Big and exciting developments in The Secret this week!

Article by Dustin White

The Secret is a book by Byron Preiss that includes a treasure hunt that began in November 1982. Preiss traveled throughout North America in 1981 building a coast to coast puzzle where he buried twelve mysterious fairy covered ceramic containers he refers to as casques and concealed inside each a key that could be exchanged for fabulous jewels when returned to him. The book contains clues in fantastical paintings by John Jude Palencar and poems crafted by Preiss himself that he calls verses. Match the correct painting with the correct verse, follow the clues and dig up the buried treasure.

Sounds easy, right? Wrong! Of the twelve casques buried over thirty-five years ago only two have been recovered. One was found in Chicago at Grant Park in 1983 by Rob Wrobel, Eric Gasiorowski and David James. The other was found in Cleveland in the Greek Cultural Garden in 2004 by Brian Zinn and Andy Abrams.

Tragically Byron Preiss died in an automobile accident in 2005. He alone knew where the burial sites were for the casques. Before he passed away Preiss would occasionally correspond with casque hunters via email and let them know if they’re going astray or provide them a few tantalizing hints on their quests. After the automobile accident Preiss wouldn’t be able to provide any more clues or hints that could hopefully, perhaps one day, help someone pull another fairy treasure box out of the ground… Or can he?

For the past three and a half decades, searchers for the elusive casques and keys buried across North America had no idea that there could be international translations of The Secret available in other regions. Last week Quest4Treasure (Q4T) user Goldengate received images from a contact in Japan that had recently acquired a previously unknown Japanese copy of The Secret. Beyond this point there will be mentions of attempts to translate some of the Japanese text from this newly found book. As you can imagine this is not an easy process or an exact science. We used Google Translate to try to confirm the translations we found on Q4T with success but Japanese to English conversion can’t quite be done with a one to one word replacement.

Goldengate posted this on August 16^th on the Q4T forum thread called Clues in the Book: “I’ve been communicating with the Japanese owner of this book (who, yes, lives in Japan) and she’s generously taken additional photos to share with the group. As you can see there are quite a few images between the covers that are NOT found in any US printing! But more important, in our discussions, she’s provided some very interesting additional information. Here’s what may be the most important element: Pages 233 onward contain hints from BP (Byron Preiss) exclusively to Japanese readers! The translator called BP in 82 or 83 before publishing and from what it sounds like… BP provided hints specific to Japanese readers who may not know about certain elements of Western culture, customs, details of cities, etc… it could be a big deal for us all!”

In addition to these details Goldengate shared images of nearly seventy pages of the Japanese version of The Secret!

Among this batch of photos it is revealed that the book contained a page for a standard English printing of the verses, word for word the same as the North American release and a Japanese translation on the following page.

Regarding the part of the book that contains clues exclusively for the Japanese readers that purchased the book, the following has been translated by Q4T user jayheedan1:

“With this, the hints that Mr. Preiss put out by international phone is over. How about that? Is it useful role? Another one, Mr. Preiss issued special advice to Japanese readers. That is, “Starting from the picture first, for that purpose it is to understand the combination of figures written in the poem”. Also, this book was issued in the United States in November of last year (1982), but at the present time (March 1983) already more than 500 answers have been received and there is not yet one correct answer yet. I would like to encourage Japanese readers to do their best, so please make the most of the hints he gave me and find the treasure. Solving the mystery of this book will be a great job, but the staff who made the original book seems to have been very difficult in other ways.”

This suggests that the editor of the Japanese version of the book contacted Byron Preiss via telephone and asked him to give special advice to his Japanese readers and that Preiss obliged. This is where things get really interesting and the verses are gone over once again but the keywords in each line are singled out and more details and clues are provided for a few lines of each verse.

How can we be sure if these are legitimate hints for the hunt? Let’s look at the section that contains hints for the casque recovered in Chicago. The casque in Chicago was found after the Japanese version of the book was published. We can check and see if that information matches and is relevant to where the casque was dug up in Grant Park.

This is translated by Q4T user Spiritr: “M and B in his word, think of some famous music composer’s name, who’s name starts with the letter M and B”. The first lines of the verse that would lead someone to the dig site in Chicago is: “Where M and B are set in stone And to Congress R is known”. The Chicago Symphony Center is across the street to the Northwest of the dig site and has the names of Mozart and Beethoven engraved on the stone work there. M and B are Mozart and Beethoven and yes, they are famous music composers. Byron Preiss himself confirmed to Brian Zinn and Andy Abrams when they met with him to receive their jewel in 2004 that M and B were indeed Mozart and Beethoven. I’m not sure how this could be taken as anything other than a legitimate major hint!

My wife, Deidra, got in on the fun of trying to translate these hints and confirmed a lot of what people were posting on Q4T along with another hint about the rest of the aforementioned line in the Chicago verse: “According to Mr. Preiss, this R is a person, critical (refreshing, seriously dangerous, saying It is meaningful) politician it seems to be.” Again, confirming these are legitimate major hints with R being Roosevelt. Roosevelt University is across the street to the southwest from the dig site on East Congress Parkway next to the Congress Hotel.

Will this “new” information help anyone dig up another elusive casque? That is unknown at this point, but it is very exciting and will give this treasure hunt a shot in the arm that might confirm things for some searchers and might have others go back to the drawing board. A note of caution, the hints are also accompanied by notes from the Japanese editor of The Secret and his thought of what the hints might mean may hinder you more than help. Alternatively, maybe the editor is spot on, who knows!? As always this is a game of interpretation, and the interpretations are endless.

Q4T user WhiteRabbit calls this “the most exciting breakthrough in years”. I would have to agree with that sentiment!

Please feel free to reach out if you would like to discuss this with me or sign up for an account on Q4T at www.quest4treasure.co.uk to join the conversation there.

Article Written by Dustin White

@DustinTheWhite on Twitter

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More Images from the Japanese Version of The Secret

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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