Oct 25, 2023 21:00:00

The first word is finally deciphered in a challenge where you can get 30 million yen by deciphering an ancient Roman scroll buried in volcanic ash and carbonized.

The Vesuvius Challenge, a contest with a prize of 250,000 dollars (approximately 33 million yen) to decipher ancient documents discovered in an ancient Roman city buried in volcanic ash, has begun on March 15, 2023. On October 12, 2023, someone finally deciphered the first word.

First word discovered in unopened Herculaneum scroll by 21yo computer science student | Vesuvius Challenge
https://scrollprize.org/firstletters

There should be more cash prizes for solving historical mysteries
https://resobscura.substack.com/p/there-should-be-more-cash-prizes

What is being deciphered by the Vesuvius Challenge is an ancient Roman papyrus scroll excavated from the ruins of the city of Herculaneum , which is registered as a World Heritage Site along with Pompeii in Italy.

Buried in hot volcanic ash, this scroll has become carbonized and extremely brittle, and will break if you attempt to open it and read it. Therefore, the ``Vesuvius Challenge'' is being conducted by Dr. Brent Shields of the University of Kentucky and others, recruiting people who are good at decoding technology and using the latest technology to decipher the characters written on the scroll. The Vesuvius Challenge is summarized in detail in the following article.

``Vesuvius Challenge'' where you can get 30 million yen if you decipher ancient Roman scrolls buried in volcanic ash - GIGAZINE

The goal of the Vesuvius Challenge is to decipher two scrolls called ``Full Scroll'' and ``Fragment.'' If you decipher at least four consecutive sentences in the scroll in 2023, you will receive $700,000 (approximately 100 million yen). The scroll was extremely difficult to decipher, but on October 12, 2023, the first words written in the 'Fragment' were finally revealed.

Luke Farriter , who succeeded in deciphering the code, repeatedly trained a machine learning model using publicly available CT scans of cross-sections of the scrolls. Through repeated training and improvement of the machine learning model, they were able to identify the unique texture left behind by the ink used on the scrolls. Fariter calls the ink's texture a 'crack pattern.'

Through repeated training, the model gradually improved, and new crack patterns that were invisible to the naked eye were discovered. Eventually, the AI discovered the word 'πορφυραc (Porphyrus)'. After receiving the report of the discovery, Mr. Shields and his team identified the meaning of this word 'πορφυραc' and found that this word was the word 'purple'.

Mr. Farita, who first reported the word, was awarded $40,000 (about 6 million yen). In addition, Mr.

Yusef Nader , who was one step behind Mr. Fariter but showed clearer results with a similar approach, was presented with $10,000 (approximately 1.5 million yen). Below is an image of the scroll shown by Mr. Nader.

'The word 'πορφυραc' was first discovered after we began our efforts to decipher the scroll,' Shields said. It is assumed that.''

Nader also released an image of a scroll with four lines of text written on it. Based on Mr. Nader's images, many research teams are working hard to identify the meaning of the characters.