Engineers use code and 3D scans to revive library collection charred by Mount Vesuvius centuries ago
One hundred twelve days ago, we brought you word of a remarkable achievement in palaeography. A computer programmer, Luke Farritor, had won a US$40,000 (C$54,000) prize by extracting a single legible word from one of the Herculaneum papyri that got flash-fried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. This papyrus scroll was one of those extracted from an entire library unearthed near the volcano in the 18th century: over the centuries, hundreds of these tightly-wrapped and then incinerated scrolls had been retrieved from the Villa of the Papyri, but had defied attempts to physically unroll them.
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Even modern, non-destructive imaging techniques employing algorithmic assistance were at a disadvantage, for the original ink on the scrolls was made of carbon. Farritor, provided with open-source 3D scans of a few scrolls, had thrilled classical scholars with his revelation of a single word, Greek “porphyras” (purple). But the really big prize was yet to be claimed. The funders of the Vesuvius Challenge, a prize pot designed to summon the attention of amateur coders like Farritor, promised US$700,000 to anyone who could decipher four passages of at least 140 characters from one of the scrolls.
On Monday morning, Farritor and two other young Vesuvius Challenge notables, Youssef Nader and Julian Schillinger, were announced as winners of the grand prize. Nader and Schillinger had, like Farritor, already won Vesuvius Challenge prizes for smaller technical discoveries, and Nader had in fact been a mere heartbeat behind Farritor in producing the same “porphyras” from the same scan. After Farritor nabbed his US$40,000 “first letters” prize, the three decided to combine their efforts to net the big fish.
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The result is a text that represents about five per cent of one of the thousands of scrolls recovered — and there may be more not yet recovered — from the Villa of the Papyri. The enormous villa was owned by an unknown Roman notable, but there are clues that one of its librarians was the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus of Gadara, who lived from around 110 to 35 BC. Until his identity was connected with the library, Philodemus did not receive too much attention even from classicists. But the Vesuvius Challenge efforts have now yielded fragments of what has to be an Epicurean text — one which discusses the delights of music and food, and condemns an unnamed adversary, possibly a Stoic, for failing to give a philosophical account of sensual pleasure.
The recovery of dozens more of the works of Philodemus would be — one might now say “will be” — a world-changing event for the classics. We know Philodemus was close to Calpurnius Piso (101-43 BC), the father-in-law of Julius Caesar and a likely owner of the doomed villa. He almost certainly had a front-row seat for the prelude to the end of the Roman Republic. We know he wrote works on religion, on natural philosophy and on history: even his thoughts on music and poetry would be of marked interest.
But nobody knows what else, what copies of older works, may be lurking in Philodemus’s library. At this moment antiquarians know the titles of dozens of lost plays by Aeschylus and Sophocles and Euripides and Aristophanes; we are missing major works of Aristotle and Euclid and Archimedes and Eratosthenes. We know that Sulla wrote his memoirs and that Cato the Elder wrote a seven-book history of Rome. Any of these old writings, or others of equal significance, may materialize suddenly out of oblivion now, thanks to the Vesuvius Challenge. It’s an impressive triumph for the idea of prize-giving as an approach to solving scientific problems, and the news release from the challenge offers a discussion of what the funding team got right and where the project will go next.
National Post
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07.02.2024
Engineers use code and 3D scans to revive library collection charred by Mount Vesuvius centuries ago
One hundred twelve days ago, we brought you word of a remarkable achievement in palaeography. A computer programmer, Luke Farritor, had won a US$40,000 (C$54,000) prize by extracting a single legible word from one of the Herculaneum papyri that got flash-fried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. This papyrus scroll was one of those extracted from an entire library unearthed near the volcano in the 18th century: over the centuries, hundreds of these tightly-wrapped and then incinerated scrolls had been retrieved from the Villa of the Papyri, but had defied attempts to physically unroll them.
Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.
Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.
Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.
Don't have an account? Create Account
Even modern, non-destructive imaging techniques employing algorithmic assistance were at a disadvantage, for the original ink on the scrolls was made of carbon. Farritor, provided with open-source 3D scans of a few scrolls, had thrilled classical scholars with his revelation of a single word, Greek “porphyras” (purple). But the really big prize was yet to be claimed. The funders of the Vesuvius Challenge, a prize pot designed to summon the attention of........
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