A complete open-source system of laser-engraver-ready nickel plate designs for time capsules intended to preserve human knowledge through catastrophic events — readable by a finder 200 to 2,000 years from now with no shared language or cultural context.
Buy it · Build it · Bury it · For someone you will never meet
"This was made for you, freely, by people who cared about the future. Use it together. Build something better. Make more capsules for others."
The Bridge Phrase — engraved on every plate, in every language
The Plates
The Patient Message
Each plate is a laser-engraver-ready SVG file, 480×680px portrait format, designed for nickel or stainless steel. Every plate uses only black strokes — no fills, no color — optimized for maximum legibility at any scale and any future reading technology from unaided eye to microscope.
The complete set spans eleven knowledge plates covering survival through metaphysics, four plates per language across 55 language traditions (including 5 sign languages and Ancient Egyptian) — 245 plates total.
245 plates complete · 55 language traditions · 66 series
Any plate set fits any container. The tiers describe survivability and cost, not content. From a clay jar fired with a wood fire to a lead-lined granite vault — every design is fully documented and free to build.
Tier 0
Fired Ceramic + Pitch
$10 – $30
Clay, fire, and pine pitch only
No industrial materials required
Buildable post-catastrophe
Dead Sea Scroll precedent: 2,000 years
500 – 2,000 years
Tier A
Schedule 80 PVC
$75 – $150
Hardware store build
Teflon tape + marine epoxy seal
Silica gel + oxygen absorbers
Maximum household distribution
500 – 1,000 years
Tier B
Titanium Sphere
$350 – $600
Grade 5 Ti-6Al-4V alloy
Argon atmosphere fill
Viton O-rings, aerogel insulation
Pyramid cavity at Giza angle
10,000+ years
Tier C
Ocean Capsule
$400 – $900
HDPE hull + zinc sacrificial anodes
Titanium pressure vessel, 600 atm
Gold-plated plates only
Unreachable, unjurisdictable
2,000+ years at depth
Tier D
Hastelloy C-276
$600 – $1,200
Superalloy for acid environments
Volcanic, sulfurous, industrial soils
Outperforms titanium in corrosive zones
Nuclear-grade chemical resistance
10,000+ years
Tier E
Lead-Lined Granite
$500 – $1,500
Carved granite box, lead-poured seal
Fixed institutional archive
Nuclear industry permanence standard
Inscribe the bridge phrase in the stone
100,000+ years
Tier F
Mountain Archive
$2,000+
Dry cave or lava tube
Natural environmental sealing
Community maintenance agreement
GPS + surface marker required
Geological timescale
· · ·
The Ten Concords
Universal Principles
Distilled from the convergence points of human civilizations across all recorded history. These are points of agreement, not imposition — discovered independently by people who had no contact with each other, across millennia. Their convergence is the evidence for their validity.
I
Every person has inherent worth.
II
Measure civilization by its most vulnerable.
III
The living world is not a resource.
IV
Knowledge is a commons.
V
Power must be held lightly.
VI
Cooperation is stronger than competition.
VII
The future has no voice. Speak for it.
VIII
Beauty is not decoration.
IX
Grief is the price of love. Pay it.
X
You are not the first. You will not be the last.
· · ·
Support the Project
Get the Plates
The plates are CC BY-SA 4.0 — always free. If you find them useful, paying for a copy funds continued development, new language series, and keeps the project alive. Every purchase is a vote for more capsules in the ground.
Every file in this project is released under CC BY-SA 4.0. Copy them. Translate them. Improve them. Distribute them to everyone. No permission needed. No registration. No cost. The knowledge belongs to whoever finds it.
Complete Archive
All Plates — ZIP Bundle
All 245 SVG plates in original folder structure. Open in any vector editor, laser engraver software, or browser. Knowledge plates, all 55 language traditions, build scripts included.
All 245 plates as a single print-ready PDF. 480×680 pt pages — prints at 5"×7" on standard paper. Bring to a print shop or laser engraving service as a single file.
Archived at CERN’s Zenodo repository with a permanent DOI. Use this citation in academic work, prior art filings, or any context where a stable, citable reference is needed.
