’s meticulous decryption of a purportedly insoluble Nihilist cipher released by John Holt Schooling in the April 1896 issue of The Pall Mall Magazine. A Nihilist cipher is built on a Polybius square key. Elgar was so gratified by his decryption of Schooling’s impenetrable code that he mentions it in his first biography released by Robert J. Buckley in 1905. Elgar painted his solution in black paint on a wooden box, an appropriate medium as another name for the Polybius square is a box cipher.

Elgar’s meticulous decryption of Schooling’s cryptogram is summarized on a set of nine index cards. On the sixth card, Elgar likens the process to “working (in the dark).” Note his use of the word dark as a synonym for cipher.

Elgar’s parenthetical remark is revealing as he employs that same language in the original 1899 program note to characterize the Enigma Theme. It is an oft-cited passage that warrants revisiting as he lays the groundwork for his tripartite riddle:

The Enigma I will not explain–its ‘dark saying’ must be left unguessed, and I warn you that the connexion between the Variations and the Theme is often of the slightest texture; further, through and over the whole set another and larger theme ‘goes’, but is not played . . . So the principal Theme never appears, even as in some later dramas–e.g., Maeterlinck’s ‘L’Intruse’ and ‘Les sept Princesses’–the chief character is never on the stage.

Elgar wields the words dark and secret interchangeably in a letter to August Jaeger penned on February 5, 1900. He wrote, “Well—I can’t help it but I hate continually saying ‘Keep it dark’—‘a dead secret’—& so forth.” One definition of dark is “secret.” A saying is a series of words that form a coherent phrase or adage. Based on these definitions, Elgar’s odd expression—“dark saying”—may be interpolated as coded language for a cipher. In a roundabout way, Elgar hints that the Enigma Theme conceals a secret message.

Mainstream scholars insist there are no valid solutions to the Enigma Variation because Elgar allegedly concocted the notion of an absent principal Theme as an afterthought, practical joke, or marketing ploy. The editors of the Elgar Complete Edition preemptively deny the likelihood of any stealthy counterpoints or cryptograms. Relying on Elgar’s recollection of playing new material at the piano to gauge his wife’s reaction, they tout the standard lore that he must have extemporized the idiosyncratic Enigma Theme mirabelle dictu without any forethought or planning:

There seems to have been no specific ‘enigma’ in mind at the outset: Elgar’s first playing of the music was hardly more than a running over the keys to aid relaxation. It was Alice Elgar’s interruption, apparently, that called him to attention and helped to identify the phrases which were to become the ‘Enigma’ theme. This suggests it is unlikely that the theme should conceal some counterpoint or cipher needed to solve the ‘Enigma’.

Such a blanket renunciation conveniently relieves musicologists of any duty to probe for counterpoints and ciphers. Prominent offenders include such luminaries as Robert Anderson, Jerrold Northrop Moore, and Julian Rushton. The unavoidable irony is that proponents of such denialism extol the validity of their position based on a dearth of evidence for which they never executed a diligent or impartial search. Such a ridiculous state of affairs is a textbook case of confirmation bias pawned off as “scholarship.” Carl Sagan warns against that perilous persuasion with the antimetabole, “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.”

Embraced by those who take Elgar at his published word, the more sensible view accepts the challenge of a famous melody lurking behind the Variations’ contrapuntal and modal facade. In his sanctioned 1905 biograph, Elgar plainly states, “The theme is a counterpoint on some well-known melody which is never heard . . .” Most scholars insist the answer can never be known because Elgar allegedly took his secret to the grave. This supposition precludes from consideration the prospect that he encoded the solution within the Enigma Variations for posterity to discover. Indeed, such a rigid judgment glosses over or blatantly ignores Elgar’s obsession with cryptography. That incontestable facet of his psychological profile enhances the possibility that solutions are skillfully encoded by the Enigma Variations’ orchestral score.

A compulsion for cryptography is a reigning facet of Elgar’s personality. Trawling the Enigma Variations for over a decade netted over one hundred cryptograms in diverse formats that encode a set of mutually consistent and complementary solutions. Although that figure may seem extraordinary, it is entirely consistent with Elgar’s fascination for ciphers. Solutions encoded by these cryptograms answer the riddles posed by the Enigma Variations. What is the secret melody to which the Enigma Theme is a counterpoint and serves as the melodic foundation for the ensuing movements? Answer: Ein feste Burg (A Mighty Fortress) by the German reformer Martin Luther. What is Elgar’s “dark saying” concealed within the Enigma Theme? Answer: A musical Polybius cipher situated in the opening six bars. Who is the secret friend and inspiration behind Variation XIII? Answer: Jesus Christ, the Lord and Savior of Elgar’s Roman Catholic faith.

