Didja Notice?

 

This book is dedicated to the memory of Denholm Elliott (1922-1994). Elliott is the actor who portrayed Marcus Brody in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

 

The book opens with two quotes from previously published works. The first quote is, as stated there, from Hamlet by William Shakespeare. The second quote, about the "true students of noble alchemie", is attributed to the Vicar of Malden here, but it's actual provenance seems unconfirmed, as research indicates it attributed to a number of different authors, and even to "anonymous".

 

Prologue: City of the Dead

 

The prologue takes place on March 31, 1933 in British Honduras. British Honduras was a crown colony of the British Empire in Central America from 1783-1981. It is now the fully independent country of Belize.

 

As the story opens, Indy gazes at the emerging dawn between two peaks of the Maya Mountains. This is an actual mountain range in Belize and Guatemala.

 

Indy rediscovers the lost city of Cozán, previously discovered and lost again by Sir Richard Francis Burton. Cozán is a fictitious location, though possibly based on the real world Copán, rediscovered around 1576 in Honduras during the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. Sir Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890) was a famed British explorer and writer. Burton's friend Tobias mentioned by Indy appears to be fictitious.

 

Indy's Guatemalan guide, Bernabé, thinks of him as a gringo. The term refers to any English-speaking foreigner in Central America (usually associated mostly with Mexico).

 

On page 2, Indy and Bernabé are travelling along a sacbob through the jungle. As noted in the text, this is an old Mayan road of white stones.

 

On page 3, Indy and Bernabé traverse the Street of the Dead in Cozán. The references to the Street of the Dead and the Temple of the Serpent here make it sound as if the fictitious Cozán is a stand-in for the real world Mesoamerican city of Teotihuacan in Mexico.

 

Hearing howler monkeys in the near distance, Bernabé tremblingly tells Indy that they are the gods of writing and gatekeepers of the underworld and that the souls of his people's priests came back as howler monkeys. Howler monkeys were considered gods of artisans, especially scribes and sculptors. I have not been able to confirm the rest.

 

On page 10, Indy finds the skeleton of Tobias in his Victorian era clothing. The Victorian era of England was from 1837-1901, during the reign of Queen Victoria.

 

In the prologue, Indy carries a .38 caliber revolver. Sarducci tosses it into the water of the cenote. Sarducci himself carries a Mauser automatic pistol. Mauser was a German firearms manufacturer founded in 1811 as Königlich Württembergische Gewehrfabrik and went defunct in 2004, spinning off into the two new firearms manufacturers, Mauser Jagdwaffen GmbH for civilian weapons and Rheinmetall Waffen Munition GmbH for military.

 

When Sarducci takes the crystal skull from Indy, he pronounces it as being from an unknown civilization prior to the Maya, one with superior skills to the Maya...and to our own. This is quite similar to the pronunciation of the crystal skulls that appear in the later Indy adventure, The Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls. While there are real world crystal skulls alleged to have been made by pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilization(s), modern scientists and academics are extremely skeptical, with research generally suggesting they were made in the mid-1800s in Europe, when interest in relics from ancient foreign cultures was very high.

 

Sarducci congratulates Indy on finally getting the respect he desires, having attained a position at Princeton University, an Ivy League school. The Ivy League is a system of private universities in the northeastern United States, generally considered to be elite and selective in admissions.

 

When Sarducci seems to admit to believing in the alleged supernatural properties of the crystal skulls, Indy cracks that he thought black magic went out with Paracelsus. Paracelsus (1493–1541), was a Swiss alchemist, philosopher, physician, and theologian of the German Renaissance. Some of the skills he learned were considered "magic" by some who lived at the time.

 

On page 14, Sarducci says, "Arrivederci, Dr. Jones!" Arrivederci is Italian for "until we meet again."

 

When Indy sees the 38-foot anaconda slithering behind Marco, he yawps out, "Holy St. Patrick..." St. Patrick was a 5th Century Irish bishop who has become known as the main patron saint of Ireland. As far as the anaconda goes, the largest ever found to date was about 29 feet.

 

The feeding habits of anacondas seem to be greatly exaggerated here. The snake gulps down Marco in essentially no time flat, then slithers into the water of the cenote briefly and re-emerges "moving quickly", ready to make another meal of Indy and Bernabé. In reality, it would take about an hour or so for it to swallow a large meal such as a person (or, more likely, a ruminant or caiman) and it would only need to eat something of that size around three times a year. After such a large meal, it would be sluggish, not moving quickly.

 

Having survived their Cozán ordeal, on page 19 Indy and Bernabé emerge from the jungle in San Pablo, Guatemala on Thursday of Holy Week. This probably refers to the San Pablo in Zacapa Department in Guatemala, as the closest to British Honduras. Indy previously experienced part of Holy Week in Rio de Janeiro in The Seven Veils.

 

On page 21, Indy and Bernabé witness a procession of Holy Week revelers acting out scenes of Jesus, Judas, and the Roman soldiers. Indy is confused that the crowd seems to cheer Judas, and Bernabé explains that the mixture of Christianity and local beliefs has Judas (the betrayer of Jesus) also assuming the role of Maximón, a Mayan god who makes people fall in love. This tradition in South America is essentially correct.

 

Chapter 1: Bits of Trash and Bone

 

As the chapter opens, Indy and Marcus are having a coffee at the Tiger Coffee House across from the Princeton campus while Indy reads the New York Times. Tiger Coffee House appears to be fictitious.

