A unique library of medieval manuscripts, devastated by fire during World War II and considered lost by scholars, could be restored using technology developed to study the surface of planets. [...]
The medieval library at Chartres, France, was destroyed in an allied bombing raid on the evening of 26 May, 1944.
[...] But digital technology called multispectral imaging may now be able to reveal text on even the most badly burned manuscripts, allowing scholars to study them again.
[...] "The beauty of [multispectral imaging] is that it is not invasive," Professor Richard Janko of the University of Michigan, US, told BBC News Online.
"It's worth a trial [on the Chartres texts]. It could do a lot for the study of medieval literature," he added.
[...] Multispectral imaging is widely used on satellites that produce detailed images of the Earth. But it is now gaining ground as a technique in archaeological restoration.
Researchers take several images of a manuscript with a special multispectral camera.
The photos are then passed through different filters to produce a set of images viewed at different wavelengths of light.
These wavelengths range from colours in the visible spectrum to infrared and ultraviolet light - which are invisible to the naked eye.
This image set is then processed to show up subtle features on the page, revealing text previously concealed from human vision.
[BBC]
Reading this I remembered the famous "Red Book" of the former Benedictine monastery Lorch (near Schwäbisch Gmünd, Württemberg) also damaged in WW II (see my German lecture).
The medieval library at Chartres, France, was destroyed in an allied bombing raid on the evening of 26 May, 1944.
[...] But digital technology called multispectral imaging may now be able to reveal text on even the most badly burned manuscripts, allowing scholars to study them again.
[...] "The beauty of [multispectral imaging] is that it is not invasive," Professor Richard Janko of the University of Michigan, US, told BBC News Online.
"It's worth a trial [on the Chartres texts]. It could do a lot for the study of medieval literature," he added.
[...] Multispectral imaging is widely used on satellites that produce detailed images of the Earth. But it is now gaining ground as a technique in archaeological restoration.
Researchers take several images of a manuscript with a special multispectral camera.
The photos are then passed through different filters to produce a set of images viewed at different wavelengths of light.
These wavelengths range from colours in the visible spectrum to infrared and ultraviolet light - which are invisible to the naked eye.
This image set is then processed to show up subtle features on the page, revealing text previously concealed from human vision.
[BBC]
Reading this I remembered the famous "Red Book" of the former Benedictine monastery Lorch (near Schwäbisch Gmünd, Württemberg) also damaged in WW II (see my German lecture).
KlausGraf - am Donnerstag, 17. Juli 2003, 22:29 - Rubrik: English Corner
