The Masonic Alphabet and Cipher Converter
Little right angles, open corners, dots: the Masonic alphabet is instantly recognizable, and it is probably the only part of Masonic culture you can learn completely in ten minutes.
It goes by several names — the Freemason’s cipher, the pigpen cipher, the Templar alphabet in the more imaginative accounts. Behind them sits a mechanism of disarming simplicity, and a history considerably less mysterious than its reputation.
How it works
The whole system fits in one image. Draw two tic-tac-toe grids and two X shapes, and distribute the twenty-six letters in order:
- First grid (nine cells): A through I
- Second grid (nine cells, with a dot): J through R
- First cross (four quarters): S through V
- Second cross (four quarters, with a dot): W through Z
Each letter then becomes the outline of its cell. The A, in the top-left corner of the first grid, has lines only to its right and below: its symbol is a right angle opening up and to the left. The E, at the center, is enclosed on all four sides — a complete square. The added dot distinguishes the second series from the first.
Hence the system’s most convenient property: there is nothing to memorize. Draw the two grids and the two crosses and you can reconstruct any letter by counting.
Masonic alphabet converter and full table
Type a word to see it transcribed, or read the complete table of 26 letters.
The complete table
Variants, and why they exist
Compare several tables found online and you will find they disagree — particularly on the order of the quarters in the crosses, and on where the dot goes.
Neither is wrong: there is no official version. The cipher spread by hand-copying for two centuries, between lodges that did not consult one another, and each fixed its own conventions. The table above follows the most widespread arrangement in English-language sources, but a nineteenth-century document may well follow another.
The practical consequence: if you are decoding an old inscription and the result is gibberish, try swapping the quarters before concluding it is nonsense.
Where it really came from
This is where popular accounts diverge most sharply from the documentation.
The attribution to the Knights Templar has no basis. No document of the Order of the Temple, dissolved in 1312, attests any use of this cipher. Like many Masonic legends, this one dates from the eighteenth century, when certain high-degree systems were shopping for a prestigious ancestry.
What can be established is more modest and more interesting. The principle — arranging an alphabet in a grid and encoding each letter by its cell’s shape — predates Freemasonry. Related schemes appear in Renaissance systems of geometric substitution, and the mechanism is obvious enough to have been reinvented several times.
What is solidly documented is its Masonic use from the eighteenth century onward: lodge registers, marks on objects, and above all funerary inscriptions. That usage is what gave it its common name.
A “secret code” that protected nothing
This needs saying plainly, because it is the source of most misunderstanding: the cipher has no strength at all.
A monoalphabetic substitution — one fixed symbol per letter — falls to simple frequency analysis. In English, E dominates; identify the most common symbol and you have the first thread, and the rest unravels. An amateur does it in an evening with pencil and paper.
Eighteenth-century Masons knew this perfectly well. Their contemporaries were reading Vigenère and understood what a real cipher required. If they used pigpen anyway, it was not to conceal — it was to mark.
An inscription in Masonic alphabet on a gravestone hides no message; it signals a membership to anyone who can read it, exactly as an engraved square and compasses does today. The function is identification, not confidentiality.
This is consistent with the rest of Masonic culture. What Masonic obligation actually covers are modes of recognition and ritual particulars — not symbols, and not this alphabet. Our article on Freemason signs develops that distinction.
Where you still meet it
On gravestones, mostly nineteenth century. By far the most visible use for the general public, in older cemeteries across the country.
In lodge archives, for annotations and lists.
On objects and jewelry, as decorative engraving — usually a motto or initials.
In popular culture, finally, where the pigpen cipher serves regularly as a puzzle in escape rooms, code-based novels, and video games. That is probably its most frequent use today, a long way from any lodge.
In short
The Masonic alphabet is an elegant system, immediately graspable, and entirely without pretension to security. It conceals nothing — it designates.
Like most of the Masonic symbolic vocabulary, its value lies not in what it hides but in what it makes recognizable.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Masonic alphabet?
A geometric substitution cipher, also called the pigpen or Freemason's cipher. The twenty-six letters are distributed across two tic-tac-toe grids and two X shapes, and each letter is replaced by the outline of the cell it occupies. A dot distinguishes the second series from the first. There is nothing to memorize — drawing the grids lets you reconstruct any letter.
Is the Masonic alphabet a real secret code?
No. It is a monoalphabetic substitution, which falls to simple frequency analysis: identify the most common symbol, which is almost always E in English, and the rest unravels. An amateur breaks it in an evening. Its historical use was to mark membership on registers, objects and gravestones — not to conceal messages.
Did the Masonic alphabet come from the Knights Templar?
No. No document of the Order of the Temple, dissolved in 1312, attests any use of this cipher. The attribution dates from the eighteenth century, when certain high-degree systems were seeking a prestigious ancestry. The principle of geometric substitution predates Freemasonry, but its Masonic use is documented only from the 1700s.
Why do Masonic alphabet tables differ between sources?
Because there is no official version. The cipher spread by hand-copying for two centuries between lodges that did not consult one another, and each fixed its own conventions — particularly on the order of the quarters in the crosses. If a decoding produces gibberish, try swapping the quarters before concluding it is nonsense.
Where can you still see the Masonic alphabet?
Mainly on nineteenth-century gravestones, which is where the general public encounters it most often, plus lodge archives and decorative engraving on objects. Its most frequent use today is far from any lodge: it appears regularly as a puzzle in escape rooms, code-based novels and video games.