 

    Marcus asks Indy what he knows about the Voynich Manuscript and Indy says that, as he recalls, it is currently on loan at the rare book collection at Yale. I've been unable to confirm that the book was on loan to Yale University at this time, but it has been in the Yale Rare Books and Manuscripts Library since 1969.

    Indy goes on to say that the manuscript was written in an unknown language by the alchemist Roger Bacon and is reputed to hold the secret of the Philosopher's Stone. Bacon (c. 1219/20 – c. 1292) is one of many speculated to have been the author, but the book has been found to have been written on vellum pages dating to the 15th Century, 200 years after Bacon. The true author remains unknown. The Philosopher's Stone is a mythical alchemical substance capable of transforming base elements into gold and as an elixir of life (rejuvenation or immortality). The idea that the Voynich Manuscript may contain the secret of the stone is an invention of this novel's author, Max McCoy.

    The actual Voynich Manuscript was purchased by Polish rare book dealer Wilfrid Voynich in 1912 from the Jesuit College at Frascati near Rome, and that is when it's existence first became publicly known. Besides being written in an unknown, thus far undeciphered language, the book features many unusual illustrations of unknown plants and people.

   The book is available in its entirety online at the Yale Library's digital collection if you should care to attempt to decipher it yourself: Voynich Manuscript.

 

Marcus tells Indy that the Voynich Manuscript has been stolen and U.S. government agents came to him looking for Indy to help them locate it. Marcus says the theft has been kept secret. Indeed, in the real world, the book has never been stolen from its various owners as far as is known.

 

Page 24 states that for the past two years since Brody was named director of special acquisitions for the American Museum of Natural History in New York, the museum has quietly funded Indy's "research" to allow them to acquire new pieces for the institution's collection.

 

On page 25, Nassau Street is an actual street that runs along Princeton University.

 

On page 26, Marcus reminds Indy that archeology is not an exact science. This is likely a callback by the author to Belloq's line in Raiders of the Lost Ark, "Archeology is not an exact science. It does not deal in schedules."

 

On page 27, Marcus wants to introduce Indy to the Explorers Club. The Explorers Club is an international professional society of explorers and researchers founded in 1904, currently with 34 chapters around the world.

 

On page 28, Indy sees the government men riding in a new V-8 Ford. This likely refers to the Ford Model 18, the first automobile to use the Ford Flathead V8 engine, introduced in 1932.

 

Indy passes through the Fitz Randolph Gateway on page 28. This is a wrought-iron and concrete gate that serves as the official entrance to the grounds of Princeton University. 

 

Indy passes the Revolutionary War big cannon on his way to McCormick Hall. There is a Big Cannon and Little Cannon at Princeton from the American Revolution against Great Britain. The Big Cannon is a British cannon that was left behind by British forces when they fled the city following the Battle of Princeton in 1777. McCormick Hall is an actual academic building on the Princeton campus. (Photo of McCormick Hall from the Princetoniana Museum website.)

 

Acting Chairman of the Department of Art and Architecture at Princeton, Harold Gruber, is said to have a passion for Machiavelli. Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) was the author of The Prince, a guide on how an individual may gain and maintain power.

 

Page 29 reveals that Indy's office in McCormick Hall is 404E. Page 30 mentions that the office has been locked up since Easter, now smelling as musty as a tomb. This tells us that the story takes place some time after the Easter holiday of 1933.

 

In his office, Indy has a human skull from the temple of Angkor Wat and a plaster cast of the Rosetta Stone. Angkor Wat is the largest religious complex in the world, located in Cambodia and built in the 12th Century. The Rosetta Stone is an Ancient Egyptian stele transcribed in 196 BC, featuring a text in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, Demotic script, and ancient Greek, becoming a translation tool for Egyptian hieroglyphics.

 

Page 31 describes Princeton's Nassau Hall as having a cupola atop it with a bell. This is correct.

 

This novel introduces Princeton's archaeology department secretary, Penelope Angstrom. She will appear again in The Dinosaur Eggs.

 

When Indy realizes the meeting with the government men is going to put him late to his class, he notifies Miss Angstrom to inform his students and to tell them to review the material on Troy until he gets there. Troy was an ancient city from about 3600 BC to 85 AD in what is now the nation of Turkey.

 

Indy refers to Major Manly as the country's best Chaucer scholar and tells him he was impressed with his criticism of Newbold's solution in the Speculum. Geoffrey Chaucer (1340-1400) was an English poet, often called both the father of English literature and the father of English poetry. Manly (1865-1940) was an actual historical figure, educated at the University of Chicago, and who served as a cryptanalyst in U.S. Army intelligence and was one of the foremost Chaucer scholars. He published an article in Speculum, a quarterly medieval studies journal, that disproved William Romaine Newbold's deciphering of the Voynich Manuscript. Newbold (1865–1926) was an American philosopher who taught at the University of Pennsylvania.

 

On page 32, the Great War is the name commonly used at the time for what is now known as World War I.

 

On page 32, Agent Bieber lights a Lucky Strike cigarette. Lucky Strike is an American cigarette brand founded in 1871.

