Poem on the Box
The Poem on the Box is the final layer of encryption protecting the Priory of Sion's keystone, a marble cryptex designed by Leonardo da Vinci. Jacques Saunière, the Grand Master of the Priory, inscribed the poem in reverse text on the underside of the rosewood box's lid, hidden beneath an inlaid rose. The poem is written in English iambic pentameter, a meter with deep pagan roots associated with the pentacle of Venus and the sacred feminine. It reads: "An ancient word of wisdom frees this scroll... and helps us keep her scatter'd family whole... a headstone praised by templars is the key... and atbash will reveal the truth to thee."
Structure and Meter
The poem's meter is iambic pentameter, a rhythmic pattern of five pairs of unstressed and stressed syllables. This meter was historically preferred by outspoken literati and secret societies across Europe, from the ancient Greek writer Archilochus to Shakespeare, Milton, Chaucer, and Voltaire. Langdon recognized it as having mystical properties, with the five feet representing the pentacle of Venus and the sacred feminine. The Priory, like many European secret societies at odds with the Church, considered English the only pure European language for centuries, as it was linguistically removed from Latin, the tongue of the Vatican.
Deciphering the Password
The first line, "An ancient word of wisdom frees this scroll," points to the Greek word "Sophia," meaning wisdom. Sophie Neveu's name derives from this root, and her grandfather had taught her that her secret initials, P.S., stood for "Princesse Sophie." The password for the cryptex is SOFIA, the ancient Greek spelling of wisdom with five letters. The third line, "a headstone praised by templars is the key," refers to Baphomet, a pagan fertility god whose stone head the Knights Templar were accused of worshipping. When the Hebrew spelling of Baphomet (B-P-V-M-Th) is subjected to the Atbash cipher—a substitution code where the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet is replaced by the last, the second by the second-last, and so on—it yields Sh-V-P-Y-A, which, accounting for Hebrew pronunciation variations, spells "Sophia."
The Atbash Cipher
The Atbash cipher is a simple substitution code based on the twenty-two-letter Hebrew alphabet. It dates back to 500 B.C. and is found throughout the Kabbala, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the Old Testament. Sophie Neveu, a cryptographer, recognized it immediately from her training. The cipher works by reversing the alphabet: the first letter (Alef) becomes the last (Tav), the second (Beit) becomes the second-last (Shin), and so on. When applied to the Hebrew spelling of Baphomet, the result is the five-letter word that unlocks the cryptex.
The Second Cryptex
When the first cryptex was opened, it revealed not a map but a second, smaller cryptex made of black onyx, nested within the first. This second cryptex contained a vial of vinegar and was wrapped in a vellum sheet bearing another four-line poem in iambic pentameter. That poem directed the seekers to a knight's tomb in London, where the password for the second cryptex could be found. The password for the second cryptex was eventually revealed to be "APPLE," referring to the orb that ought to be on Sir Isaac Newton's tomb—the apple that fell from heaven, struck Newton on the head, and inspired his life's work, symbolizing the fall of the sacred feminine.
