Using artificial intelligence (AI), three researchers successfully deciphered a 2,000-year-old scroll that had been buried in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which famously destroyed Pompeii. For their achievement, the researchers were awarded a cash prize of $700,000 on Monday (Feb 5), marking a significant breakthrough in the study of ancient texts.
The scroll in question was part of the Herculaneum papyri collection, consisting of nearly 800 Greek scrolls that were carbonized during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE, the cataclysmic event that engulfed the ancient Roman town of Pompeii. According to the organizers of the “Vesuvius Challenge,” these scrolls had been preserved in a rolled-up state, resembling logs of hardened ash.
Stored at the National Library of Naples and the Institut de France in Paris, the Herculaneum papyri had suffered extensive damage over the centuries, with many of them crumbling or becoming too fragile to handle after failed attempts to unroll them. In a bid to accelerate research on these ancient artifacts, the Vesuvius Challenge initiative conducted high-resolution CT scans of four scrolls and offered substantial cash prizes totaling one million dollars to researchers who could successfully decipher their contents.
The successful use of AI by the three researchers represents a groundbreaking advancement in the field of ancient studies, as it enables scholars to access and interpret texts that were previously inaccessible due to their fragile state. This achievement opens up new possibilities for uncovering the rich cultural and historical heritage contained within the Herculaneum papyri, shedding light on the lives and thoughts of ancient civilizations preserved for millennia beneath the volcanic ash of Mount Vesuvius.
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