Did the Zodiac Killer hide a code in purposely misspelled words? The Early Modern English Code
A thread I came across on the Zodiac Killer subreddit had me spending my entire weekend down the weirdest rabbit hole. The user who made the thread discovered an interesting pattern in the Zodiac Killer's letters that I had never heard before: The misspelled words, which people have debated about since the Zodiac's letters were first published by Bay Area papers in 1969, all appeared to be actually the archaic versions of the words. The reddit post included examples of the early modern English spelling of words like "paradice," "Christmass," "victom," and "woeman" that are similarly spelled in Zodiac letters. In this video, I go over the major recent developments in the Zodiac case that have brought a renewed focus to the Zodiac communications including the solving of the z340 cipher in 2020 after it had been unsolved for 50 years, the Tahoe27 discovery that the Zodiac Killer likely borrowed some imagery from the 1950s Western comic book called Tim Holt issue 30, and finally the publication of Jarett Kobek's two-volume set of Zodiac-related books in 2022 which begat a new popular suspect named Paul Doerr. Then, we go through the first few Zodiac letters to look for misspellings that might actually be early modern English words. I also explain the potential significance in light of the fact that there were only a handful of important books that people would have owned in the early modern period, so if we discover a pattern in the words the Zodiac was using, it might be related to a code based on the position or page number of these words in, say, the original King James bible published in 1611. Sources and notes: This Is The Zodiac Speaking - 2007 Documentary: • This Is The Zodiac Speaking - 2007 Documen... The reddit thread that inspired this video: / some_zodiac_misspellings_found_in_17th_and... Now It Can Be Told - The Zodiac Killer: • Video New English Dictionary online: https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu... David Oranchak's youtube channel - Let's Crack Zodiac - Episode 5 - The 340 Is Solved!: • Let's Crack Zodiac - Episode 5 - The 340 I... ZodiacCiphers.com article on the Tim Holt / Zodiac connection: https://www.zodiacciphers.com/zodiac-... BleedingCool.com article on Tim Holt issue 30: https://bleedingcool.com/comics/zodia... We Heard You Like Books indie publisher of Jarett Kobek: https://weheardyoulikebooks.com/ Clip from Zodiac (2007): • Zodiac (2007) Ending Hobbitalia 3, Paul Doerr's zine: https://fanac.org/fanzines/1_Issue-Ma... Los Angeles Magazine article on Paul Doerr and Jarett Kobek: https://lamag.com/news/zodiac-killer-... Linguistic analysis clip from the Zodiac (2007) DVD extras: • Zodiac Killer - Linguistic Analysis ZodiacKiller.com letters page: https://www.zodiackiller.com/Letters.... Wikipedia entry for "Silhoutte": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silhouette GrammarPhobia blog on "clew" vs. "clue": https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/20... Merriam-Webster tweet thread on "clew" vs. "clue": https://twitter.com/MerriamWebster/st... Isaac Smith Sr. to John Adams letter with "cruzeing": https://founders.archives.gov/documen... Thank you!