 

On page 36, Indy remarks that the superstition of crossing the path of a black cat causes bad luck comes from the Babylonians. Babylonia was an ancient city-state in Mesopotamia from about 1894-539 BC. Though the Babylonians considered black cats to be symbolic of serpents, I have not found evidence that the culture originated the "crossing the path of a black cat" superstition, which seems to have arisen in European folklore.

 

On pages 36-38, Indy instructs his class on Heinrich Schliemann. The information he imparts is accurate. The book that Schliemann's father gave him for Christmas in 1829 which inspired him to find the lost city of Troy is Illustrated History of the World by Ludwig Jerrer.

 

On page 37, the Trojan War is a story in Ancient Greek mythology about a war between the walled city of Troy in modern day Turkey and the Achaeans (Ancient Greece).

 

On page 38, one of Indy's students relates that Wilhelm Dörpfeld realized in the 1890s that there had been nine cities, one built atop the other, at the site of Troy. This is true. Dörpfeld (1853-1940) was a German archaeologist famed for his work on Bronze Age sites, including Troy. As another student remarks, Carl Blegen believed that one of the nine cities was the actual legendary city of Troy. Blegen (1887-1971) was an American archaeologist who was a member of the faculty of the University of Cincinnati.

 

Page 39 reveals that Miss Angstrom lives in an apartment on Witherspoon Street, overlooking Palmer Square. These are actual locations in Princeton.

 

On page 40, Indy asks Miss Angstrom if she's heard from Dr. Morey. She replies that she received a postcard from him and he is keeping himself busy at the Vatican, but misses Princeton badly. Charles Rufus Morey (1877-1955) was the chairman of the Department of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University from 1924-1945. He made numerous trips to the Vatican in Rome to develop and catalogue book collections there.

 

On page 41, Indy remarks to Angstrom that Ponce de Leon thought the Fountain of Youth existed in Florida. The Fountain of Youth is a myth that has been popular in numerous cultures for thousands of years as a fresh water spring that restores the youth of anyone who drinks from it. Currently, it is most popularly known in the West as the folly of Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de Leon, who allegedly searched for it in the New World in what is now Florida; however, the story of de Leon's obsession with finding the Fountain of Youth is now considered to be largely apocryphal by historians.

 

On page 42, Dr. Gruber tells Indy that he'd conferred with President Dodd (sic) and they agreed that Indy should step down from his teaching position. Harold Dodds (1889-1980) was the president of Princeton University from 1933-1957.

 

Chapter 2: The Most Mysterious Manuscript

 

On page 43, 77th Street is one of the actual bounding streets of the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. Central Park is across the street from the museum on Central Park West.

 

At the bottom of page 43, one taxi driver gives another "the universal hand signal of ultimate disrespect." This likely refers to the upraised middle finger. 

 

On page 45, Indy and Marcus take a look at the American Museum's current Archaeology of Mexico and Central America exhibit, which includes some of Indy's recent finds and a plaster copy of a curious reclining figure from Chichén Itzá. Chichén Itzá was a pre-Columbian city of the Maya people in Yucatán, Mexico. The reclining figure mentioned is probably this famed chacmool to the left.

 

Marcus introduces Indy to Vilhjalmur Stefansson, president of the Explorers Club, in front of the Majestic Apartments on 72nd Street in Manhattan. Stefansson (1879-1962) was the president of the club from 1919–1922 and 1937–1939, so he would not have been the president at the time of this novel (1933). He was known for having said "An adventure is a sign of incompetence...", just as he does to Indy here. The actual president of the club at the time was Roy Chapman Andrews (who is believed by some to have been one of the inspirations for the character of Indiana Jones!). Chapman "and his damned expedition to the Gobi" is mentioned by Stefansson here. The Gobi Desert is a large, cold desert region of northern China and southern Mongolia. Chapman led several Gobi expeditions in the 1920s.

 

After their less-than-pleasant encounter with Stefansson, Marcus and Indy have dinner at Carmine's. Carmine's is a famous Italian restaurant in New York City, established in 1906.

 

On page 48, Indy tells Marcus he left his bags in a locker at Penn Station and needs to go back and pick them up. Penn Station  is the major railway station in NYC. In 1933, it sprawled from 31st to 33rd streets, just as stated on page 65.

 

    On pages 49-50, Indy has a conversation with a one-legged British veteran calling himself Tommy Atkins. "Tommy Atkins" is a British slang term for a soldier, especially during WWI. The passage in the book gives the impression that it is the man's actual name, and Indy doesn't seem to recognize (or, at least, acknowledge) the British term.

    Atkins tells Indy he lost his leg in the Argonne. The Argonne is a forest in northeastern France which was the site of much trench warfare during WWI.

 

On page 51, Indy discovers Cadman's Rare Books at 611 W. 41st Street, in a building that looks as if it was from a Dickens novel. This appears to be a fictitious business. Charles Dickens (1812-1870) was an English writer and social critic who is often called the greatest novelist of the Victorian era.

 

A sign hanging above the front door of Cadman's Rare Books reads, "A good book is like a good friend" - Martin Tupper. The "good book" phrase is well known and has been attributed to a number of individuals in the past. Martin Farquhar Tupper (1810-1889) was an English novelist and poet.

 

On page 52, Cadman threatens to drop the A-L volume of the Oxford Unabridged on Indy's foot. This is a reference to the Oxford English Dictionary, considered the principal historical dictionary of the English language, first published in 1884.

