Researchers uncover hidden 6th century text inside bookbinding made from recycled medieval parchment
- The book was Greek poet Hesiod's Work and Days, printed in Venice in 1537
- It has blurred writing on the book board, recycled from medieval parchment
- But a fusion imaging technique allowed the researchers to read 90% of the text
- The writings were revealed to be sixth-century Roman Law code, with interpretive notes referring to the Canon Law written in the margins
Researchers have uncovered the writings inside a medieval manuscript using a new imaging technique.
The book was a copy of Greek poet Hesiod's Work and Days printed in Venice in 1537, and it has two columns of writing surrounded by marginal comments on the book board - which the bookbinder likely tried to remove through washing or scraping.
By combining two different imaging techniques, it was revealed that text on the book's board was sixth-century Roman Law code, with interpretive notes referring to the Canon Law written in the margins.
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It was revealed that combining the two methods initially used: Visible hyperspectral imaging (bottom left) with x-ray fluorescence imaging (top right) - provided the best image of the text. Pictured right are the imaging results of the combined method
The study, conducted by researchers based at the Northwestern University-Art Institute of Chicago Center for Scientific Studies (NU-ACCESS), was published in the journal Analytics Chimica Acta.
Between the 15th and 18th centuries, bookbinders recycled the bindings from medieval parchments into new binding materials for printing, and while scholars have long been aware that books from this time period often contain hidden fragments of earlier manuscripts, they never had the means to read them - until now.
'For generations, scholars have thought this information was inaccessible, so they thought, "Why bother?"' said Dr Marc Walton, senior scientist at NU-ACCESS and a co-author of the study.
'But now computational imaging and signal processing advances open up a whole new way to read these texts.'
Dr Emeline Pouyet, a postdoctoral fellow in NU-ACCESS and the study's first author, said: 'Before the study, basically we were able to visually identify less than 1 per cent of the letters that were present at the surface of the book.
'And after this study, we were able to read actually almost 90 per cent of the text that was present there.'
The book analyzed, Hesiod's Work and Days, was purchased by Northwestern in 1870, the copy is the only remaining imprint with its original slotted parchment binding.
Although the binding originally caught the attention of Northwestern librarians, it was the suggestion that there was writing on the book board that led to new questions arising.
When NU-ACCESS researchers studied the binding of the book, they saw that the bookbinder tried to remove the writing on the bookboard through washing or scraping, but it still retained two columns of writing which were still visible on the book's front and back covers.
'The ink beneath degraded the parchment, so you could start to see the writing,' said Dr Pouyet.
'That is where the analytical study began.'
The team of researchers first tried to decipher the writing using a technique called visible light hyperspectral imaging, which obtains the electromagnetic spectrum for each pixel in an image, dividing the spectrum of light into many more bands than visible by the human eye.
Next, the researchers tried x-ray fluorescence imaging using a portable instrument - a technique which captures the emission of fluorescent X-Rays from a material that has been excited by bombarding with high-energy X-rays or gamma rays.
The technique provided the first information about the ink composition; however, the text was still unreadable due to poor spatial resolution.
So in order to find a better imaging technique, Dr Walton and Dr Pouyet sent the book to the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS) in Ithaca, New York, where the bright x-ray source and fast detection system allowed for a full imaging of the main text and margin comments in the entire bookbinding.
When the researchers sent the more clearly imaged writing to Dr Richard Kieckhefer, professor of religion and history in Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, he immediately recognized it as sixth-century Roman Law code, with interpretive notes referring to the Canon Law written in the margins.
Northwestern researchers sent the book to the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS) where the bright x-ray source and fast detection system allowed for a full imaging of the the bookbinding. Pictured are the results of that method
Dr Walton and Dr Pouyet suspect that the parchment may have originally been used in a university-type setting where Roman Law was studied as a basis to understanding Canon Law, which was a common practice in the Middle Ages.
Then, the writing may have been covered and recycled because it was outdated because society had removed Roman laws to implement church code.
'When you have the right tool, analysis is a lot easier,' Dr Walton said.
'But the problem is that you can't always bring priceless books to an often out-of-reach synchrotron beamline.
'We wanted to be able to use our lab-based instruments to do this sort of work.'
So the researchers reached out to Northwestern computer science professors Dr Aggelos Katsaggelos and Dr Oliver Cossairt for advice on new ways to image the book.
'We had to develop new methods of doing the analysis that we wouldn't otherwise have had,' Dr Walton said.
Image of the front side of the book cover of Greek poet Hesiod's Work and Days, printed in Venice in 1537
'There's nothing that exists off-the-shelf that we can use to simply image this book and read the hidden writing.'
'There is a vast number of wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum, and each wavelength has its advantages and disadvantages,' said Dr Katsaggelos, the Joseph Cummings Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
'Some of them can penetrate deeper into the specimen, some of them have better resolution, and so on.'
Using a machine learning algorithm developed by his team, Dr Katsaggelos discovered that not one imaging technique but a fusion of two would lead to the best results.
His team combined the two methods initially used by Dr Walton and Dr Pouyet: Visible hyperspectral imaging with x-ray fluorescence imaging.
The algorithm informed the researchers of the contribution of each method to in producing the best image.
'By combining the two modalities, we had the advantages of each,' Dr Katsaggelos said.
'We were able to read successfully what was inside the cover of the book.'
Dr Katsaggelos' data fusion image was so clear that it rivaled an image of the main text produced by the powerful x-ray beams at CHESS.
Although this mystery of the text hidden in the bookbinding of Hesiod's Works and Days has now been solved, Dr Walton and Dr Pouyet say their work has only just begun.
'We've developed the techniques now where we can go into a museum collection and look at many more of these recycled manuscripts and reveal the writing hidden inside of them,' Dr Walton said.
'This is really the start of a much larger initiative.'
Pictures of the original binding (left) and of a facsimile model (right) of the book. The book is a copy of Greek poet Hesiod's Work and Days, printed in Venice in 1537. A new fusion imaging technique allowed researchers to decipher medeival text on the book cover
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