Sources and data

This page states where every file came from. It credits the work of others. It also states what may be done with each source. The data files are listed near the end, under The data.

The manuscript is out of copyright. Király and Tokai's dictionary and transcription are theirs. The readings, tests, English and editorial matter are this project's own.

What is cited

• Levente Zoltán Király and Gábor Tokai, "Cracking the code of the Rohonc Codex", Cryptologia 42:4 (2018), 285-315.
  The dictionary and the grammar are from Király and Tokai's 2018 paper.
• Levente Zoltán Király, "A Rohonci kódex teológiai karaktere", in Hagyomány, Identitás, Történelem 2022, KRE HTK, Budapest 2023, 363-376.
  The explanation of why their site exists is from Király's 2022 paper.
• Ottó Gyürk, "Megfejthető-e a Rohonci-kódex?", Élet és Tudomány 25 (1970), 1923-1928, on line breaks in the codex's repeated sequences
  The idea the orientation test rests on is from Ottó Gyürk.
• Benedek Láng, The Rohonc Code: Tracing a Historical Riddle, Penn State Press, 2021.
  The standing survey of the manuscript is from Benedek Láng's book.
• The anonymous author of the 2014 open transcription.
  The open transcription is from its anonymous 2014 author.
• Lajos Kálmány (1893) and Sándor Bálint (1978/79), for the Szeged folk tellings one endnote cites.
  The Szeged folk tellings one endnote cites are from Kálmány's 1893 collection and Bálint's survey of it.

The corpus

The codex is a compilation, and most of what its compiler wrote fits inside a small shelf of books. Every folio of the translation was read against the passage it retells, because an elliptical text does not become English on its own: the manuscript leads, and the source only ever says what one of its phrases means. This is that shelf. Every book on it is public domain, and each links to where it can be read.

How each was fetched and under what terms is in the provenance file; the reading itself is in the book, and every departure from these sources is named in its notes.

King James Bible

Project Gutenberg ebook 10, public domain.

Read it: Gutenberg 10

Douay-Rheims Bible (Challoner revision)

Project Gutenberg ebook 8300, public domain. Added 2026-09-20 because the codex is a Catholic compilation working from the Vulgate, and pooling candidate words off a Protestant English translation manufactures near-misses: a third of the King James candidate pool turns out to be wording no Vulgate reader would have had. It also supplies the deuterocanon — Tobias, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, Machabees — which the King James file here does not contain at all. Challoner's explanatory notes are set as separate paragraphs between the verses and are stripped, not pooled.

Read it: Gutenberg 8300

Wake, The suppressed Gospels and Epistles of the original New Testament

Gutenberg ebooks 6507–6515, public domain. Supplies the Protevangelium, the infancy gospels and the Gospel of Nicodemus.

Read it: Gutenberg 6507 · Gutenberg 6508 · Gutenberg 6509 · Gutenberg 6510 · Gutenberg 6511 · Gutenberg 6512 · Gutenberg 6513 · Gutenberg 6514 · Gutenberg 6515

York, Towneley, Chester and N-Town (Ludus Coventriae) play cycles

archive.org scans of 19th- and early-20th-century editions, public domain.

Read it: archive.org

Caxton's Golden Legend

archive.org, public domain.

Read it: archive.org

Barlaam and Ioasaph

attributed to St John Damascene, Woodward and Mattingly's translation — Project Gutenberg ebook 749, public domain. Added 2026-09-20. It carries the apologue of the man fleeing a unicorn who falls into a pit and clings to a tree gnawed by two mice, which folio 148v tells, and its moral names the falling man as "the race of Adam", which is why the codex writes him with Király & Tokai's Adam sign.

Read it: Gutenberg 749

The Roman Missal, English, 1865 and The Complete Office of Holy Week, 1875

archive.org scans, public domain. Added 2026-09-20 for the liturgy: a 1593 Catholic reader is at least as much missal and breviary as it is scripture, and the Reproaches of Good Friday that folio 048v tells live there and in no Bible. Both are Google scans of two-column books, so the Latin and English columns interleave and the OCR invents words; any token absent from the 1.75M words of period English in ALL.txt is dropped before use.