 

On page 54, Cadman tells Indy he was visited by some Italians in fascist uniforms and he told them if they needed another book to burn they should consider some of that awful stuff Mussolini writes. This is a reference to the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, who ruled Italy from 1922-1943. He wrote several essays and books.

 

The information about the history of the Voynich Manuscript Cadman gives on page 56 is accurate.

 

On page 61, Cadman attributes the maxim "That which is above is below" to the classical alchemists. The phrase appears in its original known form as "Quod est superius est sicut quod inferius, et quod inferius est sicut quod est superius" ("That which is above is like to that which is below, and that which is below is like to that which is above") in the 8th-9th century Emerald Tablet, a Hermetic text existing in various translations from the European and Arab worlds.

 

On page 62, Cadman remarks on Jung's term "synchronicity", a meaningful coincidence. Swiss analytical psychologist Carl Jung (1875-1961) defined synchronicity as "circumstances that appear meaningfully related yet lack a causal connection." Indy met Jung in "The Perils of Cupid".

 

On page 63, Lord Rutherford, Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson (1871-1937), was a New Zealand physicist often called the father of nuclear physics. Though long credited with the first transmutation of nitrogen into oxygen, as Cadman remarks here, since 2017 science history texts have begun to credit Patrick Blackett with it instead; Blackett performed the actual experiments, with some help and advice from Rutherford.

 

Cadman tells Indy that Alistair Dunstin is probably the world's leading authority on alchemy and he has a position at the British Museum. The British Museum was established in 1753 and is one of the most prestigious museums in the world.

 

Chapter 3: Lords of the Sky

 

On page 65, the FBI, of course, is the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which investigates federal crime and provides internal intelligence for the U.S. government.

 

Entering Penn Station to retrieve his belongings, Indy reflects that the stairway leading to the main entrance was made from the same kind of cream-colored stone as the Colosseum.

 

On page 65, Indy sees a headline on the front page of the New York Journal: "Balbo Air Armada Leaves in Triumph, Bound for Europe." The New York Journal was an actual daily newspaper under a few different names over the decades from 1882-1966; it was technically called the New York (Morning) American in 1933. "Balbo" was a term used for a large formation of aircraft in the 1930s-40s, named for Italian flying ace Italo Balbo. I have not been able to confirm whether this headline ever actually appeared in the paper. Another mention of Italo Balbo himself and his visit to Chicago appears on page 77. As seen later in the novel, Balbo was also Governor-General or Libya under Italian rule (1933-1940).

 

Major Manly arranges for Indy to fly to Europe on U.S. navy airship U.S.S. Macon. This was an actual airship in service from 1933-1935. Indy catches the airship at the U.S. Naval Air Station at Lakehurst, New Jersey. This is now Lakehurst Maxfield Field at Joint Base McGuire–Dix–Lakehurst. Indy previously visited Lakehurst in The White Witch. (Photo of the Macon from Wikipedia.)

 

The cab Indy takes from Penn Station to Lakehurst is a Plymouth. Plymouth was an American automobile brand manufactured by Chrysler from 1928-2001.

 

On page 67, the Macon is said to have German-made Maybach engines. Maybach is a German luxury car brand.

 

As Indy clings onto the loose mooring line of the airship as it takes off on page 69, he is reminded of a newspaper photo he had seen of two young seamen falling to their deaths from a mooring line of a dirigible in San Diego. This memory is from an actual incident involving the USS Akron in May 1932.

 

The Macon's commander is said to be Alger Dresel. Dresel was the actual commander of the Macon, sister ship of the aforementioned Akron, which was also under the command of Dresel during the San Diego incident. Macon was commissioned on June 23, 1933, so that may give us another point of chronology of this novel, i.e. post-June 23. Further, crewman O'Toole tells Indy he was on the Akron when it broke apart and sank into the water "a couple of months ago," which occurred on April 4, 1933.

 

Macon crewman O'Toole is a baseball fan and keeps a Louisville Slugger among his belongings on the ship. The Louisville Slugger is a famous model of baseball bat made by the Hillerich & Bradsby Company.

 

Page 74 reveals that Indy has a new Webley revolver.

 

Commander Dresel tells Indy that his drop off in London (where he will continue on by other means to Rome) will have to be by Sparrowhawk. The Curtiss F9C Sparrowhawk is a light fighter aircraft carried by both the Akron and Macon, mounted underneath. The Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company existed from 1909-1929, until it merged with Wright Aeronautical to become Curtiss-Wright Corporation.

 

As hinted at on page 75, the United States supplies the vast majority of the world's helium.

 

Commander Dresel tells Indy that the Macon's improved design makes her "quite literally unsinkable," and Indy retorts, "That's what they said about the Titanic." And the Macon does later sink after being damaged in a storm off the California coast in 1935. And, in case your forgot, Indy was aboard the Titanic when it struck an iceberg and sank in 1912, as depicted in The Titanic Adventure.

 

On page 75, "Il Duce" is essentially Italian for "the Duke" and was a nickname used by Mussolini.

 

On page 76, OVRA was the secret police of Mussolini from 1927-1945. The organization's name never appeared in any official Italian documents for secrecy reasons, but it is believed that OVRA stood for Organizzazione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell'Antifascismo (Organization for Vigilance and Repression of Anti-Fascism).

