A University of Kentucky project using artificial intelligence to help decode an ancient Roman mystery has led to a major discovery, researchers announced Thursday.
In 79 A.D., the eruption of Mount Vesuvius buried the Roman city of Pompeii and the nearby town of Herculaneum. During a dig in Herculaneum in the 18th century, archaeologists found 1,800 papyrus scrolls in an intact ancient library, deep under the site of a villa that was destroyed by Vesuvius' eruption. But reading them was impossible: The scrolls are brittle and charred, and unravelling them turns them into ash.
