In 2019, scholars at the Cambridge University Library discovered a very rare 750-year-old text in King Arthur's myths hiding in simple sight. A fragment of the fragile manuscript has been repurposed to the binding of a 16th-century property record, making it almost impossible to study medieval text without disbanding and certainly destroying the record cover. It's almost impossible – but not complete.
An interdisciplinary group of scholars from the University of Cambridge uses a variety of advanced imaging techniques to create a virtual copy of the binding, allowing them to digitally open the rare text without having to break it or the record note. This ground-breaking approach also preserves the artifact as an example of the 16th-century archival binding skill, which is “a piece of history of its own right,” Irène Fabry-Tehranchi, a French expert in collections and academic contact with the Cambridge University library involved statement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPL2JYZMI5C
In addition to standard tools such as mirrors, magnets, and prism, Fabry-Tehranchi and his colleagues use imaging cutting techniques to photograph every aspect of the folded fragment, make the text more readable, and create a quite detailed 3D artifact model to understand the unhealthy structure of unnecessary unnecessary seaming structure. Way -The images are then together like a puzzle to create a digital version of the cover, which Researchers can now open and study It was as if they were holding the real thing.
“If it was 30 years ago, the fragment could be cut off, released, and flatten. But now, maintaining it in the area gives us an important perspective on the 16th-century archival skills, as well as access to the medieval story itself,” Fabry-Tehranchi said. “It was first thought to be a 14th -century story about Sir Tasks but further analysis revealed that it was part of the old -french -next French Vulgate Merlin, a different and highly significant Arthurian text.”
The medieval legends of King ArthurQueen Guinevere, the knight Sir Lancelot, the magician Merlin, and the search for the holy grail was written, copied, read, performed, studied, and made in countless versions for centuries – maybe a thousand years. The Vulgate cycleAlso known as Lancelot-Grail Cycleis a such version in the old French.
Written in the first half of the 13th century, it recounts Arthurian myths in a massive five-part epic prose. The fragment located at Cambridge University Library is from Vulgate of Merlina part of Vulgate cycle Narrating events that took place after King Arthur's coronation. A passage from the fragment talks about Christian success in the Saxons in the battle of Cambénic involving Knight Gauvin (also activities) with his excalibur sword. Another narration when a disguised Merlin appears in King Arthur's court at the feast of the Virgin Mary. Here is the English translation:
As they rejoiced at the feast, and Kay brought the Seneschal the first dish to King Arthur and Queen Guinevere, the most handsome man had seen in Christian lands. She was wearing a silk tunic that was hit by a silk harness woven with gold and precious stones that glowed with such brightness that illuminated the whole room.
There are less than 40 survivors of prints of Vulgate of Merlin The text is known to scholars, and because they are copied by scribes to Medieval, each is a unique version. One located at the Cambridge University Library, for example, has decorative red and blue initials. Based on this as well as other features, researchers suggest that the text has been written between 1275 and 1315.
However, “this project is not just about unlocking a text-it's about developing a technique that can be used for other manuscripts,” concludes Fabry-Tehranchi. “Libraries and archives around the world are faced with similar challenges with fragile fragments embedded in bindings, and our approach provides a model for non-invasive access and study.”
A person's trash can (or binding books) can be another person's wealth – even 750 years later.
