Live Science is reporting Mummy Mask May Reveal Oldest Known Gospel:
A text that may be the oldest copy of a gospel known to exist — a fragment of the Gospel of Mark that was written during the first century, before the year 90 — is set to be published.
At present, the oldest surviving copies of the gospel texts date to the second century (the years 101 to 200).
This first-century gospel fragment was written on a sheet of papyrus that was later reused to create a mask that was worn by a mummy. Although the mummies of Egyptian pharaohs wore masks made of gold, ordinary people had to settle for masks made out of papyrus (or linen), paint and glue. Given how expensive papyrus was, people often had to reuse sheets that already had writing on them.
[...] The technique is bringing many new texts to light, Evans noted. "From a single mask, it's not strange to recover a couple dozen or even more" new texts, he told Live Science. "We're going to end up with many hundreds of papyri when the work is done, if not thousands."
[...] One drawback to the process is that the mummy mask is destroyed, and so scholars in the field are debating whether that particular method should be used to reveal the texts they contain. [See here, here, and here.]
It appears that it is only in hindsight that one can assess whether a particular mask's destruction was worth the papyri it produced. Should this research continue, or should it wait some indeterminate period of time for future technologies which might be able to non-destructively retrieve the writings?
Have any of you faced a similar decision on destructive analysis? How did you decide? How did it work out?
(Score: 2) by jimshatt on Monday January 19 2015, @12:01PM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by FatPhil on Monday January 19 2015, @01:08PM
"Now these guys with their atrocious accents and patronising attitudes are destroying what's left to get their hands on trophy exhibits.".
Said commentator is a Brit, and appears to have a disgustingly patronising attitude when it comes to accents.
Apparently, he has a history for rubbing people up the wrong way online: http://culturalpropertyobserver.blogspot.com/2009/06/paul-barford-voice-of-archaeological.html . He seems about as equipped for debate as the average internet flame warrior - in http://paul-barford.blogspot.com/2009/06/mr-tompa-looses-his-cool.html he criticises "a person [...] who cannot spell ...", and yet happily overlooks his own use of "looses" rather than "loses".
I've often said (in fact, just earlier today), that if you're pissing off idiots, you're probably doing the right thing. And if these researchers are pissing of this guy, I'm sure that does nothing but encourage them.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday January 19 2015, @04:38PM
FTA: "we soak them in water. There is a process we use with huge microwaves to do it but it’s not quite as good."
Ah... The problem with HUGE microwaves. Yes. I begin to understand the emergence of quasi-intelligence.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday January 19 2015, @11:34PM
Then again, wasn't there a huge room-sized wood-drying microwave, which causes a man to explode in it, in Kick Ass? I appreciate, of course, that Kick Ass wasn't a documentary.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday January 20 2015, @12:18AM
I think that the destruction of one relic to have a chance to recover a different prior relic should only be done if there's no other option, and the certainty of yielding the earlier relic is not in doubt. I wonder if there's a giant prehistoric pearl in this dinosaur egg? >Smash<. Erm, OK, nothing in that one. I wonder if there's a giant prehistoric pearl in *this* dinosaur egg? ...
Why is there no tomographic solution, or similar? We can see layers of paint on paintings, why can we not detect ink?
However, back to my taking sides point, the partisans who are debating this should be mature about how they address the issue, have demonstrable expertise, and should defer judgement to disinterested parties. The guy pulling apart burial masks is almost certainly a god-squadder who wants to become famous by being the guy who found the oldest Gospel, he's utterly unable to judge the legitimacy of his actions, as he's by definition completely biased, and self-serving. The other guy - I have no idea, it's just that he comes over as just being a contrarian who refuses to demonstrate the legitimacy of his stance.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1) by srobert on Monday January 19 2015, @03:47PM
It seems peculiar to me that the dilemma being discussed is whether the mask is more valuable or the text contained on it, while utterly ignoring the notion that it may rightfully be owned by the deceased. I'm uneasy with the idea that in a few thousand years people might dig up our dead bodies and display them for their amusement, or even for the advancement of their science and history.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by buswolley on Monday January 19 2015, @04:50PM
I'm not. I'd be dead.
subicular junctures
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday January 19 2015, @05:05PM
FWIW, whether they do that or not depends more on their sense of morality and legalistics than yours. IIUC currently the masks are owned by some institution or individual, not whoever was buried in them. So currently laws don't have much relevance. And I, personally, don't believe that I should expect to have any control over my possessions centuries after I'm dead. Or my body, if you don't consider it a possession.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by srobert on Monday January 19 2015, @06:03PM
Actually I don't care to have control over my possessions after death either. And I wouldn't mind if my dead body wound up in a landfill or the ocean or whatever. But that's just my opinion. It would seem to me that common decency would require that the opinions of the deceased be considered even if they are 3000 year old peasants. And if you leave your body to science, wouldn't it be undignified if it wound up as part of an advertising display for a zombie-themed casino on the moon.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 20 2015, @11:10PM
And I, personally, don't believe that I should expect to have any control over my possessions centuries after I'm dead.
Walt Disney on the other hand ...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 20 2015, @12:06AM
Have you considered cremation as an option?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 20 2015, @10:51AM
Then people could still study his ashes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 19 2015, @12:02PM
I clone the whole hdd before attempting file restore... destructive read not required.
