ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the work of medievalist and early modern scholars like philologist John Matthews Manly, who was chair of the Department of English at the University of Chicago from 1898 to 1933 with exception of his leave from 1915 to 1919 to serve in the United States Military Intelligence Division (MID) during World War I. The juxtaposition of the records of Manly's scholarship with those of his service in military intelligence powerfully emphasizes not the difference but the overlap in the kinds of work he was doing. The emphasis on a material system to support retrieval of data is also apparent in Manly's earlier work on pedagogical materials for very young students. By contextualizing ciphering within its changing cultural landscapes, humanists and scholars of the arts and sciences engage in a type of criticism that seems to assume an artifact can reveal disguised truths upon close scrutiny by disciplinary professionals.