Read it: archive.org

R. H. Charles, The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English, vol. 2

(Oxford, 1913), from the Internet Archive scan apocryphapseudep02charuoft. Published 1913 and out of copyright. The Vita Adae et Evae in it is the source of the codex's opening -- Michael, the making of Adam, Seth at the gates of Paradise for the oil of mercy -- and nothing in the corpus had covered it. Only the Books of Adam and Eve are indexed: four fifths of that volume is critical apparatus whose dense rare vocabulary outscored every real parallel.

Read it: archive.org

Flavius Josephus, The Wars of the Jews

tr. William Whiston, Project Gutenberg ebook 2850. Public domain. The codex tells the siege of Jerusalem, Vespasian and Titus, and the mother who eats her child.

Read it: Gutenberg 2850

References for the endnotes

Some endnotes in Book One name texts outside the corpus. None was downloaded; each was read once at the address given, and nothing from any of them is reproduced. On 23 September 2026 every source behind all 55 endnotes was checked again, and the notes that had to be corrected say so on the page. What each supplied, and its copyright position, is in the provenance file.

• The Slavonic Book of Enoch (2 Enoch)
  The angel Vereviel dictates and Enoch writes 360 books (chapters 22-23). Survives whole only in Church Slavonic, over twenty manuscripts, 14th to 18th century; fragments of the short recension in Coptic, from Qasr Ibrim in Nubia, were published by Joost L. Hagen, "No Longer 'Slavonic' Only: 2 Enoch Attested in Coptic from Nubia", in Orlov and Boccaccini, eds., New Perspectives on 2 Enoch (Brill 2012) 7-34, www.marquette.edu. The dictation is read in R. H. Charles's 1913 translation, already on the shelf (section 5; the angel is Pravuil there), and the manuscript count from Hagen; the Wikipedia summary, en.wikipedia.org, was the first stop. An earlier version of this entry said the book survives only in Slavonic; that was wrong.
• The Apocalypse of Elijah
  Opens "The word of the Lord came to me" and has Enoch and Elijah killed by the Antichrist and raised after three days and a half (4:7-19); the work itself ends with their second coming. Coptic, third or fourth century. English text read at www.abrahamicstudyhall.org.
• Lajos Kalmany, Vilagunk alakulasai nyelvhagyomanyainkban (Szeged, 1893)
  Folk tellings from villages near Szeged: Elijah at the fall of the angels, Lucifer's war at the making of man, Elijah and Enoch taken up. Public domain; the PDF is at mek.oszk.hu: the Terjan telling of Lucifer forming Elijah and Enoch is on p. 11, Elijah at the fall of the angels on pp. 28-29.
• Sandor Balint, "Nepi kozmogonia, termeszetismeret", A Mora Ferenc Muzeum Evkonyve 1978/79-2, 429-466
  Restates and extends Kalmany's material, pp. 430-432. In copyright; consulted at epa.oszk.hu, not copied.
• The Romanian carols of Judas plundering paradise (Iuda și prădarea raiului)
  Judas takes the little jug of wine, the throne, the sun and moon; a servant tells God. Nineteenth- and twentieth-century collections, read in the survey at www.crestinortodox.ro.
• The Slavonic apocryphon of Michael and Satanael
  Bulgarian, 11th or 12th century. Satanael sets up a throne of his own and steals the robe, the wreath and the sceptre made for God; Gabriel is sent and refuses out of fear, Michael is sent and wins them back by a ruse. Plot read in Georgi Minczew, "John Chrysostom's Tale on How Michael Vanquished Satanael", Studia Ceranea 1 (2011) 23-54, open access at czasopisma.uni.lodz.pl; the throne above the seventh heaven is Nikolai Rainov's Bulgarian retelling at www.otizvora.com; the Romanian version is the subject of a 2017 Humboldt thesis (academia.edu 43677889, abstract only). The full editions (Miltenova 1981, 1983) were not reachable from here. An earlier version of this entry said Michael was sent twice; that was wrong.
• The Wartburgkrieg and the Grail
  Recorded as a trap: the 13th-century poem has a stone falling from Lucifer's crown; the cup was added by Albert Schulz ("San Marte") in 1832. The finding is William Ashton Ellis's, in the appendix to Life of Richard Wagner, vol. IV (London 1904), pp. 481-483, archive.org, public domain; first read in the reprint at www.jasoncolavito.com.
