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Scroll down: Dead Sea Scrolls go online: Scientists in Israel are taking digital photographs of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
(Globes Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Aug. 31--A pilot project by the Israel Antiquities Authority will take pictures of thousands of Dead Sea Scroll fragments in the State Collections in color and infra red using the latest in digital cameras and placing them in a unique internet data bank.
The Israel Antiquities Authority said on Wednesday that it would take more than two years to complete the project.
The scrolls are the most ancient Hebrew record of the Old Testament that has been found to date. They shed light on a time of great upheaval in the history of the Jewish people at the end of the Second Temple period as well as the history of Early Christianity.
Based on radiocarbon dating and paleographic analysis, the earliest of the scrolls can be dated to the end of the third century BCE. However, the overwhelming majority of the manuscripts are dated to the first century BCE-first century CE, to the time of the Hasmonean and Herodian dynasties.
The pilot project will involve the documentation of all of the thousands of Dead Sea Scrolls fragments belonging to about 900 manuscripts, and placing them in an internet data bank that will be available to the public. This will be accomplished by imaging the scrolls in color and infrared which allow, among other things, the reading of scores of scroll fragments that were blackened or ostensibly erased over the years and which were not visible to the naked eye until now.
According to Israel Antiquities Authority head of the department for the treatment and conservation of artifacts Pnina Shor, "In addition to acquiring the test images, which will be used to analyze and evaluate the quality control of the conservation, we are focusing on a workflow that will minimize as much as possible the exposure of the scrolls to light and will aid in determining the time and manpower needed for the complete imaging of all of the thousands of scroll fragments. The innovative technology will make it possible for the first time to scientifically measure changes in the state of the scrolls' preservation."
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Copyright (c) 2008, Globes, Tel Aviv, Israel
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