AI helps scientists read entire scroll charred by Vesuvius

The scroll, known as PHerc. 1667 or Scroll 4, had remained sealed since the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. The papyrus was carbonized by the disaster, making it too fragile to unroll by hand without destroying it.

According to the Vesuvius Challenge, researchers have now virtually unwrapped and read the scroll from beginning to end for the first time. The team used high-resolution X-ray scanning, digital reconstruction and machine learning to detect traces of ancient ink hidden inside the carbonized papyrus.

The scroll contains around 1.4 meters of papyrus and about 22 columns of ancient Greek text. The recovered writing is believed to be a philosophical treatise on ethics, with evidence suggesting it belongs to the Stoic tradition.

The text touches on human nature, impulse and moral progress. Its final preserved column mentions Aristocreon, the nephew and disciple of the Stoic philosopher Chrysippus, helping scholars place the work in a Stoic context and date it to the 2nd century BC.

The scans were carried out using high-resolution phase-contrast X-ray microtomography at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, in cooperation with the National Library of Naples “Vittorio Emanuele III,” which preserves the Herculaneum papyri.

The project also reported progress on two other scrolls. In PHerc. Paris 4, researchers were able to make ink directly visible inside the scroll using higher-resolution imaging. In PHerc. 139, they identified the title and author attribution, showing that the work is Philodemus’ On Gods, Book 8.

Hundreds of Herculaneum scrolls remain sealed. Scientists say the method could now be applied to more ancient texts that have not been read for almost 2,000 years.

Earlier, Qazinform News Agency reported that artificial intelligence had been used in Pompeii for the first time to reconstruct the final hours of a person who died during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79.