Experts disclose specifics of Plato's resting site and concluding moments from a long-standing document.
The infamous Herculaneum papyrus scrolls, carbonized after being buried beneath meters of volcanic ash from Mount Vesuvius's eruption in 79 A.D., are still being scrutinized by specialists with advancements in AI and other technologies.
Recently, it was disclosed that Plato may have been laid to rest in a secret garden next to the sanctuary dedicated to Muses inside the Platonic Academy of Athens, as reported by Graziano Ranocchia, an expert in Papyrology at the University of Pisa's Department of Philology, Literature, and Linguistic. Before this, it was known that he was merely buried in the academy, but not in a specific location.
The Platonic Academy was demolished in 86 B.C. by Roman general Sulla.
The paper also sheds more light on Plato's final night—he did not appreciate the music that was being played.
It was once assumed that the so-called "pleasing notes" played by a woman from Thrace were something Plato enjoyed, as experts had suggested during a conference in Naples last week.
However, the texts revealed that Plato thought the flute music he heard on his deathbed entertained him marginally, according to Ranocchia, who indicated that he had shared this opinion with a Mesopotamian visitor.
Ranocchia noted that "Even though he had a fever, he was disturbed by the music they were playing."
The just-decoded passage also offers further insight into the circumstances that led to Plato's enslavement. It had previously been thought that he was sold as a slave in either 399 B.C. after the death of Socrates or in 404 B.C. on the island of Aegina after its conquest by the Spartans, but instead, he might have been enslaved while in Sicily in 387 B.C.
The text is one of more than 1,800 charred scrolls uncovered in the 18th century in a building presumed to have once belonged to Julius Caesar's father-in-law in Herculaneum—a coastal hamlet around 20 kilometers (12 miles) away from Pompeii.
Researchers are leveraging AI in conjunction with optical coherence tomography, an imaging technique, and infrared hyperspectral imaging technology to extract legible passages from the partially corrupted papyrus scrolls.
This latest discovery comes from a text arrangement stretching over 1,000 words — around 30% of the script — that has been restored after several readings throughout the past year, as it was disclosed during the presentation in Naples on April 23.
This significant advancement was facilitated by a €2.5 million ($2.7 million) grant from the ERC – European Research Council awarded in 2021.
This 5-year endeavor, dubbed the Greek Schools project, employs cutting-edge tools and methods to aid in translating these brittle papyri.
"The rise in text is equivalent to the discovery of about ten additional middle-sized papyrus fragments," remarked Kilian Fleischer, the editor of the papyri for the Greek Schools project, during the conference in Naples. "These revelations often refer to concrete information about Plato's Academy, Hellenistic literature, Philodemus of Gadara, and ancient history in general."
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Source: edition.cnn.com
