Love Archive:100 Year Old anciednt Love Letter found

by **Admin** Fri Apr 23, 2010 10:51 am

A LOVE letter penned in a secret
picture code has been found more than 100
years after it was written. The author used symbols such as eyes, saws, ships
and even horsewhips to replace word
fragments. The message, hidden among the minutes of a temperance
society, was discovered when a university student asked to borrow the
records.

Archivist Elisabeth Bennett, of Swansea
University library, said: “The book was very fragile so I was
leafing through to check it was OK to lend it when I noticed the note.
It was in the minutes book.” In the message, dating back to at least 1890, devoted William
Weightman declares his love for “dearest
Fanny” by creating a complex puzzle of icons known as a rebus.

Symbols include the picture of a fan followed by the letter E to spell
her name. And William drew lines through a heart and made a sketch of a
pudding to tell her he would “be
broken-hearted if you desert me”. Elisabeth — who has looked
after the university archive for 15 years — said: “I was amazed by it.
Some of the drawings were so intricate.

“The ship he used in ‘friendship’ has a full rigging and sails. He has
been very inventive in his use of language.”Experts have compared
William’s handiwork to flirty text messages sent by youngsters.

But Elisabeth believes his words took more than a few minutes to craft.
She said: “I think William was practising before he wrote the final
letter. It must have taken him hours.” Love Archive:100 Year Old anciednt Love Letter found Lol

Love Archive:100 Year Old anciednt Love Letter found Lol