How I'm discovering the secrets of ancient texts | Gregory Heyworth

翻译人员: Chelsea Luo 校对人员: Tony Yet

On January 26, 2013,

2013年1月26日

a band of al-Qaeda militants entered the ancient city of Timbuktu

一群基地武装分子进入了

on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert.

在撒哈拉沙漠的南边 廷巴克图的古城市

There, they set fire to a medieval library of 30,000 manuscripts

他们放火烧了保存了三万本由阿拉伯语

written in Arabic and several African languages

和一些非洲语写成的手稿的 中世纪图书馆

and ranging in subject from astronomy to geography, history to medicine,

并且被分类成天文、地理、历史、医疗科目

including one book which records

在医疗科目中包括一本记录了

perhaps the first treatment for male erectile dysfunction.

可能是第一本 治疗男性勃起功能障碍的的书

Unknown in the West,

西方不知道的是

this was the collected wisdom of an entire continent,

在非洲一直被认为是不能发出声音的时候

the voice of Africa at a time when Africa was thought not to have a voice at all.

这些都是非洲的声音 和整个非洲可以被收集到的智慧

The mayor of Bamako, who witnessed the event,

巴马科市长目睹了这个事件

called the burning of the manuscripts

说这个焚烧手稿事件

"a crime against world cultural heritage."

是一群罪犯在对抗世界的遗产

And he was right --

他曾经是对的

or he would have been, if it weren't for the fact that he was also lying.

或者本应一直都是 如果他没有撒谎的话

In fact, just before,

事实上 就在之前

African scholars had collected a random assortment of old books

非洲学者们随机收集了各种各样的旧书

and left them out for the terrorists to burn.

免得让恐怖分子烧毁这些书

Today, the collection lies hidden in Bamako,

今天这些书就藏在马里的首都

the capital of Mali,

巴马科里面

moldering in the high humidity.

书因为高湿度而被侵蚀

What was rescued by ruse

这些曾经被救出来的书

is now once again in jeopardy,

再一次陷入危险之中

this time by climate.

这一次是因为气候

But Africa, and the far-flung corners of the world,

但那些危如累卵

are not the only places, or even the main places

却可以改变世界文化历史的手稿

in which manuscripts that could change the history of world culture

不唯一 甚至不主要

储存于非洲 或那些偏远的地方

are in jeopardy.

Several years ago, I conducted a survey of European research libraries

几年前 我对欧洲研究图书馆进行了一个调查

and discovered that, at the barest minimum,

发现最少有

there are 60,000 manuscripts

60000本

1500年前的手稿

pre-1500

that are illegible because of water damage,

因为水的侵蚀、褪色、发霉、化学侵蚀

fading, mold and chemical reagents.

而变得字迹模糊 难以辨认

The real number is likely double that,

真实的数据可能是这个的两倍

and that doesn't even count

这还没有算那些

Renaissance manuscripts and modern manuscripts

文艺复兴和现代的手稿

and cultural heritage objects such as maps.

和一些文化的遗产 比如地图

What if there were a technology

如果有一种高科技

that could recover these lost and unknown works?

可以还原这些丢失的和未知的文字呢

Imagine worldwide how a trove of hundreds of thousands

想想看世界范围内这些成百上千

of previously unknown texts

以前不为人知的手稿

could radically transform our knowledge of the past.

可以彻底地改变我们对于过去的了解

Imagine what unknown classics we would discover

想想看那些我们会发掘的 不为人知的名著

which would rewrite the canons of literature, history,

可以改写文学经典、历史

philosophy, music --

哲学、音乐等等

or, more provocatively, that could rewrite our cultural identities,

甚至更激进点说 能改写我们的文化身份

building new bridges between people and culture.

在人和文化之间建立新的桥梁

These are the questions that transformed me

这些问题改变了我

from a medieval scholar, a reader of texts,

从一个中世纪的学者 一个文本读者

into a textual scientist.

变为一个考证学家

What an unsatisfying word "reader" is.

单单“读者”这个词语难以满足我

For me, it conjures up images of passivity,

对我来说 它会让人感觉很被动

就像一个人懒散地坐在贵妃椅上

of someone sitting idly in an armchair

在一个整洁的小方块里面

waiting for knowledge to come to him

守株待兔 等着知识朝他走来

in a neat little parcel.

How much better to be a participant in the past,

做一个过去的参与者岂不是更好

an adventurer in an undiscovered country,

去做在未知的国度里

searching for the hidden text.

寻找不为人知的文字的冒险家 岂不是更好

As an academic, I was a mere reader.

