A team of researchers at the University of Oxford's Bodleian Libraries and the Vesuvius Challenge have successfully deciphered another carbonized scroll from Herculaneum, utilizing artificial intelligence algorithms to reveal the hidden text. This breakthrough marks a significant advancement in understanding Roman history and culture.
Researchers at the University of Oxford’s Bodleian Libraries and the Vesuvius Challenge have made a significant breakthrough in deciphering another scroll carbonized by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. Designated PHerc. 172, this scroll is one of nearly 2,000 carbonized scrolls and charred papyrus fragments discovered in the lost Roman town of Herculaneum in 1750. It is one of three such scrolls now housed at the Libraries.
Gifted to Oxford in the early 19th century by Ferdinand IV of Naples and Sicily, PHerc. 172 was brought to life through the power of artificially intelligent algorithms. These algorithms enable the reading of the scrolls without the need for painstaking (and often hazardous) unwrapping. The eruption of Vesuvius buried the coastal towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum under ash and volcanic debris, catching residents completely off guard. The papyri in the villa of Julius Caesar’s father-in-law were carbonized by the eruption’s pyroclastic outflow. Remarkably, the ink residue on these tightly wrapped documents retained its chemical differences from the surrounding papyrus even in their charred state. Cutting-edge software can now extract the characters from these documents.Experts at the University of Kentucky pioneered this digital unwrapping technique, utilizing X-ray tomography and computer vision to create 3D models of fragile documents. These models are then digitally unwrapped, revealing the hidden text. A neural network is employed to identify patterns in the scan’s data that indicate the presence of ink on the papyrus. The Vesuvius Challenge, a competition awarding cash prizes for translations of the scrolls’ text, recently received widespread attention after Luke Farritor, a 23-year-old now working with Elon Musk’s team on sensitive federal data, deciphered the first word from an unopened carbonized scroll. The Musk Foundation, a sponsor of the Vesuvius Challenge and a major donor to the project, has contributed over $2 million. Farritor won $40,000 for his individual efforts in October 2023 and was part of a three-person team that won the 2023 grand prize of $700,000. The United Kingdom’s Diamond Light Source scanned the scroll in July 2024, and over the next six months, the scroll’s contents were digitally pieced together. The team has so far detected about the last 26 lines of each column of text; one of the first translated words was the Ancient Greek “διατροπή,” or “disgust,” which appears twice in the first columns of text. ‘This is an incredible moment in history as librarians, computer scientists and scholars of the classical period are collaborating to see the unseen,’ said Richard Ovenden, the director of the University Libraries, in a Bodleian Libraries press release. ‘The astonishing strides forward made with imaging and AI are enabling us to look inside scrolls that have not been read for almost 2,000 years. This project is a perfect example of libraries, humanities and computer science complementing each other’s expertise to understand our common past.’ The core of the papyrus—its innermost contents—has not yet been deciphered, and the research team is hopeful that the work’s title may be found in that section
History Science Vesuvius Eruption Carbonized Scrolls Artificial Intelligence Decipherment Herculaneum Ancient Rome Oxford University
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