Lost Works of Ancient Philosophers Brought Back with AI from Burned Scrolls

The ancient scrolls found in the city of Herculaneum, İtalya, which became unreadable by charring because of the Vezüv yanardağ eruption in MS 79, can now be fully read for the first time thanks to modern technology. Preserved for centuries under volcanic ashes and lavas, these works belong to a great library of the ancient Roman period. With the use of advanced scanning methods and new generation AI-based software, the content of these blackened and physically impossible-to-open rolls has been successfully revealed. This historical and archaeological breakthrough brings the lost treasures of the ancient world back to light, offering invaluable contributions to classical literature. Experts believe this discovery may contain new, game-changing information, especially in studies on ancient Greek and Roman philosophy.

The risk of causing permanent damage by attempting to physically open the said scrolls is very high because the structures have become extremely fragile. For this reason, researchers have turned to innovative and non-destructive scanning techniques that make it possible to examine the works digitally without consuming them physically. Using computed tomography (CT) and similar advanced X-ray methods, the inner layers of the rolls were scanned with millimetric precision and their three-dimensional models were created digitally. However, since visualizing only these internal structures was not enough to read the texts, the stage of analyzing this massive data stack to detect ink traces was initiated. Highly advanced AI algorithms, stepping in right at this point, distinguished the slight density differences and ink residues on the papyrus surface, virtually assembling the hidden letters in a digital environment.

The Herculaneum library has the distinction of being the only complete library surviving from the ancient period and is of unique historical importance worldwide. Although the high-temperature gases and ashes spread to the region because of the disastrous eruption of the Vezüv yanardağ destroyed a large part of the city, they preserved the scrolls by carbonizing them instead of destroying the structures that housed them. This sudden charring effect caused by the eruption allowed organic materials to survive to the present day, escaping the destructive effects of time and natural decomposition processes. Archaeologists and historians have known for years that these ashen and blackened rolls contain highly valuable texts that will shed light on world history. However, until technology reached this level, the dream of accessing these texts remained a legend accompanied by great disappointment in the world of literature and history.

One of the greatest gains of this revolutionary AI-assisted reading process is the possibility of rediscovering the lost books of ancient philosophers that have not survived to the present day or are known only by their names. The Herculaneum rolls are thought to belong to Filodemos, a follower of the Greek philosopher Epikür who lived during the Roman period, and these texts are of a quality to shed light on the philosophical discussions of the period. Furthermore, within these works, it is highly likely that there are correspondences regarding the daily lives, literary tastes, observations of natural events, and the political atmosphere of the periods of important historical figures. These new findings, which deeply preoccupy the world of classical philosophy and literature, have the potential to reshape the intellectual framework of Antiquity. Scientists state that these carbonized structures hold much deeper secrets waiting to be discovered and that we are still only at the very beginning.

The achievement of this incredible success is cited as the clearest and most striking proof of how powerfully classical archaeology and modern data science can combine. AI models continue to be trained on ancient Greek and Latin texts through massive language models to complete the occasionally missing or faded parts of the read texts. This technological advancement promises massive hope that hundreds or even thousands of scrolls found in Herculaneum and not yet opened can also be read in the future. With the multiplication of these discoveries in the coming years, it becomes certain that there will be an explosion of knowledge that will enable us to rewrite the philosophical, literary, and social history of ancient civilizations. These dark pages of human history are now slowly but steadily being illuminated thanks to machine learning.