I’m reminded of some of the old Davis/Manson theories: The Z campaign supposedly was a branch of Helter Skelter (the general purpose of which was to incite a racial war, specifically through killing people in a manner that would put the blame on black perpetrators). And when it was pointed out that Z had done a terrible job, since he was identified almost from the very beginning as a white man (there was no mistaking his ethnicity whatsoever), the answer was that Manson’s oh-so-subtle plan was to mix the blame-it-on-the-black-guy killings with…regular killings, because…er, because this would be pretty effective too. Or something like that. Incite racial hatred through non-racially motivated murders. A cunning plan, as Baldrick would say.

Manson’s followers tried really hard to make the killings look like they were perpetrated by the Black Panthers or at least by black radicals. Zodiac’s killings have no hint of that.

If The Zodiac was a white supremacist, he sure did have a strange way of showing it, killing all those Aryans, and all.

Joseph Paul Franklin he wasn’t…

In the "unveiled" letter he says he was observed making the BRS phone call my a man, a negro.

Had he been racist, he would’ve been less respectful with his language. I think there is zero race motive or component with Z.

The resemblance between the white supremacist cross and the Zodiac symbol is really to do with the roots of Hermetic tradition, which in the 20th C. took a Nazi and later Neo-Nazi turn (in a sense, these ancient and mysterious esoteric symbol systems were perverted for political purposes). There’s quite a good academic book on the subject by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. It’s full of batshit UFO-believing moon nazi weirdness, yet explains how alchemical symbols common to Rosicrucianism and the freemasons, came to be purloined by the fascists. If you click through to the Ariosophy page from that link, you’ll see the World Rune Clock zodiac calendar (just to demonstrate the blurring between esoteric mystical beliefs and later fascist ones).

Therefore, the similarity is entirely coincidental and accidental, I’m not even certain that the Celtic Cross was even a white supremacist symbol in the late-60s. The white supremacism of the Stormfront variety, really developed with the US prison system post-Attica 1971, with the emergence of racial gang allegiance.

Zodiac himself doesn’t exhibit much in the way of political commentary, beyond hating the cops. I do actually think he thought he could tap into the popular sympathies of the time by taunting the cops, since he tries to force the issue with his button-based extortion demands. IMO he hates the cops, not for any political reason, but because of narcissistic injury he’s carrying; such as being a rejected as a candidate for LE.

The Aryan Brotherhood began in San Quentin Prison in 1964. Their main symbol has always been a shamrock in various forms, however they do use other symbols.

A couple of articles-

https://culteducation.com/group/825-ary … -gang.html

https://www.adl.org/education/reference … rotherhood

The celtic cross is actually one of the main neo-nazi symbols in France (a combination of the illegal swastika and the catholic cross). Post-war the swastika was either illegal or socially unacceptable, so far-right groups manipulated other symbols to serve as cryptic-swastikas. The far-right use symbols opportunistically, anything to parasite on existing feelings of identity.

For my money, Zodiac is getting his symbol system from books like The Codebreakers. It’s through an interest in ciphers, that he’s channelling the symbolism (present in hermetic traditions which relied on codes and encipherment, the most common of which in the US is freemasonry, without a doubt. Although in the contemporary era, Mormonism, Scientology and Crowley’s OTO have also borrowed heavily from freemasonry).

Hermetic traditions came about well before the medieval times, when there was generally considered two types of knowledge.

(i) Public knowledge, that was available to everyone;
(ii) and esoteric knowledge (which was secret, protected and which represented the ‘inner’ truth only known to a select, yet enlightened few).

Amongst those with esoteric knowledge, these secrets were usually secrets of the trade, crucial to ensuring the livelihoods of craftsmen. Often this was a combination of maths, alchemy, geometry, astronomy and early scientific-understanding. The protection of these trade-secrets by guildspeople was all important because their income depended on it. So trade-guilds were in effect a combination of fraternal order and proto-trade union. Internally, these organisations would share their secrets in the form of mysteries (which illuminated reality). Therefore, in order to keep the secrets of the craft hidden, it required encipherment.

See the magic square sum in this engraving by Dührer (a guild craftsman) which generates symbolic figures.

Now the reason I reckon Zodiac enciphers his innermost reasoning (his motivation for killing and slave collection) is that he understands the desire to kill is socially repellent. Therefore, it is a secret he carries silently; part of his innermost condition. Killing is his ‘craft’. He wears a Templar-like cross on the chest of his ritual uniform. Therefore his ciphers and puzzles serve as a test, so only those who are worthy can discover his innermost truth. Yet whether Zodiac has any engagement with the symbol systems he’s using, beyond his shallow engagement with a book like The Codebreakers, is really an open question.

I tend to agree with you about the source of Zodiac’s symbols, both his "signature symbol" and the symbols he used in the codes. He was using symbols that have been around for centuries and used by secret societies. I was simply pointing out that the Celtic cross symbol used by the white supremacist today were not used by the mainstream supremacist in the US in the late 60’s, particularly the prison supremacist.

I know I’ve posted this somewhere on the site in the past, who knows where! This is the cover and a page from a paperback book that was published in January 1969. It covers a number of secret societies. I wouldn’t be surprised if Zodiac used something like this as an inspiration.

Yeah, I’ve taken a read of that book. What’s interesting is that it doesn’t go all that deep into the codes, but the cipher symbols that do make an appearance are interesting. The Codebreakers goes a bit further in linking ciphers and their historical sources.