World Mysteries - Shepherd’s Monument Inscription Mystery

World Mysteries - Shepherd’s Monument Inscription Mystery

All across the world, there are still many mysterious ancient scripts, tablets, codes and maps that until this day remain undeciphered.

World Mysteries - Shepherd’s Monument Inscription Mystery

For a long time, the Shepherd’s Monument in Staffordshire, England and its cryptic inscription was considered to be a great puzzle to all who tried to solve the enigma of the mysterious letter combination. The code inscribed on the Shepherd’s Monument has eluded decipherment for over 250 years.

Many of the world’s greatest minds have tried to crack the code and failed, including Charles Dickens and Charles Darwin. The 10-letter inscription – DOUOSVAVVM has remained a mystery.

Those of a romantic disposition believed it to be a coded message of the kind used by the Knights Templar and their successors to point to the whereabouts of the Holy Grail or some other religious relic. Others believed it to be a private affirmation of love.

The monument located at the grounds of Shugborough Hall in Staffordshire, England, was commissioned by Thomas Anson, paid for by his brother, Admiral George Anson, and fashioned by the Flemish sculptor Peter Scheemakers.

It is set within a stone arch which appears like an entrance to a cave, carved to look natural and wild. It contains a marble bas-relief copy of Poussin’s painting “The Shepherds of Arcadia” and a carved inscription below it.

The relief shows a woman and three shepherds, two of whom are pointing to a tomb. On the tomb is carved the Latin text ET IN ARCADIA EGO (“I am also in Arcadia” or “I am, even in Arcadia”).

Shepherd's Monument 'code' was 19th century graffiti

World Mysteries - Shepherd’s Monument Inscription Mystery

It is a secret code that has confounded some of the finest minds of the past 150 years, and proved irresistible to hundreds of conspiracy theorists.
Explanations for the eight-letter inscription on the 18th century Shepherd's Monument, at Shugborough Hall in Staffordshire, have ranged from a coded love letter to Biblical verse.
Some have even suggested that the letters OUOSVAVV – framed at either end by DM – were a sign left by the Knights Templar pointing to where the Holy Grail was buried.
Their true meaning, however, could prove a disappointment to lovers of Da Vinci Code-style mysteries.
According to the historian AJ Morton, the inscription is little more than graffiti left in the early 19th century by the former Shugborough residents George Adams and his wife, Mary Vernon-Venables.
Mr Morton, an expert in graves and monuments, explained that the letters could be matched to the couple, relations of Thomas Anson, who built the monument in the mid-1700s. "There doesn't appear to be any reference to the curious letters until the 19th century. This suggests, quite strongly, that they were added later," said Mr Morton. Nothing in Thomas Anson's life fits the letters in the inscription … except the family of his nephew, George Adams."

The Inscription

Perhaps the most convincing explanation is often the simplest; the letters O.U.O.S.V.A.V.V. is the Latin translation of Ecclesiastes 12:8, ORATOR UT OMNIA SUNT VANITAS AIT VANITAS VANITATUM, which reads; "Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher, all is vanity" .

World Mysteries - Shepherd’s Monument Inscription Mystery

This explanation tends to agree with an earlier monument at Hagley Park, Worcestershire,which was inscribed "OMNIA VANITAS" taken from the Vulgate version of the verse which is "Vanitas vanitatum dixit Ecclesiastes omnia vanitas".

A letter dated 23rd December 1743 mentions the inscription at Hagley Park:

"Mr Lyttelton has built a kind of alcove in his park, inscribed "Sedes Contemplationis" near his hermitage. Under the aforesaid inscription is 'OMNIA VANITAS'."

Thomas Anson is known to have visited Hagley Park in the 1750's.

The letters D and M on the line below is considered an abbreviation of the Latin Diis Manibus, “dedicated to the shades” a common inscription on Roman tombstones and monuments where “shades” was typically a term for “spirits of the dead". It is known that there were authentic Roman funerary stones at Shugborough.

Of all the explanations offered for the inscription on the Shepherd's Monument at Shugborough this is the simplest and considered to perfectly reflect the message of Poussin's painting.