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Pigpen cipher fonts

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sample of Pigpen

Pigpen

 

Pigpen, Pigpen Square, and Royal Arch, the three fonts in this package, are suitable for intercepted or otherwise obtained secret messages of all types. Due to their historical associations, they are particularly suitable for games set in a realistic or fantastic version of the real world, particularly those with pulp and adventure themes. Royal Arch, though a pigpen cipher, does not closely resemble the others, especially in its diagonal form, and its weathered versions in particular are good for fantasy or historical use. Royal Arch, using the mixture of cases described below, will drive escape room participants batty. It is perhaps the cipher most recognizable as a cipher, which can be good if you want to ensure that the players will recognize what they see as  a secret message.

Yes, several versions of the Pigpen cipher really were used by the Freemasons. They were also used for secret messages during the US Civil War, by the Rosicrutians, and reputedly by other secret groups. Pigpen also features in children's books as a means of secret writing for notes to one's friends. Blaise de Vigenère's book Traicté des chiffres, ou Secrètes manières d'escrire, published in 1586, contains one of the earliest documented examples of this cipher. There's even a tombstone, that of one James Leeson, with a Pigpen inscription on the top edge. That's actually a three-grid version like Pigpen Square, though with the grids in a different order.Pigpen grid layout

Pigpen ciphers are based on a key grid which can be easily reconstructed, so there is no need to keep a written key that could be stolen by an enemy. Different versions can be created simply by the sender and recipient agreeing on what order the grids and the letters should be in. This version uses one of the simplest key grids, which is shown here.

The three fonts in this package:

Pigpen itself is in the usual plain, calligraphic, heavy, and outline forms in Regular, Italic, Bold, and Bold Italic respectively. The calligraphic form has straight letters in the lowercase and slightly tilted (both left and right) in the uppercase. By using TextJiggler (Windows only) with a bias of 60% or so toward uppercase, the characters will be randomly mixed at different angles for an even more handwritten look. It uses Thomas Hunter's extension of the X-shaped grids to allow for numerals as well without affecting the ordinary Pigpen symbols.

Pigpen Square is a version of Pigpen that uses only square grids, with no X-shaped ones. It has been extended to four in order to allow for numerals; all numerals except 0 therefore have three dots in them. Given that James Leeson's tombstone has recognized Masonic symbols on it, this cipher must have been used by the Masons of New York City in the late 1700s, as Leeson died in 1794.

Royal Arch, despite its most common name being that of a Masonic degree, is historically more closely associateRoyal Arch casesd with the Rosicrucians. It is also a pigpen cipher, but using lines instead of dots, which gives it a totally different look. Like Pigpen Square, it uses square grids, originally three but here extended to four to allow for numerals as well. Along the normal version with straight lines, found in Regular and Italic, a form with angled lines has been created to add interest. Italic and Bold Italic are weathered versions. In addition, in the Regular and Italic forms, the uppercase has vertical rather than horizontal lines as shown in the example. You can either use it normally, with the secondary version denoting capitals, used either all uppercase or all lowercause, or use TextJiggler to randomize them, giving you effectively 52 alphabetic symbols to make breaking it slightly tougher.

Incidentally, the Nug-Soth cipher alphabet is also a form of Pigpen, although some of its letters are placed randomly in their grids, defeating the purpose of having an easily reconstructed key.

sample of Pigpen


FONT LICENSE INFORMATION: Wintertree fonts are licensed as ordinary commerical fonts. This means you can install the font on your computer to use with programs such as word processors, design tools and similar applications, and use it for creation of print or PDF documents, images (JPEG, TIFF, PNG, etc.) and logos. In other words, you can use the Wintertree fonts to make things with and sell the things you make, but you can't sell the font itself in any way, or use it as a web font (@font-face). Credit is gratefully appreciated but not required.

The font used for the title text in the product graphic is Remington, from The Vaults of McTavish.

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Discussions (1)
Customer avatar
Florian B January 07, 2018 6:07 pm UTC
PURCHASER
Awesome fonts!! :) ... Will there be a commercial license as well? ;)
Reply
Customer avatar
Florian B January 07, 2018 6:54 pm UTC
PURCHASER
Hey Jean,

First: Thanks for the fast reply! :)

Second: Great to hear that Pigpen (and supposedly your other fonts) is open for commercial use! :) ... I already have some puzzle ideas for various adventures i'm writing right now ^^

And yep, a license note would be great for any buyer! It's still a little tricky for us to see if we can use a font / stock art / etc for our commercial projects; even if a (cryptic) license is included. A clear note (plain textfile or something like that) would give us some security.


Thanks again !!! :)
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2203
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File Last Updated:
December 31, 2017
This title was added to our catalog on December 31, 2017.