作为学者 我过去仅是一枚读者

I read and taught the same classics

那些同样的名著 维吉尔, 奥维德, 乔叟, 彼特拉克...

that people had been reading and teaching for hundreds of years --

我读了教 教了读

Virgil, Ovid, Chaucer, Petrarch --

然而人们已经这么做上百年了

and with every scholarly article that I published

我把我发表的每一篇学术文章

I added to human knowledge in ever-diminishing slivers of insight.

都贡献到了那些洞察力在不断减少的知识当中

What I wanted to be

我想成为的

was an archaeologist of the past,

是过去的考古学家

a discoverer of literature,

一个文献的发现者

an Indiana Jones without the whip --

一个没有鞭子的印第安纳琼斯

or, actually, with the whip.

或者 事实上 有鞭子

(Laughter)

（笑）

And I wanted it not just for myself but I wanted it for my students as well.

我想要这些不光为了自己还为了我的学生

And so six years ago, I changed the direction of my career.

6年前 我改变了我事业的方向

At the time, I was working on "The Chess of Love,"

当时 我还在处理“爱的象棋”

the last important long poem of the European Middle Ages

欧洲中世纪的最后一首长诗

never to have been edited.

还没有被编辑过

And it wasn't edited because it existed in only one manuscript

它没有被编辑是因为关于它的只有一篇手稿

which was so badly damaged during the firebombing of Dresden

而这篇手稿已经 在第二次世界大战期间

in World War II

被德累斯顿的燃烧弹严重损坏

that generations of scholars had pronounced it lost.

一代代的学者已经宣布它遗失了

For five years, I had been working with an ultraviolet lamp

五年以来 我一直尝试用紫外线灯

trying to recover traces of the writing

试着还原手稿的一些痕迹

and I'd gone about as far as technology at the time

当时的科技能帮我多少

我也确实就做了多少

could actually take me.

And so I did what many people do.

我做了很多人都会做的事

I went online,

上网

and there I learned about

在那里我学到了

how multispectral imaging had been used to recover two lost treatises

如何用多光谱成象来恢复十三世纪

由著名的希腊数学家阿基米德撰写的 重写本上

of the famed Greek mathematician Archimedes

两篇遗失的论文

from a 13th-century palimpsest.

A palimpsest is a manuscript which has been erased and overwritten.

重写本是指被擦除过然后重写的手稿

And so, out of the blue,

并且 让我吃惊的是

I decided to write to the lead imaging scientist

我决定写信给当时的成像科学家的

on the Archimedes palimpsest project,

在阿基米德重写项目上的负责人

Professor Roger Easton,

罗杰 伊斯顿教授

with a plan and a plea.

信中写了计划和请求

And to my surprise, he actually wrote back.

令我吃惊的是 他回信了

With his help, I was able to win a grant from the US government

有了他的帮助 我得到了美国政府的津贴

to build a transportable, multispectral imaging lab,

建立了一个可移动的 光谱成象实验室

And with this lab, I transformed what was a charred and faded mess

有了实验室 我将被烧黑的和褪色的手稿

into a new medieval classic.

变为崭新的中世纪杰作

So how does multispectral imaging actually work?

所以光谱成像到底是如何起作用的呢

Well, the idea behind multispectral imaging

恩…一个很熟悉红外夜视镜的人

is something that anyone who is familiar with infrared night vision goggles

能够立刻领会光谱成像的原理

will immediately appreciate:

that what we can see in the visible spectrum of light

我们看到的可见光

is only a tiny fraction of what's actually there.

只是光谱中的很小一部分

The same is true with invisible writing.

对于那些看不见的笔迹也是同理

Our system uses 12 wavelengths of light

我们的系统用了12个不同的光的波长

between the ultraviolet and the infrared,

从紫外线到红外线

and these are shown down onto the manuscript from above

LED管和其他光源

从上往下投射

from banks of LEDs,

and another multispectral light source

投射到这些手稿上面

which comes up through the individual leaves of the manuscript.

投射穿过手稿的每一页

Up to 35 images per sequence per leaf are imaged this way

这么做 能用带有石英镜头的

using a high-powered digital camera equipped with a lens

高能数码相机

which is made out of quartz.

每次每页呈现至多35张图片

There are about five of these in the world.

世界仅有五个这种相机

And once we capture these images,

一旦我们抓取了这些图片

we feed them through statistical algorithms

我们便将统计算法加入其中

to further enhance and clarify them,

并使用原本应该

using software which was originally designed for satellite images

给地理空间科学家和中情局服务的

and used by people like geospatial scientists

专门给卫星设计的软件

让这些图片增强 变得清晰

and the CIA.

