Text scrolls found under the ruins of Vesuvius have been deciphered with the help of artificial intelligence
He writes that the parchment scrolls, which were found at Herculeum and thus called the Scrolls of Hercules, are so fragile and charred that they would crumble if anyone tried to open them. CNN American news network.
Father-in-law of Julius Caesar
Since the discovery of paper rolls at the end of the 18th century, it has not been known what was on more than 1,000 rolls. However, scholars have always had the idea that it could be of great historical value, because it was found in what was most likely the home of Julius Caesar's father-in-law, he writes. University of Kentucky.
It is now possible to decipher what is written on paper from a few turns. To do this, scientists used a technique they call “virtual offloading.” Scans of the paper rolls were performed using X-rays. This process can be seen in this video:
The scans were then “rolled out”, and advanced artificial intelligence was used to detect where the ink was on the paper. This was compared and the images were then sent to papyrologists (people who work with texts written on papyrus in ancient Greek) in England, France and Italy.
Philodemus van Gadara
In this way the first sections of a text were deciphered. The text appears to have been written by a philosopher Philodemus van GadaraWho worked in the library of the house where the manuscripts were found.
The first word to be decoded was “porphyras” which means “purple” in Greek. More can now be said about the content of the text. Philodemus of Gadari wrote on the scroll about “pleasure, and whether the abundance of available things can affect the pleasure given by those things.” “Just as with food, we do not immediately believe that rare products give more pleasure than those that are abundant,” is the first sentence of the text.
Scientists are excited about this discovery and the fact that the techniques they used appear to work. “It is very gratifying to know that these texts are available, and we now have a way to read them.”
take it easy
It may also give greater fame to Philodemus. “He was forgotten over the years because we couldn't really read what he wrote. (…) In these clips, he tries to convince the people listening to him that they should take things easy, find good friendships, and have CNN: “Live in the moment and enjoy the good things in life.”
Scholars hope that one of the scrolls will be almost completely deciphered this year, and that the other three published scrolls will soon follow. they have A prize of $100,000 was offered The first person to decipher at least 90 percent of the four scrolls.
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