 

The dossier on Sarducci that Indy reads on page 76 says he was born in Fascati, Italy. There does not seem to be a town of that name, but I believe this is a misspelling of Frascati, a city in the area of greater Rome.

 

The dossier reveals that Sarducci studied at the Sarbonne and received a doctorate from the University of Rome.

 

Pages 77-78 state that Balbo called his elite cadre of airmen atlantici. Atlantici is Italian for "Atlantic".

 

The SIAI airplanes mentioned on page 78 are actual models that were manufactured by SIAI-Marchetti, an Italian aircraft manufacturer from 1915-1983.

 

As stated on page 78, during his U.S. tour, Balbo visited New York City, Coney Island, Broadway, and Madison Square Garden, met President Franklin Roosevelt, and had a street named after him (Balbo Drive in Chicago)!

 

On page 79, Ponta Delgada is an actual Atlantic island in the Azores, part of Portugal. Lisbon is the capital city of Portugal.

 

Page 79 reveals that Indy's residence at this time is a rented house at 1226 Chestnut in Princeton. Although there is a Chestnut Street and Chestnut Court in Princeton, there is no 1226 address on them.

 

On page 83, Mario Volatore says, "Eccomi, Dottore Jones!" This is Italian for "Here I am, Doctor Jones!"

 

On page 85, Mario says, "Come si chiama...la bomba?" This is Italian for "How is it called...a bomb?"

 

On page 87, Mario shouts out "Spazio!" before he lets himself fall from the Macon into the sea. This is Italian for "Space!" Indy explains on page 89 that it was the Fascist war cry, as in space as "territory", elbow room. My research suggests the full cry was "spazio vitale"..."vital space".

 

On page 88, O'Toole mentions Babe Ruth. George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (1895–1948) was an American Major League baseball player, playing for the Boston Red Sox from 1914–1919.

 

Commander Dresel tells Indy he can't wait to get him off his ship, as "trouble" seems to be his middle name and Indy responds, "Actually, no." His actual middle name is Walton, the same as his father. The name was first seen in "My First Adventure". "Walton" is also the middle name of Indiana Jones creator George Lucas.

 

Chapter 4: Soror Mystica

 

The title of this chapter is Latin for "Mystic Sister".

 

Arriving in London by Sparrowhawk, Indy sends a coded message back to Major Manly to have Marcus ask the museum to wire him travel money to the Bank of England to get to Rome, designated as working capital for an expedition to the Isle of Wight as a cover story. The Bank of England has been the chief issuer of paper currency for the UK since 1694.

 

On page 91, the Sparrowhawk pilot tells Indy that a few months from now the plan is to remove the landing gear from the Sparrowhawks and replace them with long-range fuel tanks. This is true, the Sparrowhawks assigned to airships had the landing gear replaced with fuel tanks for longer flight range. The landing gear was not needed because the small planes docked with the airship by a trapeze mechanism underneath the ship, not by "landing".

 

As the milk truck driver states on page 91, "Londinium" was the name of the city established by the Romans that eventually became London.

 

Indy and the milk truck driver discuss how history repeats itself, such as Roman legionnaires fighting the English natives for control of England and then British soldiers fighting Zulus in Africa or the Irish in Belfast.

 

On page 92, Indy gets off a double-decker bus on Tottenham Court Road in Bloomsbury and sees the Greek facade of the British Museum a few blocks ahead. This is all accurate to a map of London.

 

In the library of the British Museum, Indy finds the librarian behind a desk described as looking like "it had already been there when Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo." Napoleon Bonaparte was the high general, First Consul, and Emperor of France from 1799-1814. Napoleon met his defeat at the hands of the forces of the Seventh Coalition in the 1815 Battle of Waterloo.

 

Alecia points out that the Caliph of Baghdad once threatened to have Indy boiled in oil (a misunderstanding, Indy tells her).

 

The clerk at the Bank of England doesn't believe Indy's story of having gotten into the country without a passport due to arriving in the U.S. Navy dirigible Macon, and retorts, "And were Tinker Bell and Peter Pan aboard?" Tinker Bell and Peter Pan are characters in the 1911 fantasy novel Peter and Wendy by J.M. Barrie about a boy who can fly.

 

Page 98 reveals that Indy has carried a card of the Boy Scout oath with him since childhood. Indy was seen to be a member of the Boy Scouts of America (now Scouts BSA) in a few of his youth adventures.

 

Alecia Dunstin lives in a flat on Southampton Row. This is a thoroughfare through Bloomsbury.

 

Alecia confides in Indy that she visits cemeteries and particularly likes to go to Mortlake and visit the grave of Sir Richard. Mortlake is a suburb of London. The "Sir Richard" she refers to is Richard Burton (the explorer mentioned earlier in this study), whose tomb is at the cemetery of St. Mary Magdalen Roman Catholic Church Mortlake.

 

Among the souvenirs in the Dunstin siblings' flat are a miniature Eiffel Tower and a toy cannon from Gettysburg.

 

On page 101, Alecia tells Indy that Alistair breeds passenger pigeons he keeps up on the roof of the building. Indy responds, "Homing pigeons," and Alecia says, "I suppose." Indy is presumably correcting her, since passenger pigeons, once native to North America, went extinct due to human hunting of them by 1914.

 

The history of Hermes Trismegistus' Emerald Tablet and its rediscovery by Alexander the Great and loss after his death which Alecia tells of on pages 102-103 is accurate to the myth.

