The intricate chiselled symbols and curious carvings had left scholars perplexed for 500 years, while Rosslyn Chapel’s tangled mysteries even inspired a bestselling book and movie.
The Da Vinci Code may have sparked global interest in the 15th century chapel’s religious secrets, yet it would take a father and son living less than 10 miles away in an Edinburgh housing scheme to crack one of its most confounding puzzles.
Tommy Mitchell and his son Stuart worked together over nearly three decades to unravel the symbols carved into the ceiling design and arches of the chapel in Roslin, Midlothian. Eventually they unleashed their hauntingly beautiful music and helped transform understanding of the 15th century church.
Now, however, both father and son have died within weeks of each other, bringing to an end a remarkable musical code-breaking connection.
Jazz musician Tommy Mitchell, 85, died last week after a year-long battle against bowel cancer. His death came only four months after his son Stuart, 52, a talented pianist who counted Shirley Bassey among his friends, died of lung cancer.
The pair had become fascinated by the symbols which adorn the chapel’s lavish interior, in particular a series of figures at the base of the elaborate arches round the altar which showed an “orchestra of angels”, with each celestial figure depicted holding a musical instrument.
They went on to spend countless hours attempting to decipher the patterns on cubes jutting from the arches, convinced that the markings concealed a tune.
Their remarkable challenge was aided by father Tommy’s code-breaking skills learned during a spell in the RAF, and the pair’s extensive musical knowledge.
Former serviceman Tommy had spent time in Iraq before moving to Edinburgh to work at renowned music shop Rae Macintosh.
A regular figure on the city’s jazz scene, he taught his son to play the piano and he went on to become a professional musician like his father.
Stuart was performing in Spain when he caught the attention of singer Shirley Bassey, and the pair struck up a close friendship.
The pair, who lived in Juniper Green, Edinburgh, had already been working on deciphering the musical mysteries of the 500-year-old chapel when interest in it peaked with the release of author Dan Brown’s mystery thriller centred on a symbologist’s attempts to unravel cryptic religious codes.
Tommy said at the time: “We were convinced from the position at the top of the pillars of the angels and they are all directly under the arches where the cubes occur that there was music there.
“Over the years this became more of an obsession than anything else and we decided we had to find out what was going on.
“If these patterns and cubes had not contained music anything we turned up would have been purely random and would not have sounded hauntingly beautiful.”
It is believed the tunes were hidden in the stonework because knowledge of harmonics may have been seen as dangerous, even heretical, by 15th Century church authorities.
The music found in the stonework has been likened to a “compact disc from the 15th century”.
Tommy’s surviving son, Ali, 57, said: “They were working on it for 27 years. The patterns were musical shapes, like a tone or a key which created a shape.
“Stuart wrote a piece called the Rosslyn Motet, which was performed in the chapel using instruments dating from that time.
“The Rossyln Motet is played all around the world.”
Poignantly, the Rosslyn Motet was performed at Stuart’s memorial service after his death in August.
Ali added: “They were working on it for years - long before The Da Vinci Code. But nobody had ever thought of it until my dad did.”
The Da Vinci Code book in 2003 shone a spotlight on the remarkable chapel.
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