![]() "Inscribed texts are of considerable interest to the linguist and philologist," said Kevin Clinton, Cornell professor of classics, a co-author of the article. The discovery could herald an important breakthrough in the study of ancient cultures. It will be published in August in Zeitschrift fur Papyrologie und Epigraphik (journal for papyrology and epigraphy ), one of the world's leading journals on ancient texts. The article describes the first successful application of XRF imaging to the study of ancient stone inscriptions between 1,800 and 2,400 years old. "X-ray fluorescence imaging has the potential to become a major tool in epigraphy ," said Robert Thorne, professor of physics and co-author of an article in a German journal titled "Recovering Ancient Inscriptions by X-ray Fluorescence Imaging." "It's just so much more powerful than anything that's been used in the past." The research, carried out at the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS), applies a nondestructive chemical analysis technique widely used in geology, archaeology and materials science. In an unusual collaboration among scientists and humanists, a Cornell University team has demonstrated a novel method for recovering faded text on ancient stone by zapping and mapping 2,000-year-old inscriptions using X-ray fluorescence (XRF) imaging. ![]() Even in areas that have been significantly weathered, the fluorescence is strong enough to clearly read the text. The middle panel is the iron fluorescence while there is iron fluorescence visible, it becomes very weak in areas that have been significantly worn away. This is a scan of a group of letters on CIL VI 12139. ![]()
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