• John the Baptist and the Sons of the Prophets
  Catholic Encyclopedia (1908), "The Carmelite Order", www.newadvent.org, public domain, which says only that "some authors think" John revived the institute of the Sons of the Prophets; the note on 024r had called this a Carmelite tradition, corrected 2026-10-03; and the Order's own page on Saint Joseph, which records the medieval legend that the Holy Family visited the hermits at Elijah's well, www.ocarm.org. An earlier version of this entry pointed at the Order's page on Mary, which does not carry the legend; that was wrong.
• Suarez, De Angelis VII.13 (Lyon 1620, posthumous), and Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God (1670)
  Cited at second hand for the angels' test in its theological and its narrated forms; neither was read in the original. Suarez is cited as the Catholic Encyclopedia (1908), "Devil", cites him, www.newadvent.org; Agreda in George J. Blatter's 1914 translation, vol. I, book I, chapter VII, where the angels are told to admit as their superior "a Woman, in whose womb the Only-begotten of the Father was to assume flesh" and Lucifer refuses, www.ecatholic2000.com.
• Borbala Lovas, "Adam a kereszt alatt" (Adam under the cross), a Hungarian study on the ELTE server
  Quotes the Seth episode from the Erdy codex (1526-27), the Teleki codex (1525-31) and the Debreceni codex (1519), which were not reachable themselves, and says the Teleki codex is the one telling in which Adam is alive when Seth returns. An earlier version of this entry gave the study a wrong title. Read at magyar-irodalom.elte.hu.
• The Old Hungarian Corpus (Ómagyar Korpusz), Hungarian Research Centre for Linguistics
  The plain text of all 47 Old Hungarian codices it holds, normalised where it offers that and in the editors' original spelling where not, fetched 2026-09-26 at one request per 1.5 seconds from oldhungariancorpus.nytud.hu (`documents/kodexek/<id>/norm/<id>_4.txt`, else `3a/<id>_3a.txt`) into `data/ref/hu_codices/`, which is kept local and is not redistributed. Searched for Lucifer, Satan or the devil near a word for cup, chalice or stealing. Quoted in the book's appendix: the Virginia codex (1515) on the throne Lucifer lost through pride; the Kazinczy codex (1526-41, fols. 31v-33v) and the Érsekújvár codex on the devil and the sacristan's chalices, read whole in the Kazinczy text.
• Sanhedrin 97a and Carion's Chronicle
  The "prophecy of Elias": six thousand years, in three spans of two thousand. The Talmud read at www.sefaria.org. The chronicle itself, Carion, Chronica (Wittenberg 1532), is at archive.org, public domain, and its preface carries the scheme in Melanchthon's words: "Der spruch des hauses Elia. Sechs tausent jar ist die welt, vnd darnach wird sie zubrechen. Zwey tausent oed. Zwey tausent das gesetz. Zwey tausent die zeit Christi." The Wikipedia articles en.wikipedia.org and en.wikipedia.org were the first stop. An earlier version of this entry said the chronicle was not read; it now has been, at that page.
• Augustine, Quaestiones Evangeliorum 2.19
  The two pence of the Samaritan are the two commandments of love, or the promise of this life and the next. Latin at www.augustinus.it. The note on 105v had put the two Testaments on his authority; corrected.
• Tertullian, Adversus Praxean 8
  Root, tree and fruit; fountain, river and stream; sun, ray and the tip of the ray, for the three Persons. English at www.newadvent.org. The note on 083v had given the figure to Augustine's De Trinitate 6.10, which does not use it; corrected.
• Caxton's Golden Legend (1483), "Saint Augustine"
  The child by the sea is Caxton's own addition, from an altar-piece at the Black Friars in Antwerp, and he says so: "I have seen painted on an altar of S. Austin at the black friars at Antwerp, howbeit I find it not in the legend, mine exemplar, neither in English, French, ne in Latin." Voragine's Latin does not have it. Read in the Temple Classics edition, vol. 5, p. 66, archive.org, public domain; that is the volume that could not be fetched for the corpus (section 4). The note on 084r had put the story in the Golden Legend without qualification; corrected.
• Adso of Montier-en-Der, De ortu et tempore Antichristi
