NAPLES, Italy—Scientists have completely “unwrapped” an entire carbonized papyrus scroll preserved by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Advertisement 79, cnn Report. Known as PHERC. 1667, this scroll is one of a library of texts found in a villa in the ancient city of Herculaneum in the eighteenth century. Information from PHERC. 1667 were assembled using CT scans and then the papyrus was virtually unwrapped. Advanced artificial intelligence, trained to identify ink on papyrus, detected 20 columns of text on the nearly five-foot-long scroll. “Today – after years of interdisciplinary work combining advanced imaging, artificial intelligence, academic research and an innovation competition – we are finally able to read them,” said Brent Seals of the University of Kentucky. Seals is a member of the team that launched The Vesuvius Challenge in 2023, a competition encouraging researchers to work on virtually unwrapping carbonized scrolls. Frederica Nicolardi of the University of Naples Federico II said that PHERC. 1667 had been damaged by previous attempts to hoist it, and was eventually deemed unreadable in the 1980s. Now, he explained, analysis of the scroll’s handwriting and context shows that it dates to the late second or early third century. BC The text, written by an unknown author, discusses morality, art, and human behavior, perhaps reflecting Stoic thought. “It’s no longer just about imaging or machine learning,” Seals said. “Now we need experts who can read, edit and understand what they are saying,” he concluded. To read more about the library of papyri discovered in the ancient city, visit “Burnt Scrolls of Herculaneum“
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