 

The story of The Book of Abraham (more commonly referred to as The Book of Abramelin) and The Gospel of St. Dunstable and the hands they/it passed through as told by Alecia is essentially true to history, with embellishment.

 

Alecia claims that the Voynich Manuscript (and The Book of Abramelin and The Gospel of St. Dunstable, which she claims are all one and the same) is a kind of Rorschach test for the soul: that you look at it and it mirrors whatever you believe in. A Rorschach test is a psychological test in which the patient's perceptions of a series of ink blot cards is used to interpret their psychological status. 

 

On page 105, Alecia claims that Nicolas Flamel (1330-1418) successfully made a lot of gold through alchemical transmutation and that he and his wife, Perenelle, were made essentially immortal by the philosopher's stone, saying the couple gave lots of money to hospitals and churches, etc. and were seen attending opera in Paris centuries later in 1761. But, historically, while the couple was known for their philanthropy later in life, Perenelle brought wealth into the marriage from money she'd gained from two previous marriages. The reported sighting of the pair in 1761 seems to be taken by the author from the 1957 E.J. Holmyard book Alchemy, which provides no source for the sighting.

 

On page 109, the couple who are neighbors to Alecia are listening to the BBC on radio.

 

When Alecia retrieves a carved piece of obsidian from her flat, Indy realizes it is a shew stone. This is a term for what is essentially a crystal ball.

 

On page 112, Indy and Alecia eat at a pub called Dark Horse. This appears to be a fictitious pub for London. Possibly the pub's name is nod to the publisher of Indiana Jones comic books at the time, Dark Horse Comics.

 

On page 114, Alecia speaks Shelta Thari to a pub patron in order to make him understand that she does not want Indy beaten up. Shelta Thari is an actual secret language or travellers language that is part Celtic and part Germanic.

 

On page 116, Indy asks Alecia if her body tattoo is a kell. Her response is, "Not exactly. It is the mark of the Thari, the ancient Druid caste of metalworkers..." I've not been able to uncover what Indy means by "kell". Possibly, it is a shortened term for "Celtic" ornamentation.

 

On pages 119-122, Indy and Alecia find themselves dodging the bullets of the atlantici in a scrap yard called, ironically, Jones Wrecking. This is likely a fictitious business in London.

 

On page 123, Alecia turns towards the Thames as she makes the decision not to return to her usual haunts where the atlantici will likely know to look for her. The Thames is the longest river in England, running through London.

 

Chapter 5: Flotsam and Jetsam

 

When Alecia volunteers to scrye the pages of the Voynich Manuscript for Indy as she did for her brother, Indy tells her he doesn't believe in such things and that it all begins to remind him of that business with Arthur Conan Doyle and the fairies. Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was a British writer and the creator of Sherlock Holmes. He also had a strong interest in spiritualism, mysticism, and paranormal subjects, including the photos of the so-called Cottingley Fairies taken by two teen cousins (Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright) that later were shown to be faked by the girls.

 

As Alecia, in trance, begins to translate the Voynich Manuscript on page 130, the first paragraph of the manuscript ("Praise be to God...") is actually from Jabir ibn Hayyan's 9th Century Kitab al-Ahjar ‘ala Ra'y Balinas (The Book of Stones), an alchemical text that reputedly told how to create living tissue from other matter. The third paragraph ("Speak not fictitious things...") is from the previously-mentioned Emerald Tablet. Other passages seen here are small phrases from other esoteric sources or are original to the author of the novel.

 

On page 130, Tabula Smaragdina is Latin for "Emerald Tablet".

 

Forced to abandon the garbage scow, Indy and Alecia stow away aboard their pursuers' Savoia-Marchetti 55 seaplane.

 

On page 141, Indy admits to Alecia that he can't read Italian. Yet, he is known to be able to speak it in "Love's Sweet Song" and "To Have and Have Not". When the pair arrive in Rome, it seems that he is unable to speak it either, as far as this novel is concerned.

 

On page 144, the seaplane begins its landing approach to the Ostia seaplane base near Rome. This is an actual water airport on the coast of the Ostia neighborhood of Rome.

 

Chapter 6: Tower of the Winds

 

On page 145, a soldier says, "Uno momento." This is Italian for "One moment."

 

On page 146, the soldier says, "Che ha detto?" This is Italian for "What did you say?"

 

When Indy and Alecia are stopped at the Ostia port by an Italian soldier, Indy mumbles "Mozzarella" and "Ravioli", possibly in an attempt to identify themselves, seemingly not understanding or able to speak Italian. After knocking out the soldier, Alecia complains that he could have used such names as Botticelli, Raphael, Polo, or Columbo. These are names of famed Italian (or Italian-adjacent) artists and explorers.

 

On page 147, Indy and Alecia's Fiat cab pulls up to the Inghilterra on the Via Bocca di Leone, though the pair decide not to stay there. The Inghilterra (Hotel England) is an actual 5-star hotel on the Via Bocca di Leone in Rome.

 

Rome is referred to as the Eternal City on page 47. This is one of the nicknames of the city.

 

On page 147, Balbo and the atlantici, greeted by Mussolini, march under the Arch of Constantine. This is a triumphal arch in Rome dedicated to Constantine the Great, Roman emperor from 306-337 AD.