  Antichrist born of a Jewish father and mother of the tribe of Dan, the devil filling the womb; no harlot. English translation at www.tha.de. The note on 101r had tied the harlot to Adso; corrected.
• Council of Trent, session 22 (1562)
  The water mixed with the wine is chapter 7 of the doctrine and canon 9. English at en.wikisource.org. The note on 030v had cited canon 7; corrected.
• The Christmas proclamation of the Roman Martyrology
  "Anno a creatione mundi ... quinquies millesimo centesimo nonagesimo nono": 5,199 years from the creation to the Nativity, as the note on 223v says. Read in the Martyrologium Romanum in the text of Gregory XIII, Urban VIII and Benedict XIV, 1846 printing, 25 December, archive.org, public domain. The proclamation in use since 2004 reads "ages beyond number" instead, as at www.usccb.org; an earlier version of this entry pointed only there.
• Council of Florence, Laetentur caeli (1439)
  Souls are cleansed after death "penis purgatoriis", by purgatorial punishments; the bull does not name fire. Latin at www.vatican.va. The note on 088r had the council define a fire; corrected.
• The Protevangelium of James and the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew
  In the Protevangelium Anna "stood by the gate", unnamed; Pseudo-Matthew, chapter 3, has "the gate which is called Golden". Both at www.newadvent.org and www.newadvent.org. The note on 016v had put the Golden Gate in the Protevangelium; corrected.
• Mary's age at the Annunciation (018r:5), read 2026-10-04
  Protevangelium of James 8, "reached the age of twelve years in the temple", and 12, "she was sixteen years old when these mysteries happened"; Pseudo-Matthew 8, "when she was fourteen years old"; both at the newadvent addresses above. Caxton's Golden Legend, "The Nativity of Our Lady", "in the fourteenth year of her age", read at sourcebooks.fordham.edu.
• The infancy story against its sources (016v–022r), read 2026-10-04
  Protevangelium 1 (Rubim, no office), 5 ("in the ninth month Anna brought forth"), 17–18 (the ass; "he found a cave there"); Pseudo-Matthew 1–2 ("twenty years", "the priest, Ruben by name"), 3 (the Golden Gate), 13 (the cave), 23 (the idols fall); Caxton's Golden Legend, "The Nativity of Our Lady" ("divided all their substance in three parts", "twenty years", "the priest", "the golden gate") and "The Nativity of Our Lord" ("a stable for an ass that he brought with him, and for an ox"), volumes 5 and 1 at Fordham. Neither Latin text gives Mary's age at the birth (searched for fifteen and sixteen). The finding is in the Finds chapter.
• Council of Trent, session 22, chapter 7 (1562)
  "It has been enjoined by the Church on priests, to mix water with the wine", read at www.papalencyclicals.net. The note on 030v had Trent make the rule; corrected 2026-10-03.
• Origen, Against Celsus 2.62 and 2.68
  Names the Emmaus pair "Simon and Cleopas", read at www.newadvent.org, public domain. The note on 061r had called the codex's Luke "a western tradition", with no source; withdrawn 2026-10-03.
• The Golden Legend, Caxton's English (1483), as edited by F. S. Ellis (1900)
  "Saint James the Less" (vol. 3): the mother who roasts her child, Vespasian made emperor and leaving Titus at the siege, thirty Jews sold for a penny; "The Exaltation of the Holy Cross" (vol. 5): "the year of our Lord six hundred and fifteen", Cosdroe carries off the Cross and Heraclius brings it back. Read at sourcebooks.fordham.edu and `...Volume5.asp`. Replaces, 2026-10-03, an uncited Hegesippus (111v), "Vespasian and his son Titus took Jerusalem" (110v, corrected), and uncited dates 614 and 630 (183r).
• Douay-Rheims Mark 14:1, 14:10
  , read at www.drbo.org. Replaces, 2026-10-03, the 032r note's "Spy Wednesday in the Latin calendar", which had no source.
• Stephan Borgehammar, "Heraclius Learns Humility: Two Early Latin Accounts Composed for the Celebration of Exaltatio Crucis", Millennium 6 (2009) 145-201
  Edits the Reversio sanctae crucis and a sermon telling the same story, dates them between the end of the seventh century and the middle of the eighth, from an Eastern original of 630 to 636. Abstract at www.lunduniversity.lu.se; the article itself was not read. The note on 185v had said no chronicle of the period reports the scene; it now names the source.