The results can be spectacular.

结果是令人惊叹的

You may already have heard of what's been done

你可能已经听说过我们在

for the Dead Sea Scrolls,

死海古卷中做的了

which are slowly gelatinizing.

我们将他们慢慢地胶化

Using infrared, we've been able to read even the darkest corners

使用红外线 我们就可以去阅读

of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

甚至是死海古卷最模糊的部分

You may not be aware, however,

然而 你可能还没有意识到

of other Biblical texts that are in jeopardy.

其他的圣经文本也陷入危险当中

Here, for example, is a leaf from a manuscript

这里举个例子 是一本手稿的其中一页

that we imaged,

我们成像出来的

which is perhaps the most valuable Christian Bible in the world.

可能是世界上最有价值的基督圣经

The Codex Vercellensis is the oldest translation of the Gospels into Latin,

维切里法典可能是世界上最早的 拉丁福音书的译文

and it dates from the first half of the fourth century.

它可以追溯到四世纪前期

This is the closest we can come

这是我们可以看到的最接近的

to the Bible at the time of the foundation of Christendom

在那个时候的基督教圣经

当时还是君士坦丁大帝的统治之下

under Emperor Constantine,

and at the time also of the Council of Nicaea,

尼西亚委员会的时期

when the basic creed of Christianity was being agreed upon.

当时关于基督教的基础教义刚刚被商定好

This manuscript, unfortunately, has been very badly damaged,

这个手稿 不幸运的是 已经严重被损坏了

and it's damaged because for centuries

原因是世纪以来

it had been used and handled

它都在教堂开典礼时

in swearing in ceremonies in the church.

宣誓被使用

In fact, that purple splotch that you see in the upper left hand corner

事实上 你看到的左上角那个紫色的斑点

is Aspergillus, which is a fungus

是曲霉菌 它是一种真菌

which originates in the unwashed hands

来源于

没有洗手的肺结核病人

of a person with tuberculosis.

Our imaging has enabled me to make the first transcription

我们的成像可以让我

of this manuscript in 250 years.

对这个250年的手稿进行首次誊写

Having a lab that can travel to collections where it's needed, however,

然而 有一个可以去那些古物需要它的地方的实验室

is only part of the solution.

这只是解决方案的一部分

The technology is expensive and very rare,

这种高科技昂贵而稀有

and the imaging and image processing skills are esoteric.

而且成像和成像过程技巧是晦涩的

That means that mounting recoveries

这意味着越来越多的恢复

is beyond the reach of most researchers and all but the wealthiest institutions.

超出了大部分研究者的能力 除了一些最富裕的机构

That's why I founded the Lazarus Project,

这也就是为什么我要建穷人的项目

a not-for-profit initiative

一个非盈利的机构

to bring multispectral imaging to individual researchers

把多谱成像技术 很少或者没有成本的

and smaller institutions at little or no cost whatsoever.

带给独立的研究人员和小型机构

Over the past five years,

在过去超过5年的时间里

our team of imaging scientists, scholars and students

我们的小队由成像科学家、学者和学生组成

has travelled to seven different countries

他们已经旅行了七个不同的国家

and have recovered some of the world's most valuable damaged manuscripts,

并恢复了一些世界上最有价值并被损坏的手稿

included the Vercelli Book, which is the oldest book of English,

包括维切里集 它是最老的一本英文书

the Black Book of Carmarthen, the oldest book of Welsh,

喀麦登的黑皮书 一本最老的威尔士书

and some of the most valuable earliest Gospels

还有一些最有价值的最早期福音书

located in what is now the former Soviet Georgia.

现在位于前苏联的格鲁吉亚

So, spectral imaging can recover lost texts.

所以 光谱成像技术可以恢复遗失的卷帙

More subtly, though, it can recover a second story behind every object,

可更精妙的是，他可以挖掘出每个古物品中 所暗藏的第二个故事

the story of how, when and by whom a text was created,

这故事包括了这些卷帙如何、什么时候和 被什么人创造出来

and, sometimes, what the author was thinking at the time he wrote.

以及作者当时写的时候是怎么想的

Take, for example, a draft of the Declaration of Independence

举个例子 独立宣言的草案

written in Thomas Jefferson's own hand,

出自于Thomas Jefferson之手

which some colleagues of mine imaged a few years ago

我的一些同事几年前把它加以成像

at the Library of Congress.

在国会的图书馆里

Curators had noticed that one word throughout

馆长注意到有一个遍布全文的词

had been scratched out and overwritten.

不断被划掉和重写

The word overwritten was "citizens."

