The Invisible Library
John Seabrook on the Herculaneum scrolls, which have stymied papyrologists for centuries. Can a particle accelerator make them all readable?
At least eight hundred scrolls were found at Herculaneum—the only sizable library from the ancient world known to have survived intact. Some were stacked on shelves; others were packed in travelling boxes, "presumably in preparation for flight" from Vesuvius. The learned world hoped for lost classics.