murder most foul

I just finished a short piece about the suspected murder case Tycho Brahe (1546-1601), which has a new suspect in the shape of the (distantly related) Swedish count Erik Brahe. (See, for example this article from January.) Intriguingly, the story has lots of resonances with Shakespeare's Hamlet, written in the year of Tycho's death.

During my research, I contacted Peter Andersen, who discovered and is now analysing Erik Brahe's diaries, and casually mentioned my research into the Strada family who, like Tycho in his final years, were also at the court of Rudolf II at Prague. Turns out that Octavio Strada actually met the murder suspect a couple of times. Money changed hands, and one of the entries was encrypted in Erik's secret code.

Watch this space, as the murder plot thickens ...