这个被重写的词就是“公民”

Perhaps you can guess what the word underneath was.

也许你们可能猜到下面那个词是什么了

"Subjects."

“主体”

There, ladies and gentlemen, is American democracy

这里 女士们先生们 美国民主政治开始

evolving under the hand of Thomas Jefferson.

由托马斯杰斐逊展开

Or consider the 1491 Martellus Map,

或者再考虑一下1491年的马塞勒斯地图

which we imaged at Yale's Beinecke Library.

我们在耶鲁的白洁图书馆将它成像

This was the map that Columbus likely consulted

这个地图是哥伦布在他出海去新大陆前

before he traveled to the New World

很有可能参考过的

and which gave him his idea of what Asia looked like

让他了解到亚洲是什么样子的

and where Japan was located.

以及日本位于什么地方

The problem with this map is that its inks and pigments

问题在于这张地图它的墨水和颜料

had so degraded over time

随着时间的推移 严重褪色

that this large, nearly seven-foot map,

这个巨大的 几乎有七英尺的地图

made the world look like a giant desert.

使世界看起来像一个巨大的沙漠

Until now, we had very little idea, detailed idea, that is,

直到现在 我们还是不了解其中的细节

of what Columbus knew of the world

关于哥伦布对世界的了解

and how world cultures were represented.

以及世界文化是如何表示的

The main legend of the map was entirely illegible under normal light.

地图上的主要图案 在正常光下很难被辨认

Ultraviolet did very little for it.

紫外线在这里很难起作用

Multispectral gave us everything.

但多谱成像技术给了我们一切支持

In Asia, we learned of monsters with ears so long

在亚洲 我们知道了有种怪兽有巨长的耳朵

that they could cover the creature's entire body.

可以遮住整个生物的身体

In Africa, about a snake who could cause the ground to smoke.

在非洲 有种蛇能使地面引起烟雾

Like starlight, which can convey images

地图就好像星光一样 告知我们

of the way the Universe looked in the distant past,

遥远过去的宇宙是什么样的

so multispectral light can take us back to the first stuttering moments

所以多谱成像的光可以让我们回到 物体被首先创造出来时

of an object's creation.

那个稚嫩而不成熟的时刻

Through this lens, we witness the mistakes, the changes of mind,

通过透镜 我们目的了错误的发生 思维的改变

the naïvetés, the uncensored thoughts,

天真和未经雕琢的想法

the imperfections of the human imagination

不够完美的人类想象

that allow these hallowed objects and their authors

让这些神圣的物体和它们的作者

to become more real,

变得更加真实

that make history closer to us.

让历史与我们更进一步

What about the future?

未来是怎样的呢

There's so much of the past,

过去的东西有那么多

and so few people with the skills to rescue it

但是可以挽救它的人却又那么少

before these objects disappear forever.

在这些物品完全消失之前

That's why I have begun to teach this new hybrid discipline

这也是为什么我开始教授一个 新的混合学科

that I call "textual science."

我把它称之为“考证科学”

Textual science is a marriage

考证科学是由将传统技术

of the traditional skills of a literary scholar --

和文学探索的合并起来的学者组成

the ability to read old languages and old handwriting,

他们拥有阅读古文字和古文献的能力

the knowledge of how texts are made

还了解关于文献是如何被创造的知识

in order to be able to place and date them --

为了能够处理和确定这些文献的年代

with new techniques like imaging science,

运用新的科技 比如像成像技术

the chemistry of inks and pigments,

油墨和颜料化学

computer-aided optical character recognition.

计算机辅助光学和字符识别

Last year, a student in my class,

一年前 一个我课上的学生

a freshman,

新人

with a background in Latin and Greek,

拥有拉丁语和希腊语的背景

was image-processing a palimpsest

运用成像技术处理一篇重写本

that we had photographed at a famous library in Rome.

重写本是我们在罗马的一个著名图书馆拍摄的

As he worked, tiny Greek writing began to appear from behind the text.

随着工作的进行 微小的希腊文字在文本中 开始浮现出来

Everyone gathered around,

所有人聚在一起

and he read a line from a lost work

他开始读上面的文字 是关于一个当时失去工作

of the Greek comic dramatist Menander.

的希腊喜剧作家米南德

This was the first time in well over a thousand years

这是史上第一次 在这些文字过了整整一千年之后

that those words had been pronounced aloud.

被重新大声读出来

In that moment, he became a scholar.

在这个时候 他成了一名学者

Ladies and gentlemen, that is the future of the past.

女士们先生们 这就是关于过去的未来

Thank you very much.

非常感谢

(Applause)

（鼓掌）