 

Indy and Alecia end up staying at the Royal des Etrangers hotel near the Piazza Colonna. The Royal des Etrangers ("Royal Foreigners" in French) appears to be a fictitious hotel for the time. The Piazza Colonna is a public square in the Colonna district of Rome.

 

The clerk at the Royal des Etrangers is named Giuseppe Rinaldi. Possibly he was named by the author for the Italian actor of the same name who lived from 1919-2007.

 

Rinaldi tells Indy the hotel is discreet, bragging that Mussolini and his mistress had once stayed there and he told no one. The mistress mentioned may be Clara Petacci (1912-1945), though her relationship with the married Mussolini is said to have begun in 1936, while this novel takes place in 1933. Petacci remained his mistress until near the end of WWII, when both were captured by Italian partisans and executed together.

 

On page 149, Rinaldi tells Indy the hotel's restaurant is buono. This is Italian for "good".

 

Indy reads the New York Herald Tribune in the restaurant while he waits for Alecia to finish her bath. This was an actual newspaper from 1924-1966.

 

When Indy tells Alecia that Italy's airplane armada had traditionally lost one of every six planes in the crossing of large distances such as the Atlantic Ocean, she calls it Russian roulette. Russian roulette is a game of chance in which a revolver is loaded with a single round, the cylinder is spun, and the player places the muzzle against their head and pulls the trigger, hoping they haven't landed on the loaded chamber.

 

On page 150, Alecia remarks that Rinaldi probably thinks Indy is John Dillinger and she his gun moll. John Dillinger was an infamous U.S.gangster and bank robber during the Depression who was killed by FBI agents during a shootout in Chicago on July 22, 1934.

 

On page 152, Indy and Alecia enter the Museum of Antiquities in Rome. This may be a generic name used for a museum that existed at the time.

 

On the museum floor plan in the guidebook, Alecia finds a room marked Maestro di archeologia. This is Italian for "Master of archeology".

 

Sarducci's secretary, Caramia, greets Indy and Alecia as Dottore and Signorina. These are Italian for "Doctor" and "Miss", respectively.

 

On page 155, Caramia is said to smile "a Mona Lisa smile". The Mona Lisa is a famous painting by Leonardo Da Vinci, painted in the 16th Century. The smile on the woman in the painting is considered enigmatic by many.

 

Sarducci's office is furnished and decorated with items from the Renaissance. The Renaissance is the period of European history covering the 15th and 16th centuries, a time of renewed interest in ideas in art and science.

 

Indy picks up a sword in Sarducci's office and the man tells him it was made in Toledo 600 years ago. Toledo is a city in Spain that is traditionally known for metalworking, swords in particular, historically.

 

On page 159, Sarducci compares himself to Faust, suggesting he's made a deal with the devil. Faust is the main character in a German legend (based on the historical 16th Century figure, Johann Georg Faust) of a man who makes a pact with the devil for knowledge and worldly pleasures.

 

On page 160, Sarducci warns Indy, "As your poet said, you are as one whose name is written upon the water." He is referring to John Keats (1795-1821), an English poet who had carved on his tombstone the words, "Here lies One whose Name was writ in Water."

 

On page 161, Indy grabs a sword from the hands of a wax statue of a Roman legionnaire in the museum and Alecia asks him if he knows how to use it and can he dance, referring to what she says is an old Celtic proverb, "Never give a sword to a man who can't dance." This is an aphorism that has been heard around the world for some time, but its provenance is unknown. Some say it is a Celtic proverb, others one from Confucius or other sources.

 

On page 162, a security guard at the museum shouts, "Fermata!" at the fleeing Indy and Alecia. This is Italian for "Stop!"

 

Also on page 162, Indy and Alecia run past glass cases of Aztec, Mayan, and Incan artifacts and past a reconstructed stone arch from Tulum. Tulum is the site of an ancient Mayan walled city in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo.

 

On page 167, Nicholas quotes from the Bible, "what does it profit a man to gain the whole world only to lose his own soul?" This is from the Bible's Book of Mark.

 

On page 168, Indy and Alecia pass through the Gate of St. Anne into Vatican City and down the road to the Court of Belvedere to the stairway leading to the Vatican Library, next to the statue of the antipope Hippolytus. The Gate of St. Anne is the border crossing between Italy and the Vatican City State. The Court of Belvedere is a 16th Century architectural work leading up to the Vatican Palace, including the library. Hippolytus (c. 170–235 AD) was an important Christian theologian who became the first antipope (a person who claims to be the pope as the leader of a Christian faction at odds with the Catholic Church).

 

    Indy and Alecia are approached by a Swiss guard who asks them their business at the Vatican. The Pontifical Swiss Guards are honor guards for the pope and his palace within Vatican City.

   The pair explain to the guard that they are looking for Dr. Morey and the guard says he is in the Secret Archives in the Tower of the Winds. The Secret Archives are now known as the Vatican Apostolic Archive and it is located in the Tower of the Winds (or the Gregorian Tower, for Pope Gregory XIII). They find Morey in the Meridian Room of the archives, an actual room in the tower. The anemoscope Morey describes on page 171 is also there.

 

On page 168, Alecia essentially uses the Jedi mind trick on the Swiss guard! Call it a Celtic mind trick, I guess. (Another woman, Anita, a Mayan, performed a similar trick in The Feathered Serpent!)

