tech
AI helps read papyrus scroll burnt to crisp during Vesuvius eruption
Previously hidden text revealed without unrolling scroll discusses stoic philosophy on ethics, art and human behaviour
TL;DR
- AI was used to virtually unwrap and read a section of a papyrus scroll damaged by the Mount Vesuvius eruption.
- The scroll, PHerc 1667, is one of hundreds recovered from a Roman villa in Herculaneum.
- The newly read text discusses stoic philosophy, potentially authored by Chrysippus, and covers topics like ethics, art, and human behavior.
- The Vesuvius Challenge utilizes AI and machine learning to read carbonized scrolls without physical unrolling.
- Another scroll revealed that Philodemus's work 'On Gods' was a multi-book composition.