Ancient scroll rises from the ashes: 2,000-year-old text buried by volcanic eruption is deciphered
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An ancient Italian scroll that was damaged by a volcanic eruption in 79AD has been deciphered for the first time.
Using a form of X-ray imaging, scientists have been able to peer inside it without breaking the fragile papyrus.
It is among hundreds of texts retrieved from villa at Herculaneum - a town that was destroyed when Mount Vesuvius erupted 2,000 years ago.
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The charred papyrus (pictured left) was unfurled using a form of X-ray imaging called X-ray phase contrast tomography. It takes advantage of subtle differences in the way radiation pass through substances. On one fragment (right), researchers spotted words that are thought to be 'would fall', 'would say', and 'to move'
The catastrophic event was the same eruption that wiped out Pompeii.
Some of the texts from what is called the Villa of the Papyri have been deciphered after being discovered in the 1750s.
But many more remain a mystery because they were so badly damaged.
It was feared that unrolling the papyrus they were written on would have destroyed them completely.
'The papyri were completely covered in blazing-hot volcanic material,' said Vito Mocella, a theoretical scientist at the Institute of Microelectronics and Microsystems in Naples who led the latest project.
Previous attempts to peer inside the scrolls failed to yield any readable texts because the ink used in ancient times was made from a mixture of charcoal and gum.
This makes it indistinguishable from the burned papyrus.
The scroll is among hundreds retrieved from the remains of a villa at Herculaneum, which along with Pompeii (preserved victim pictured) was one of several Roman towns that were destroyed when Mount Vesuvius (pictured in background) erupted in 79AD
This map shows the cities and towns affected by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Herculaneum is pictured to the west of the volcanoe. Pompeii is in the south east. The estimated shape of the ash and cinder is shown by the dark area covering the region
Mr Mocella and his colleagues used a technique called X-ray phase contrast tomography, which has previously been used to examine fossils without damaging them.
Phase contrast tomography takes advantage of subtle differences in the way radiation - such as X-rays - pass through different substances, in this case papyrus and ink.
Using the technology at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, France, the researchers found they were able to decipher several letters in one of the scrolls, proving that the method could be used to read what's hidden inside others.
The only clearly distinct marks found inside the document, are rounded or oblique traces - shapes that are not easily confused with papyrus fibres - which run vertically and horizontally, the researchers said.
For example, letters are A, B, D, E, Z, Y, K, L, M, N, O, P, C, U, F, X, C and O are easy to decipher. While G, H, I, X, P and T are more easily confused.
On one fragment, the sequence of Greek capital letters PIPTOIE could be read, and the researchers believe it may read 'would fall.'
Some of the texts recovered from what is called the Villa of the Papyri (ruins pictured) have been deciphered after being discovered in the 1750s. But many more remain a mystery because they were so badly damaged. It was feared that unrolling the papyrus they were written on would have destroyed them completely
The next challenge will be to automate the process of scanning the charred lumps of papyrus (example pictured) and deciphering the texts inside them
In the following line, they believe it reads 'would say', and in a later fragment the researchers identified a sequence that could be words of the verb 'to move.'
'Our goal was to show that the technique is sensitive to the writing,' said Mr Mocella.
In a further step, the scientists compared the handwriting to that of other texts, allowing them to conclude it was likely the work of Philodemus, a poet and Epicurean philosopher who died about a century before the volcanic eruption.
The next challenge will be to automate the process of scanning the charred lumps of papyrus and deciphering the texts inside them.
Once achieved, it will mean 700 further scrolls stored in Naples could be deciphered.
Scholars studying the Herculaneum texts said the new technique may well mark a breakthrough for their efforts to unlock the ancient philosophical ideas hidden from view for almost two millennia.
'It's a philosophical library of Epicurean texts from a time when this philosophy influenced the most important classical Latin authors, such as Virgil, Horace and Cicero,' said Juergen Hammerstaedt, a professor of Greek and Latin at the University of Cologne, Germany, who was not involved in the project.
'There needs to be much work before one can virtually unroll carbonized papyrus because one will have to develop a digital method that will allow us to follow the layers,' he said.
'But in the 260 years of Herculaneum papyrology it is certainly a remarkable year.'
The findings are published in the journal Nature Communications.
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