Maria Crocifissa della Concezione – Maria for short – was a 17th century nun. As the legend goes, she was possessed by Lucifer, and wrote a letter at the Palma di Montechiaro convent in 1676.
Until now it’s been a mystery, scribed by Satan using her hands, but thanks to the dark web it’s been translated, reports the Daily Mail.
341 years later, a group of Italian computer scientists unscrambled the code using decryption software they found on the dark web, and found it does carry a devilish message.
It even describes God and Jesus as ‘dead weights’.
Maria entered the convent in 1660, changing her name, aged 15, from Isabella Tomasi upon doing so.
One morning in 1676, she reportedly awoke covered in ink with the mysterious letter in front of her. She told her fellow sisters that she had been possessed by Satan and that he had told her to write the message.
For years, the code has remained a mystery, with generations of nuns unable to decipher what she had written – with the letter displayed in the convent.
With years of mystery surrounding it, a team at the Ludum Science Centre in Catania, Sicily, used a program they found on the dark web to unscramble the letter.
Daniele Abate, director of the centre, told The Times: “We heard about the software, which we believe is used by the intelligence services for codebreaking.
“We primed the software with Ancient Greek, Arabic, the Runic alphabet and Latin to de-scramble some of the letter and show that it really is devilish.”
Story has it that Sister Maria had become very knowledgeable of many languages and that this transcript is a mish-mash of everything she had come to know.
Using that detail, scientists were able to translate 15 lines of the letter and found that it discusses the relationship between humans, God and Satan.
However, as opposed to being written by the devil, the inconsistency in the letter is likely to indicate the sister was a sufferer from schizophrenia or bipolar.
The letter adds that ‘God thinks he can free mortals’ and that he was invented by man, but it is a ‘system that works for no one’.
Another sentence reads: “Perhaps now, Styx is certain’ which references the River Styx which, in Greek and Roman mythology, separates the Earth and the Underworld.
Lucifer appears in many religions, from ancient mythology to Islam, Christianity and modern-day occultism.