Table of Contents
Curiosity Stream follows an effort to read books that the eruption of 79 AD turned to charcoal. Herculaneum, the film says, was not buried like Pompeii. A blast of superheated gas burned the town, including a seaside villa whose library is the prize. The rolls looked like lumps of fuel. Peeling them open saved some Greek letters and a body of Epicurean poetry and philosophy, and destroyed many more. What remains is presented as the only ancient library still found where it was stored, with hundreds of volumes still shut. The method comes from medical imaging. A researcher who had virtually opened a fragile Hebrew roll, by scanning the layers in software, turns the same idea on these briquettes. A dental lab’s machine and soft packing are there to avoid new damage. Fragments from older unrollings are described as examples a program can learn from, so that ink might be picked out without parting the layers. A partnership with the Naples library is framed as urgent, because a stored collection can still be lost.
Key points
- A burning surge in 79 AD is said to have carbonized Herculaneum and its villa library, unlike the ash at Pompeii.
- The rolls are presented as the only ancient library found still in place, many of them still sealed.
- A prior virtual opening of a Hebrew roll is the precedent for scanning these lumps instead of peeling them.
- Dental X-ray gear and careful packing are shown as the way to image them without further harm.
- Older damaged fragments are described as training material for software that might read the hidden writing.
Short quotes
artificial intelligence May soon delicately and digitally unravel history and reveal ancient texts
Curiosity Stream, Reading the Herculaneum scrolls
The film opens on software as a way to read rolls that cannot be unrolled by hand. Watch at 1:00
this is the only Library we have with its contents from the ancient Greco Roman world
Curiosity Stream, Reading the Herculaneum scrolls
The library is set apart because the books are still there, not just the building. Watch at 8:59
when dealing with 2,000 year old documents what's a few months mean to learn the secrets held within
Curiosity Stream, Reading the Herculaneum scrolls
The narration treats a long wait at the scanner as a small price for the text. Watch at 18:01
Video by Curiosity Stream. Watch on YouTube.