Pherc.172
A papyle parchment charred by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius 2000 years ago has been slowly read again thanks to Artificial Intelligence (IA). Those who can decipher him have a prize of over nearly 700,000 euros.
An old Roman scroll has been read for the first time since it was charred at the Vesuvius volcanic eruption, there are two millennia, thanks to artificial intelligence and a high -power X -ray installation.
As it details, the papyrus roll was one of 1800 rescued from a Roman city room of Herculaneum during the 1750s. They were all charred by the heat of the volcanic debris that buried them.
Initially, the local inhabitants (from the current Italian city Ercolano) began to burn their scrolls, but when they found that they contained texts, some were still saved.
Since then, about 200 scrolls They were meticulously opened and read by clock -based mechanical devices that open the millimeter to a millimeter. Three of these scrolls are stored at the Bodleian Library of Oxford University.
Almost 700 thousand euros award
One of the three scrolls – known as Pherc. 172 – It is now object of analysis using algorithms Ia and its interpretation It’s worth money.
As required by New Scientist, the scroll was scanned with a X -rays of very high power and the resulting data were made available to participants in the.
This contest is giving 700 thousand dollars (about 672 thousand euros) for the interpretation of the text of the scrolls.
So far, the investigators have revealed several text columns, with about 26 lines in each column. The academics now hope to read the whole scroll; But, for now, they found the old Greek word testwhich means “NOJO”.
Peter Totha conservative of the Bodleian library, suspects that this word already deciphered will relate in some way to the philosopher Epicuruslike many of the other scrolls found in the same place.
The pherc. 172 was the only one of the three Bodleian library scrolls considered sufficiently stable to travel, and only in a 3D -printed box in another cushioned box, Toth told New Scientist.
