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AI Unwraps Herculaneum Scroll, Reveals Philodemus' Lost Works

6/27/2026

Summary

Nicolardi AI Unwraps

Italian researchers announced on June 26, 2026 they read Herculaneum scroll PHerc. 1667 via AI virtual unwrapping.
Federica Nicolardi of the University of Naples Federico II led ML that identified ink and extracted passages crediting Philodemus with an eight-book “On Gods” series and 70 columns of “On Vices, Book 1”.
The Vesuvius Challenge offers a $1 million prize and, after supplying CT scans for over 45 scans, notes that more than 600 scrolls remain unopened.

Summary

Kentucky Offers Prize

University of Kentucky announced a $1 million prize for anyone who deciphers a Herculaneum scroll by June 2027.
Professor Gianluca del Mastro said the team reads philosophers from the third to first centuries B.C.
Only about 10 % of the 1,800 carbonized scrolls have been read, leaving over 1,600 inaccessible.
The National Library in Naples stores around 600 of the most fragile scrolls sealed while scans occur at the UK’s Diamond Light Source facility.

History

Historical Context

In 2009 University of Kentucky’s Brent Seales used phase-contrast X-ray tomography to virtually unwrap a carbonized Herculaneum scroll, building on centuries-old excavations that began after the 1738 rediscovery of the Villa of the Papyri. That breakthrough inspired the 2023 Vesuvius Challenge, launched by Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross, which awarded a $700,000 prize in February 2024 after teams read about 5 % of scroll PHerc. Paris 4.

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Nicolardi AI Unwraps

Italian researchers announced on June 26, 2026 they read Herculaneum scroll PHerc. 1667 via AI virtual unwrapping.
Federica Nicolardi of the University of Naples Federico II led ML that identified ink and extracted passages crediting Philodemus with an eight-book “On Gods” series and 70 columns of “On Vices, Book 1”.
The Vesuvius Challenge offers a $1 million prize and, after supplying CT scans for over 45 scans, notes that more than 600 scrolls remain unopened.

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