Thursday, May 2, 2024

First Herculaneum scroll decoded

Now this is cool:

Newly deciphered passages from a papyrus scroll that was buried beneath layers of volcanic ash after the AD79 eruption of Mount Vesuvius may have shed light on the final hours of Plato, a key figure in the history of western philosophy.

In a groundbreaking discovery, the ancient scroll was found to contain a previously unknown narrative detailing how the Greek philosopher spent his last evening, describing how he listened to music played on a flute by a Thracian slave girl.

What's even cooler is that this is one of the carbonized scrolls that people tried to unroll decades ago, causing enormous damage to the scroll.  They were still able to scan it and put it back in order.

 

3 comments:

Tacitus said...

Good stuff. I'll be digging for anaerobically preserved writing tablets in a few weeks. Probably just get some Roman shopping list....

Jester said...

this is really dang cool

James said...

What fine details, or changes to the "known" of history might we soon find?

Excellent, Borepatch!

James