Some “EFB” Ciphers

A distinct subset of ciphers sprinkled throughout the Enigma Variations encode the initials of Ein feste Burg. Some noteworthy examples are the Enigma Theme Keys Cipher, Nimrod Timpani Tuning Cipher, Variation XII through XIV Letters Cluster Cipher, Mendelssohn Fragments Scale Degrees Cipher, and the Original and Extended Ending Ciphers. The Enigma Theme is written in the parallel modes of G minor and G major. The accidentals for those two key signatures (B♭, E♭, and F♯) are an anagram of “EFB.” The keys of the Enigma Theme unlock the initials of the covert Theme. It is also significant that the first three letters of the Theme’s title (Enigma) are an anagram of the Ein, the first word from the covert Theme’s title.

Variation IX (Nimrod) begins in measure 308 at Rehearsal 33. Elgar specifies the tuning of the timpani for this elegiac movement as E♭, B♭, and F. Those three note letters are an anagram of “EFB”, the initials of Ein feste Burg. The first three letters in the timpani’s tuning directions (“in E♭ . . .”) is a thinly disguised anagram of Ein, the first word in the covert Theme’s title. This mirrors the same pattern observed with the first three letters of the Theme’s title “Enigma” which form an anagram of “Ein”. The E♭in the timpani’s tuning supplies Elgar’s initial and the three pitches are separated by two perfect fifths. Two intervals of a perfect fifth suggest a coded form of Elgar’s initials (EE) as E is the fifth letter of the alphabet. Consistent with that pattern, the Rehearsal number (33) is also the mirror image of two capital cursive Es.

Variation XIII (✡ ✡ ✡) has a cryptic title of three black hexagrammic asterisks enclosed by parentheses. The absent initials signified by those starry asterisks are conveniently supplied as an acrostic anagram by the titles of the adjoining movements, XII (B. G. N.) and XIV (E. D. U. & Finale). Elgar frames the mystery posed by the cryptic title with the correct solution as an acrostic anagram using the titles of the neighboring movements.

There are four incipits in Variation XIII sourced from a subordinate theme of Felix Mendelssohn’s concert overture Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt (Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage). Two quotations are performed in A♭ major, one paraphrase in F minor, and another quotation in E♭ major. These Mendelssohn fragments encode the initials for Ein feste Burg using the number of statements in a given key to designate the scale degree of that particular mode. Two Mendelssohn fragments in A♭ major specify the second scale degree of that key which is B♭. One Mendelssohn fragment in F minor identifies its first degree of F. A single Mendelssohn quotation in E♭ major designates its first scale degree of E♭. The notes selected by this encipherment system—B♭, F, and E♭—are an anagram of “EFB”. These are the same three notes chosen by Elgar to define the timpani’s tuning in Variation IX.

There is an “EFB” acrostic anagram on the final page of the manuscript score with the original ending of Variation XIV. On that closing page, Elgar penned Fine, an Italian paraphrase from Torquato Tasso’s La Gerusalemma Liberata (Jerusalem Delivered) beginning with the word Bramo, and his autograph. The first letters of these three entries (Fine, Bramo, Edward) generate the acrostic anagram “EFB”, the initials of the covert Theme.

The anomalous date on that page—“FEb 18 1898”—furnishes yet another anagram of “EFB” coinciding with the anniversary of Luther’s death in 1546. As documented on the cover of the autograph score, Elgar completed the Enigma Variations on February 19, 1899. The erroneous date on the last page is one year and one day earlier than the actual completion date, a whopping discrepancy of 366 days. Luther is interred in front of the pulpit of Schlosskirche (Castle Church) in the city of Wittenberg. A coded reference to Luther’s death points to his resting place where “EIN FESTE BURG IST UNSER GOTT” is emblazoned around the church tower. Luther’s resting place supplies the title of the covert Theme.

The tower of Schlosskirche (Castle Church)

Like the original ending, Elgar inserted another acrostic anagram of “EFB” on a 96-bar addendum to the Finale composed in June and July 1899. His signature on the final page of this addition is accompanied by the word Fine and the location (Birchwood Lodge) where he completed the manuscript. The first letters of these three entries form an acrostic of “EFB”, the initials of Ein feste Burg. The L in “Lodge” even divulges the initial of its composer (Luther). That same initial is reinforced by the quotation at the upper right of the page from stanza XIV of the poem Elegiac Verse by Longfellow.