However, in the days of DeathStars it most certainly was a destructive read and die at the end. Thanks IBM, for the memories.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by jimshatt on Monday January 19 2015, @12:14PM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday January 19 2015, @04:24PM
These are the end times. There is no posterity.
Drill, baby, drill!
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 1) by forkazoo on Monday January 19 2015, @05:45PM
Yeah, I'm thinking if you let this sit for ten years, somebody will get a PhD out of nondestructive techniques to get at the data. Maybe some super CAT scan will be able to pick out ink letters on the layers or something.
(Score: 2, Informative) by pTamok on Monday January 19 2015, @12:45PM
I wonder if a CT scanner could be used?
It has been tried on the carbonised scrolls from the villa in Herculaneum of the father-in-law of Julius Caesar ( Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25106956 [bbc.co.uk]
I would favour non-destructive means, even if the consquence is that we have to wait until the sufficiently able technology arrives.
Untold numbers of Eqgyptian mummies may have already been destroyed.
From the Straight Dope: http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2341/do-egyptians-burn-mummies-as-fuel [straightdope.com]
"Egyptian mummies really were--and are--available by the truckload. Originally reserved for the upper classes, mummification eventually became popular with the proles; by modern times, mummies numbered in the millions. A single burial ground discovered not long ago is thought to contain 10,000. Second, mummies really were used for bizarre purposes. During medieval times they were ground into powder and used as medicine. Later this powder was used as a paint pigment called "mummy brown," a practice that persisted into the early 20th century."
One thing to be aware of is that if the mummies are currently in countries where he majority faith is Muslim, there may not be a great deal of support for such research of interest to the Christian faith.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 19 2015, @03:06PM
From what I have heard the mummy dust medicine originated in Europe due to a mistranslation.
(Score: 1) by srobert on Monday January 19 2015, @03:35PM
Since Jesus was a significant figure in Islam as well as Christianity, I would think that Muslim scholars would want to be in on this.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 20 2015, @12:04AM
Actually, maybe not. In ways which don't quite make sense to me, Muslims pay lip service to the "holy books" of the Jews and Christians, yet they also view these books as being irredeemably corrupted. Hence the reason that Mohammed needed to set us all straight with his revelations recorded in the Koran. Muslims will quite literally take special care and reverence for a Christian Bible in their possession (I've actually seen this with my own eyes)...but open it up and read it? Most likely, not.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday January 20 2015, @07:40AM
It's a bit ironic if they consider them "irredeemably corrupted" how much of those same stories Mohammed obviously appropriated.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 19 2015, @01:42PM
How useful is it to have a mask behind some glass in a museum? How many people will get to see it in person and how much will the entrance fee be?
Take a picture and 3D scan the mask then put it with the texts on a website. There will be plenty of rich people's masks made with blank papyrus left anyway.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 19 2015, @02:48PM
It is useful to not destroy the mask because in the future we may find ways to extract information from it which we currently don't even know that it is there, and which may no longer be available if we destroy it to get at the texts. Given that the texts will still be recoverable later, keeping at least some of the masks seems reasonable.
For example, maybe in five years we find a way to learn new things from the glue, but to obtain the texts you probably have to dissolve the glue, making it unavailable for future analysis.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Refugee from beyond on Monday January 19 2015, @04:42PM
On the other hand in 3 years it might happen that mask is destroyed by random idiots…
Instantly better soylentnews: replace background on article and comment titles with #973131.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 19 2015, @08:06PM
This was the problem with palimpsests. When philologists figured out in the early nineteenth century that parchment got reused and that certain chemicals could reveal, destructively, the contents that had been erased for the reuse of the physical material, people like Angelo Mai started dumping acids on books right and left. It got them some major wins: from an otherwise unremarkable copy of some writings of Augustine of Hippo, Mai recovered the lost text of Cicero's De Republica. On the other hand, they destroyed a number of medieval works that were also important, but were at the time of less interest to classical philologists (who utterly hated the middle ages, no joke, and many still do). Newer technology, developed in the intervening two centuries, now allows for nondestructive recovery of the same contents.
The lesson: it may take a few hundred years, but technology will advance to the point of being able to recover information from those masks without destroying them. The real question is whether political circumstances will remain stable enough to preserve the masks, of if they'll be destroyed like the Muslim libraries at Timbuktu (destroyed by... Muslims). Egypt's stability is questionable... it might be wise to extract some of that information before there's nothing left to extract.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Monday January 19 2015, @02:59PM
(currently at 0) Why mod this down? Even if you don't agree it's a perfectly valid opinion!
(Score: 3, Informative) by maxwell demon on Monday January 19 2015, @08:07PM
Nobody had moderated it down. Anonymous Coward posts start at score 0.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Funny) by srobert on Monday January 19 2015, @03:52PM
"There will be plenty of rich people's masks made with blank papyrus left anyway."
Yeah, but the masks of rich people should be left in their tombs with the bodies. It wouldn't be very respectful to desecrate the graves of rich people.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 19 2015, @09:27PM
Yeah, let's desecrate the graves of poor people instead...