2020 April Fool's Puzzle Competition Summary & Solutions

The solution is to decode the base64, for example with the Linux command base64 -d.

WeDontLetCOVID19RuinAFP

As hinted by a = n and Qb guvf!, the first step is to run the clue through ROT13:

D'oh!

Hinting at Homer Simpson.

Homer hints at Homer's Odyssey. cbq onl qbbef becomes "pod bay doors", hinting at "2001: A Space Odyssey".

"Odyssey" ROT13'd is the answer, Bqlffrl.

These are Pythagorean triples.

The oldest list of such triples is Plimpton 322.

• David Gibbins is an underwater archaeologist and a bestselling author of the Jack Howard series, which begins with Atlantis.

• Donovan is a Scottish songwriter who wrote and sang Atlantis (1968). It has been parodied in Futurama.

• Stargate: Atlantis is a spin-off series of the well known Stargate francise.

The answer is Atlantis.

One slot could hold two answers. Combine them for the password, Freyja_Prende.

Archivist's notes on possible errors:

• Xochipilli is male.
• The only reference to the Hausa Zamani I found is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_love_and_lust_deities. It claims Zamani is male.
• It is unclear that Bastet and Qetesh are beauty goddesses.

All the symbols (some look like english) are uppercase greek letters.

The solution is to interpret the letters as Greek/Ionic numerals

This gives the numeric values: 101-78-111-72-112-69-83-114-101-80

Interpreted as ascii byte values, this reads: eNoHpESreP. Or backwards, PerSEpHoNe.

Another name for Persephone is Kore.

Hints:

• The answer is between 65 and 122 (A and z in ASCII). Hints at greek numerals and readable ASCII text.
• STX ETX. ASCII control codes for "start of text" and "end of text". Hints at ASCII encoding.

Morse dits and dahs are: __ ._ _.__ ._ ___... / .... / ..

In international morse (ITU) this might read MAYA: / H / I

But actually, everything after the colon (.... ..) is maya numerals, not morse.

The answer is simply 42.

The text is unicode symbols (white chess kings and mountain emoji) in the shape of an egyptian ankh.

Interpreting the symbols as binary (♔=0,⛰=1) and ignoring whitespace, we get the following bytes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFND5bGUYxM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFND5bGUYxM is Mozart's "Grabmusik - KV 42 (35a)". "Grabmusik" is literally "Grave Music". "KV42" is a catalogue number--the catalogue is called Köchel Verzeichnis.

The two symbols (mountain, crown), the ankh, and the name "Grave Music" hint at the valley of the kings.

KV42, or King's Valley Tomb 42, was constructed for Merytre-Hatshepsut, the wife of Pharaoh Thutmose III, although she was never buried there.

The answer is merytre_hatshepsut.

An image of a maze. There is only one path from the outside to the center. Solution

The letters along the path spell (from outside in): HOREMHEB

Horemheb was a pharaoh around 1319BC.

The hieroglyphs in the center of the maze are M23-N41:X1-G36:X1. They spell hmt-nswt-wrt, "Great Royal Wife'.

Horemheb's wife was the former queen of Egypt, mutnedjmet.

The glyphs are Suzhou numerals.

man ❤️ 67 104 ❤️ 97 110 ❤️ 103 39 ❤️ 102 52 ❤️ woman

The decimal numbers 67-104-97-110-103-39-102-52, when decoded as ASCII read Chang'e4.

Chang'e is the Chinese goddess of the moon. It's also the namesame of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program, the most recent mission of which was Chang'e 4.

The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl is the tale of two lovers, reunited once a year by a bridge of magpies between them. It's also the name of the most recent Chinese relay satellite, part of the Chang'e 4 mission.

The answer is Magpie_Bridge.

Decoding the roman numerals, we get:

-- -- 15 23 14 10 15 10 <- 1
18 21  2  2  5  4 17 21 -> 10
-- -- -- -- 24  6  8 23 <- 5

Decoding using A=1, Z=26 we get:

--OWNJOJ
RUBBEDQU
----XFHW

Caesar shifting the first line back 1, the second forward 10, and the last back 5, we get:

NVMINI BELLONAE SACR

A quick search shows this the the beginning of an inscription in the Temple of Bellona. The reverse begins:

A(ulus) LIVIVS PROCVLVS P(ublius) LVCILIVS GAMALA F(ilius) IIVIR PRAEF(ectus) CAESAR(is)

That names Aulus Livius Proculus and the duovir Publius Lucilius Gamala Filius as rebuilding the temple.

Or, "A.L.P. & P.L.G.F.", the initials in the inscription.

The answer is the missing name from the image, Aulus_Livius_Proculus.

Höðr is the blind son of Odin and Figg. He is instructed to write the book of "whatever". We have hints toward Braille (Odin with one eye, Höðr being blind). We also have hints toward historical norse writing--Runes.

Split at each "O" to get:

1643 131425 13155226 13461643 13155226 52262553 132435 131425

All strings are even length. This hints at the correct interpetation as pairs:

16/43 13/14/25 13/15/52/26 13/46/16/43 13/15/52/26 52/26/25/53 13/24/35 13/14/25

Braille cells dots are numbered 1-3 in the first column, 3-6 in the second column. (Hinted by 11548-1, a braille standard)

We are hinted to draw a conclusion. 16/43 is 1->6, 4->3 or draw a line from 1 to 6, then draw a line from 4 to 3.

This forms 8 drawings for the 8 groups. We interpret them as Elder Futhark runes with some imagination.

ᚷᚨᚱᛞᚱᛟᚠᚨ

Or, "gardrofa". The horses Hamskerpir and Garðrofa are from Norse mythology.

The answer is hamskerpir.

The image is a nonogram.

Archivist's note: The nonogram has two solutions. Only one was intended.

You can solve by hand or use an online solver. {"ver":[[7,1,1],[3,1,3,2],[4,1,2],[13,1],[2,1,1,2],[1,5,1,1],[1,1,1,4],[4,1,1,1,2,1],[2,1,1,2],[4,5,1,2],[1,1,2,1],[1,11],[1,1,1],[2,1,2,2],[5,1,1,4]],"hor":[[3,1,3],[4,1,1,2],[4,3,2],[12,1],[1,1,1,1],[1,1,5,2,1],[2,1,1,1,1,1],[1,1,1,1,1,2,1],[4,1,1,1,1],[1,1,5,1,2],[1,1,2],[9,1],[4,3,2,1],[2,1,1,1,1,2],[1,5,2,2]]}

Decoded, it looks like:

Which is an Aztec barcode.

The code reads Nemontemi.

The answer is nemontemi.