Three musical friends depicted in the Enigma Variations attended constituent colleges of Oxford University. The dedicatee of Variation II is the pianist Hew David Steuart-Powell who graduated from Exeter College. The dedicatee portrayed in Variation XII is the cellist Basil George Nevinson, another graduate of that same institution. The friend sketched in Variation V is the pianist Richard Penrose Arnold, a student of Balliol College. All three were active in the Oxford University Musical Society (OUMS) founded in 1872. Another Oxford graduate portrayed in Variation VII of the Enigma Variations is Troyte Griffith who attended Oriel College. Unlike his three Oxford peers, Troyte was unmusical and not actively engaged in the Oxford University Musical Society. The musical trio of Oxford students—Steuart-Powell, Arnold, and Nevison—were friends of Elgar’s wife and entered his social sphere following their marriage in May 1889.

Exeter College was founded in 1314 and adopted the Latin motto “Floreat Exon” (Let Exeter Flourish). Balliol College was founded in 1263 but does not advertise a collegiate motto. It is possible to obtain the initials “EFB” as an acrostic from the first letters of Exeter, its Latin motto “Floreat Exon”, and Balliol.

Exeter

Floreat Exon

Balliol

It is equally feasible to generate the acrostic anagram “EFB” using Exeter’s motto and the name Balliol.

Floreat Exon
Balliol

Elgar ingeniously encodes the initials of Ein feste Burg as an acrostic anagram using the college names and motto associated with three Oxford friends portrayed in Variations II, V, and XII.

This overview showed how Elgar encodes the initials “EFB” through a variety of different cryptograms. Most rely on the use of anagrams and acrostics to encode information. These ciphers represent a set of variations on the covert Theme’s initials. The “EFB” decryption is consistent with the majority of the titles from the Enigma Variations which are comprised of different sets of initials. This pattern of anagrams is consistent with the name “Craeg Lae” coined in March 1899 by Elgar for his new residence. The unusual moniker is an anagram of his forename spelled backward (Craeg Lea) mingled with the initials of Carice, Edward, and Alice (Craeg Lea).

Joachim’s Motto “EFB” Cipher

Another “EFB” cipher was recently discovered In Variation XIII (✡ ✡ ✡) of the Enigma Variations. Before presenting this discovery, it is necessary to revisit two related cryptograms. In Variation XIII, Edward Elgar openly cites a four-note melodic fragment from the concert overture Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage by Felix Mendelssohn. As shown earlier, the key letters of those Mendelssohn fragments encipher an anagram of “FAE”, the initials of Joseph Joachim’s romantic motto “Frei aber einsam” (Free but lonely). Elgar scholars should have easily spotted this simple musical cryptogram but were too preoccupied with denying the existence of ciphers in the Variations to mount even a cursory search. The “FAE” Cipher furnishes valuable clues about the covert Theme’s title and its composer. The discovery of the “FAE” Cipher embedded within the Mendelssohn fragments verifies that they harbor cryptograms.

There is a slightly more sophisticated cipher in the Mendelssohn fragments that encodes the initials of Ein feste Burg. This cryptogram relies on the number of times an incipit is stated in a given key to encode the scale degree of that particular mode. Two quotations in A♭ major pinpoint its second scale degree of B♭. One paraphrase in F minor points to its first scale degree of F. A third quotation in E♭ major identifies its first scale of E♭. These three note letters (B, F, E) are an anagram of “EFB”, the initials of Ein feste Burg. This set of initials supplies the absent letters in the cryptic title of three hexagrammic asterisks.

The latest “EFB” cipher found in Variation XIII bridges the “FAE” and Mendelssohn fragments “EFB” ciphers. Elgar devised a straightforward method to identify specific scale degrees from the three different keys of the Mendelssohn fragments to encode the covert Theme’s initials (EFB). What makes his formula even more extraordinary is that it also works with Joachim’s motto. The first scale degree of F minor is F, the same as the first letter in Frei. The second scale degree of A♭ major is B♭ which corresponds to the second letter in aber. The first scale degree of E♭ major is E, the same as the first letter of einsam. Applying the specific scale degrees associated with each key letter (one for F and E, and two for A) to letters from each corresponding word in “Frei aber einsam” highlights F, b, and e. These three letters are an anagram of “EFB”, the initials of Ein feste Burg. The methodology used to encode “EFB” in the Mendelssohn fragments also transfers seamlessly to Joachim’s German motto. This synchonous treatment of the FAE and Scale Degrees ciphers located in the Mendelssohn fragments yields identical decryptions that validate both cryptograms and illustrate Elgar’s mastery of cryptography.

To learn more about the secrets of the Enigma Variations, read my free eBook Elgar’s Enigmas Exposed. Please help support and expand my original research by becoming a sponsor on Patreon.

Soli Yah Gloria