# Sams 1970: Elgar's Cipher Letter to Dorabella

> Eric Sams, 1970. 6 records on Mysteries Department cite it. The best-known claimed solution.

Source: https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0CRZAGA45BG6/elgars-cipher-letter-to-dorabella  
Publisher: Mysteries Department  
Licence: CC BY 4.0 (credit Mysteries Department and link the page)  

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[Sources](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources)[Dorabella cipher](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher)Sams 1970

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# Elgar's Cipher Letter to Dorabella

Eric Sams, 1970. _The Musical Times 111(1524): 151-154_.

Proposes a substitution reading in which phonetic shorthand expands 87 symbols into 109 letters of English.

**Dorabella cipher** Articledoi: **[10.2307/956733](https://doi.org/10.2307/956733)** Checked against the original0

## What it's used for here

The best-known claimed solution.

## Cited by on this site 6 records

[A plain monoalphabetic substitution of ordinary English, one symbol per letter, read line by line.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher/answers/ANS0CRZAS3C3Q44/a-plain-monoalphabetic-substitution-of-ordinary-english-one)

Answer

ANS

[Sams's phonetic-shorthand reading is correct.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher/answers/ANS0CRZAXZM6F86/samss-phonetic-shorthand-reading-is-correct)

Answer

ANS

[Eric Sams publishes his reading in The Musical Times](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher/events/EVT0CRZAQ4W526P/eric-sams-publishes-his-reading-in-the-musical-times)

EVT

[Eric Sams](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher/people/FIG0CRZAN6C5J3S/eric-sams)

FIG

[The Dorabella cipher](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher)

The mystery article

MYS

[Is any published decipherment correct?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dorabella-cipher/questions/QST0CRZARVJ7VVV/is-any-published-decipherment-correct)

Question

QST

## Cite it

```
Sams, E. (1970). Elgar's Cipher Letter to Dorabella. The Musical Times 111(1524): 151-154. https://doi.org/10.2307/956733
```

[Find it at jstor.org](https://www.jstor.org/stable/956733)

Key

**SRC** 0CRZAGA45BG6

Kind

Journal article

Rights

The publisher's

Kept

29 Oct 2026, for editors

Checked

Against the published article

Added by

[apollo](https://mysteriesdept.com/u/apollo)

The record

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[CSL-JSON](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0CRZAGA45BG6/elgars-cipher-letter-to-dorabella/csl.json)