A groundbreaking scientific breakthrough has unveiled a long-lost text by an ancient Greek philosopher, hidden for nearly 2,000 years within a carbonized papyrus scroll. Thanks to advanced X-ray scanning technology, researchers have identified a work by the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, titled “On Vices”, dating back to the 1st century BCE.
The papyrus—catalogued as PHerc. 172—is part of the Bodleian Library’s collection at Oxford University. It is one of hundreds discovered in a luxurious Roman villa in Herculaneum, believed to have belonged to the father-in-law of Julius Caesar. The villa was buried beneath layers of ash and pumice during the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE.
A Digital Unrolling of History
This remarkable discovery was made possible by a revolutionary technique that involves virtually “unrolling” the papyrus using computer imaging after scanning it with X-rays. It marks the first time researchers have successfully identified both the title and author of a papyrus scroll using this method.
Dr. Michael McOsker, a papyrologist at University College London, emphasized the significance of the find in an interview with The Guardian:
“This is the first papyrus where the ink could be seen directly in the scan. No one knew what was inside it. We didn’t even know if it had writing at all.”
The Vesuvius Challenge: Unlocking Ancient Knowledge
The discovery is part of the Vesuvius Challenge, an international competition launched in 2023 to accelerate the deciphering of Herculaneum’s scrolls using 3D X-ray imaging. Last year, a team of computer science students won a $700,000 prize by developing AI software capable of reading 2,000 Greek characters from another ancient papyrus.
The scroll in question was scanned in July 2024 at Diamond Light Source, the UK’s national synchrotron facility in Oxfordshire. Notably, researchers identified the ancient Greek word for “disgust” at least twice within the recovered text.
Further analysis by Sean Johnson, Marcel Roth, and Micha Nowak led to the discovery of the scroll’s title and author deep within its layers—earning the team the Vesuvius Challenge’s $60,000 title prize.
A Philosophical Work on Human Faults
Philodemus’ On Vices spans at least ten volumes, exploring topics such as arrogance, greed, flattery, and household management. A character resembling the Greek letter alpha (α) on the scroll suggests it may be the first volume of the series.
The Race to Decode Continues
The research is moving swiftly. In March 2025, 18 more scrolls were scanned at the Diamond facility, with 20 additional scrolls scheduled for imaging at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble.
Dr. Brent Seales, a computer science professor at the University of Kentucky and co-founder of the Vesuvius Challenge, highlighted the current hurdle:
“We’re seeing traces of ink in many of the newly scanned scrolls, but we haven’t yet turned those clues into coherent text.”
Dr. McOsker added:
“The pace is accelerating incredibly fast… All of this technological progress has happened in just the last three to five years. For classicists, that’s astonishing. Every new discovery from the Herculaneum library is completely unprecedented for us.”
This fusion of technology and ancient history is not only reshaping our understanding of the past, but also offering an unprecedented glimpse into the minds and writings of philosophers whose voices were thought to be lost forever.
