Help wanted: 1900 document, can't recognise script - or is it code?
I'd be grateful for help with this document, which turned up in a recent auction lot. The first line clearly says "Johannesburg 24/5/00", but then I can't make head or tail of it;either it's in a script and language I don't recognise, or it's in some code. I'll post an image of the first page; there are three more pages.
Best to all,
Bas
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The date on the letter is the day that the British Army entered and occupied Johannesburg.
The heading with the date is written in a deliberate way, as though they are less familiar with writing English than with what follows in code in the body of the letter.
Johannesburg, being the 'City of Gold', wealth and opportunity, attracted a large, mostly east European criminal class before the South African War. These criminals were successful and well-organised. Some of them almost certainly would have used a secret code to communicate with each other. While many of these east European criminal departed for the coast in the Uitlander flight, enough remained in Jo'burg kicking their heels for the British to call them 'riff-raff' when they occupied Jo'burg.
Finally, the recreational art of writing coded letters like this was a more common past-time then than it is today. It could possibly be based on a non-English language shorthand.
Good luck. You have piqued my interest. I would love to know what it says.
Hi
I also suspect that it might be in mirror script...
Regards
Mike
You can observe that it is written from right to left, so probably some Indian/Malay script; if you lucky from one of the many Indian contingents that participated in the Boer War or a Trader.
Some characters are very similar to characters in Oriya script.
I see the bottom part is cut off in the scan. This can provide further information.
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