scytale

plural scytales · alternative skytale

1. historicalA cylinder with a strip of parchment wound around it on which a message is written, used for cryptography by the ancient Spartans.

   This was what the Spartans called a ſcytale, a thong of leather or parchment, which they twiſted round a ſtaff in ſuch a manner, that there was no vacancy or void ſpace left upon it.

   1768, Charles Rollin, anonymous translator, The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Medes and Persians, Macedonians, and Grecians, 5th edition, J. Rivington et al., translation of Histoire Ancienne (in French), page 307

   2 more examples

   But, being perſwaded that they would not hear any propoſal to that effect, he delivered each of them a ſcytale, or ſtaff on which the Lacedemonians wrote their ſecret letters, and with theſe diſpatch’d them home to the Ephori.

   1753, Desiderius Erasmus, anonymous translator, The Apophthegms of the Ancients, volume I, A. Millar, translation of Apophthegmatum opus (in New Latin), pages 53–54

   This Perſian grandee reſolved, if poſſible, to humble the inſolence and haughtineſs of Lyſander, and for this purpoſe diſpatched ſome of his emiſſaries to Sparta, where they expoſed his ambitious views, charging him with an intention to render himſelf general for life, and independant of his conſtituents, and alleged ſuch probable reaſons for what they ſaid, that the ſenate and Ephori immediately diſpatched a ſcytale to recall him.

   1764, William Guthrie, John Gray, A General History of the World from the Creation to the present Time, volume II, J. Newberry et al., page 408