PHerc. Paris 4Scroll 1scroll
⚖️ Data access and publication notice
The raw scan data, virtually unwrapped segments, ink-enhanced data, ink identifications, and related derived materials for this ancient scroll are being made available to support open examination, study, verification, and technical experimentation. Access to these materials is provided on the express condition that they are not used for scholarly publication during the temporary publication-reservation period.
For one year from the public release of these data, scholarly publication rights are reserved for the research teams designated by the Vesuvius Challenge or by the custodial institution holding the physical scroll. Those teams have been granted the right to prepare the first scholarly analyses because they were designated by the Vesuvius Challenge or by the institution responsible for the original material. This publication reservation was a condition of the imaging of the scroll and must be respected by all users.
During this period, users may examine, study, test, and analyze the data, but may not publish scholarly claims, transcriptions, translations, editions, interpretations, or formal analyses based on the data without permission from the Vesuvius Challenge, the custodial institution, or the designated scholarly teams. After the one-year restriction has expired and the designated teams have published their analyses, the data will be released from this publication restriction and will be available for unrestricted scholarly use.
These terms are a modification of the CC BY-NC 4.0 license (additional terms) under which these materials are provided. The publication-reservation period runs until 25/06/2027.
Recovered text
Scroll 1 — the flagship. Substantial continuous Greek text recovered from the banner and body; site of the 2023 First Letters and Grand Prize.
⚠️ The title region shows no detectable ink (possibly a different ink; the top rows are physically missing).
Photograph
/PHercParis4/photos/PHercParis4_photo.jpg)
3D model
Stats
- Status
- Substantial text · unrolled: To Be Estimated
- Segments
- 81
- Available pixel sizes
- 1.129 µm / 2.4 µm / 7.91 µm / 45.532 µm
- Scans
- 7
- Volumes
- 7
About this scroll
PHerc. Paris 4 is a rolled Herculaneum papyrus from the Institut de France, carbonized during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. It was first scanned at the Diamond Light Source in Oxfordshire, UK (2023, at 7.91 µm), and rescanned in 2026 at the ESRF in Grenoble, France (2.4 µm, plus 45.5 µm overview scans). It is the scroll with by far the most segments, and the first from which substantial continuous Greek text — Epicurean philosophy attributed to Philodemus — was recovered: the first letters were discovered here, and the 2023 Grand Prize was claimed on it.
Data & access
https://vesuvius-challenge-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/PHercParis4/s3://vesuvius-challenge-open-data/PHercParis4/https://dl.ash2txt.org/full-scrolls/Scroll1/PHercParis4.volpkg/Model predictions (3)
Volume-level machine-learning predictions over this scroll's CT data — surface geometry and, where available, 3D ink detection. Each row opens the prediction volume in Neuroglancer or links its raw files.
Ink detection & renders (3 images)
Substantial continuous Greek text recovered; ink clearly legible at 2.4µm.
Ink predictions (80 segments)
Ink detected on each flattened segment surface. Click a thumbnail to view it (← / → to step through); each segment also links to the full-resolution TIFF, and where available its surface layers in Neuroglancer and its mesh.
