Researchers have successfully unraveled a carbonized papyrus scroll from Herculaneum, buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD, through advanced X-ray imaging and AI. The scroll, discovered in 1750, is part of a collection housed at Oxford's Bodleian libraries. The Vesuvius Challenge incentivizes the exploration of the scrolls, which has yielded words suggesting its authorship might be linked to the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus. The scrolls were scanned to create a 3D model, allowing AI to detect ink signals, bringing ancient texts to light for the first time in centuries.
"We're confident we will be able to read pretty much the whole scroll in its entirety, and it's the first time we've really been able to say that with high confidence," the project lead Stephen Parsons told the BBC.
The scroll offers hints pointing to its likely author being our favourite philosopher in residence: [the Epicurean poet] Philodemus... the letter-forms present in this book suggest it was written sometime in the first century BCE and are of similar shape to handwriting found in other books attributed to him.
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