Vesuvius Challenge
@scrollprize

The Vesuvius Challenge is a machine learning, geometry and computer vision competition to read the Herculaneum Papyri.

scrollprize.org
Joined February 2023
24 Photos and videos
Vesuvius Challenge just awarded another $40K in prizes this month, for progress across virtual unwrapping and ink detection, bringing us closer to reading the rest of the Herculaneum Papyri scrollprize.org/winners

Vesuvius Challenge

Browse every Vesuvius Challenge prize winner, from the $700,000 Grand Prize for reading a Herculaneum scroll to monthly open source and Kaggle awards.

scrollprize.org
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Check out this amazing visualisation of papyrus fibers from one of our winners!
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$50K First Letters Prize awarded to Erwin Nieuwlaar for finding text in PHerc 343! This is the first time in nearly 2000 years that anyone has read text in this rolled scroll. Our papyrologists reckon it’s part of the expression πᾶ̣ν τ̣ὸ γιν̣όμ̣ε̣[νον, “everything that happens/is generated”
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…and here is where Erwin discovered the text, hidden deep within the fine windings of the scroll
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There are still 21 scrolls eligible for First Letters prizes – and of course the $1M Grand Prize – scrollprize.org/prizes

Vesuvius Challenge

Open Vesuvius Challenge prizes: win cash for finding the first letters or title in a Herculaneum scroll, plus monthly progress prizes for open source work.

scrollprize.org
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WOW! Letters found in PHerc. 1447, a GRAND PRIZE eligible scroll. This means ONE thing: the $1M Grand Prize pool is now a LOW HANGING FRUIT! Nothing is impossible in the AI era, join our Discord and be the one to win the race. Only 270 days left! discord.gg/V4fJhvtaQn
Ink predictions in PHerc. 1447

ALT Ink predictions in PHerc. 1447

Text validated by papyrologists

ALT Text validated by papyrologists

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Vesuvius Challenge retweeted
Kevin Albrecht
@kevinpalbrecht
Aug 24
Vesuvius buried Herculaneum in AD 79 and carbonized a library of scrolls. We can read one of them now: PHerc. 1667, a Stoic treatise on ethics, read from inside the still-sealed roll. It's on Kevilex in the Ancient Greek, every word clickable: kevilex.com/collections/pher…
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Want $50K for discovering the first letters in an ancient papyrus scroll? We've published a new article that walks you through one possible way to win our First Letters Prize scrollprize.substack.com/p/f…
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Have we found a squashed bug in the scrolls?
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This month we awarded $33,500 in progress prizes to 13 different winners! The top submission got $20,000, and we will keep awarding $20,000 to the best contribution of the month till June 2027! Join us, help us read the scrolls, write history and win prizes!
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I still can’t believe we’re reading Greek text from this piece of coal! Every month, we’ll award $20,000 to contributors who help us recover more text from other pieces of coal like this one. Join our Discord: discord.gg/V4fJhvtaQn
PHerc. Paris 4

ALT PHerc. Paris 4

Text extracted from PHerc. Paris 4

ALT Text extracted from PHerc. Paris 4

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A new phase BEGINS! 🚀 🏆 $1M Grand Prize 💰 $2M+ in open prizes 👑 $20K awarded every month to the best submission scrollprize.org/ Will you read the next scroll? 👀 Spread the word and repost! 🔁

Vesuvius Challenge — Reading the Herculaneum Scrolls with AI

Vesuvius Challenge uses machine learning and computer vision to read the carbonized Herculaneum scrolls buried by Vesuvius in 79 AD. Over $1,958,500 awarded.

scrollprize.org
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This sounds crazy, BUT this week we READ A FULL SCROLL!! scrollprize.org/firstscroll It’s PHerc. 1667, aka Scroll 4! And that’s not all. We also proved that we can directly see ink in a rescan of PHerc. Paris 4 — Scroll 1 — WITHOUT machine learning… …and we UNROLLED ABOUT 140 COLUMNS FROM IT. This was honestly POETIC. We first saw a glimpse of the results over dinner in Naples, in a restaurant where Caravaggio was stabbed. Federica was so excited — more excited than we had ever seen her — that we abandoned dinner, went back to work, and unrolled the 140 columns until 3 a.m. on a hotel rooftop, with Vesuvius in the background. The unroll is not perfect. But guys… 140 columns, with text visible everywhere. It’s HUGE. This project has been full of ups and downs, but somehow, at some point, something ALWAYS happens. We’re starting to think these scrolls have personalities… …and they want to be read. @natfriedman has announced a $1M Grand Prize to read another full scroll. Official details coming soon!
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The Vesuvius Challenge is still a CHALLENGE! 🧠📜 We’re teaming up with @kaggle to launch a $100K Surface Detection competition on 3D CT scans of the Herculaneum scrolls: kaggle.com/competitions/vesu… . Train topology-aware models, climb the leaderboard, and help us read an ancient library! #VesuviusChallenge #kaggle #computervision #machinelearning

Vesuvius Challenge - Surface Detection

Build a model to virtually unwrap ancient scrolls.

kaggle.com
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