Team cracks chapel's music 'code'


A father and son team from Edinburgh think they have found a secret
piece of music hidden in carvings at a famous medieval chapel in
Midlothian.

Stuart Mitchell, 41 and his father Tommy, 75, said they had
deciphered a musical code locked in the stones of Rosslyn Chapel for
more than 500 years.

They will perform the music in May at a concert in the 15th Century
chapel.

Visitor numbers to the chapel have increased rapidly since it
featured in Dan Brown's novel The Da Vinci Code.

Stuart Mitchell discovered a series of figures which he calls
an "orchestra of angels" at the base of elaborate arches round the
altar, with each angel holding a musical instrument.

He worked with his father to decipher the patterns on cubes which jut
out from the arches.


Over the years this became more of an obsession than anything else
and we decided we had to find out what was going on
Tommy Mitchell

Tommy Mitchell said the markings concealed a tune which they were
determined to crack.

He said: "We were convinced from the position at the top of the
pillars of the angels and they are all directly under the arches
where the cubes occur that there was music there.

"We got clues from other books as well. Over the years this became
more of an obsession than anything else and we decided we had to find
out what was going on."

"If these patterns and cubes had not contained music anything we
turned up would have been purely random and would not have sounded
hauntily beautiful."

Stuart Mitchell said the tunes could have been hidden because
knowledge of harmonics may have been seen as dangerous, even
heretical, by 15th Century church authorities.

He said: "What we have here is a recorded piece of music, it is
almost like a compact disc from the 15th Century."


Your comments

Music, like mathematics, is based on patterns. Mr and Master Mitchell
are free to translate patterns into music, though the harmonious
proportions they have found in the architecture of Rosslyn Chapel are
no more significant than those found in a '50s high rise. Perhaps the
magnificent symmetries of the Forth Bridge will provide the
inspiration for their next opus.
Jim, London


Yes I think this is very possible with the use of cymatics which
shows the shapes created by notes of sound. Whether the code was
hidden there intentionally I'm not sure, it will depend on how the
piece of music comes out.
Hannah Ireland, Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex


It will be very interesting to see how the code has been translated
into the exact musical notes, and what decisions have been made about
musical scale and modality. The snippet of the motet sound clip
suggests melodic and harmonic characteristics of a later period.
Paul, W. Yorkshire