What is not here

Király and Tokai's dictionary, transcription, page records and the library scans are not on this site. The signs are traced from the manuscript's own ink. The shapes are the sixteenth-century scribe's.

Their site is rechnitzer-kodex.hu, and it is the place to read them.

Where the scans are

The page images this project reads are the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Library’s low-resolution monochrome scan of K 114: 227 spreads at about 100 ppi. The Academy’s repository offers it for academic and educational use and marks it “do not pass on”, so it is not copied here. The places below hold the scan, the microfilm it descends from, or a few public-domain page images.

• Rohonci Codex K 114cs, Internet Archive
  A PDF named for the Academy’s K 114cs file, without a watermark. Not checked against the original.
• The Rohonc Codex, Internet Archive
  A complete PDF made from the microfilm.
• The Academy’s repository record
  Lists both the low-resolution monochrome scan and a high-resolution colour PDF of the codex; the colour file is restricted to repository staff.
• Wikimedia Commons
  A handful of page images and a facsimile photograph, public domain or CC0.

The data

The data is in the repository at github.com/styopr613/rohonc-codex. This section names the books the codex is read against and says where everything else goes.

The books every folio is read against are listed above, under The corpus.

The outside review

The two reviewers' specifications are quoted whole: Gemini 2.5 Pro and Grok 4.7. Their replies as re-glossers and blind readers are files, and go up with the rest.

Everything else

The dictionary of added readings with its evidence, the folio English, the rendering, every saved run, the outside readers' replies, the working documents and the programs are posted to GitHub, with their history, so that nothing here links to a copy that can go stale. The standing orders are already published whole at The standing orders.

The working documents

The project's working documents are described here. They are working files written for whoever runs the project next. They are kept accurate rather than tidy. Anyone who wants one can ask for it.

• The full account The line-break measurement that started it, the dictionary, all seventeen attempts to extend it with the ten that failed, what the book turns out to say, and what none of it decides. The longest of them by far.
• The standing orders What the next person is to do, in order, and the arithmetic of how much of the book is still unread. Three earlier versions of that arithmetic were wrong and are kept on the page beside the right one. Published whole.
• The tests in full Every test with the bar it declared before it ran, the control it was measured against, and the saved run it produced.
• Where each file came from Every source, the terms it carries, what may be done with it, and one courtesy failure recorded so it is not repeated.
• The vocabulary before the guesses Why the words had to be checked before the bracketed restorations were, and what that changed.
• The blindfold test The one check the project cannot run on itself, written as instructions for a stranger.
• The last unread words The final few per cent of the manuscript, how they were closed, and what the attempt taught.

Ask for any of them at [email protected].

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