 

The Council of Trent mentioned by Morey was held in Trent, Italy from 1545-1563 as an ecumenical council to discuss questions and issue changes of church doctrine.

 

Chapter 7: Sand

 

Marlow's crew delivers crates of Thompson submachine guns to the Arab prince in Libya. This is a real gun, famously known as a Tommy gun during the gangster era of the 1920s-1930s.

 

On page 175, "Allah" is the Arabic word for "God".

 

Prince Farqhuar is enchanted by the writings of Jules Verne and Mark Twain. Jules Verne (1828-1905) was a French writer known for his fantastical science-fantasy novels. The story described by Farqhuar of the cannon shell fired to the Moon is from Verne's 1865 novel From the Earth to the Moon. Mark Twain was an extremely popular American writer and humorist of the 19th Century.

 

On page 177, Indy tries half-heartedly to convince Alecia to go with Captain Marlow to Cairo and wait for him there with Sallah. Sallah is Indy's friend there, whom he first met in Tomb of Terror.

 

On page 184, upon finding a couple of light bulbs are not working in the latrine, Alistair remarks, "You'd think if Mussolini can make the trains run on time, they could change a few lamps around here." There was a popular saying during Mussolini's reign in Italy, "Say what you like about Mussolini, he made the trains run on time."

 

On page 186, an Italian soldier says, "Grazie." This is Italian for "Thank you."

 

When Sarducci asks where Alecia is, Indy responds on page 191, "...she took off long before sunrise. You'll never find her. She's got enough supplies to last a week and a Bedouin guide who knows every inch of this country like the back of his hand." This is similar to his response to Donovan about Marcus Brody in The Last Crusade when he says, "He's got a two day head start on you, which is more than he needs. Brody's got friends in every town and village from here to the Sudan, he speaks a dozen languages, knows every local custom, he'll blend in, disappear, you'll never see him again." In both cases, Indy's lying through his teeth. The Bedouin mentioned here were a nomadic Arab ethnic group of the deserts, now mostly settled in the modern cities of the Middle East.

 

On page 195, tenente is Italian for "lieutenant".

 

Sarducci claims that the tattoo on Alecia's back points the way to various spots on Earth, including Alexandria, Moscow, and the Tomb of Hermes.

 

Sarducci says that Alexander discovered the Tomb of Hermes roughly on the border of Libya and Egypt during his pilgrimage in Siwa. Alexander the Great made this pilgrimage to consult the oracle at the oasis of Siwa, who proclaimed that Alexander was the son of Amun (one of the major Egyptian gods) and therefore the legitimate Pharaoh of Egypt.

 

Sallah claims that Prince Farqhuar is one of his brothers-in-law. Tomb of Terror established that Sallah has a number of extended family members who do him favors.

 

On page 201, Farqhuar accompanies Indy and the others on their quest for the Tomb of Hermes, announcing they have not yet discussed the wonderful autobiography of Huckleberry Finn. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is an 1884 novel by the aforementioned Mark Twain, told in the first person of the words of Finn.

 

Chapter 8: The Stone

 

On page 210, Indy mentions the Valley of the Kings. The Valley of the Kings is a real world archaeological site where the Pharaohs of the Egyptian New Kingdom (16-11th Centuries BC) were entombed.

 

On page 212, Sallah reveals that he does not know how to swim.

 

On page 214, Farqhuar is said to speak to his men in tarog. I've been unable to find this term as a language or dialect.

 

On page 215, the statue found of Hermes Trismegistus in the underground cave depicts him wearing a robe covered with alchemical symbols, including the winged Mercury. Mercury is the Roman god of commerce and communication and wears winged shoes and hat. Mercury is essentially the same as the Greek god Hermes.

 

On page 216, Indy reads the Coptic inscriptions on the arch found in the cave. Coptic is a group of Egyptian dialects starting around the 3rd century AD.

 

The Latin phrase Visita Interiora Terrae Rectificando Invenies Occultum Lapidem Indy and Alistair find abbreviated as VITRIOL in the cave inscriptions is a well-used phrase in the annals of alchemy. Alistair's English translation of the phrase here is accurate ("Visit the interior parts of the earth, and by rectifying you will discover the hidden stone."). As soon seen on page 222, "vitriol" is also an old name for sulfuric acid.

 

Indy and Alistair find foot stones in the chamber floor with zodiacal symbols on them. Alistair deduces they may need to step on them in alchemical sequence to proceed without triggering a trap, and he proceeds to guide Indy along the sequence through Calcination=Aries, Congelation=Taurus, Fixation=Gemini, Dissolution=Cancer, and so on. But there are a number of so-called "alchemical sequences" historically, in different order. How did Alistair know which one to apply here?

 

Epilogue

 

Indy informs Marcus that he plans to tell the FBI that the Voynich Manuscript is gibberish, the Tomb of Hermes does not exist, and the philosopher's stone is just a dream.

 

On page 234, ruba is Italian for "steal". On the next page, Indy translates it as "stolen", but that word would be rubato. 

 

Unanswered Questions

 

Who stole the crystal skull from the American Museum? Readers learn more about that and the skull itself in three of the following novels by the same author, The Dinosaur Eggs, The Hollow Earth, and The Secret of the Sphinx.

 

The stolen Voynich Manuscript still has not been returned to the museum. Who has it now? Will it ever be returned to the public eye?

 

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