Abstract
Handwritten characters in administrative antique documents from three centuries have been detected using different synchrotron X-ray imaging techniques. Heavy elements in ancient inks, present even for everyday administrative manuscripts as shown by X-ray fluorescence spectra, produce attenuation contrast. In most cases the image quality is good enough for tomography reconstruction in view of future applications to virtual page-by-page `reading'. When attenuation is too low, differential phase contrast imaging can reveal the characters from refractive index effects. The results are potentially important for new information harvesting strategies, for example from the huge Archivio di Stato collection, objective of the Venice Time Machine project.
Highlights
Heavy elements in inks (Del Carmine et al, 1996) normally allow their detection by X-ray attenuation
The use of X-ray tomography to analyze handwriting was pioneered by Seales et al (Lin & Seales, 2005; Baumann et al, 2008; Seales et al, 2011) with the EDUCE project
Why could heavy elements be present in ancient inks? Let us start from black inks (Yale University Library Special Collections Conservator Unit, 2012; Capella, 420)
Summary
We have correlated the chemical analysis by X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (XRF, with a portable instrument) of 15th to 17th century administrative Italian documents and the X-ray imaging of the handwritten characters using synchrotron radiation. The raw data can be obtained without opening or manipulating the manuscripts, reducing the risk of damage and speeding up the process This approach is based on precursor projects exploiting X-rays to decipher documents. The project virtually ‘unrolled’ scrolls producing flat readable images and assessed the possibility of damage by X-ray exposure These efforts are part of several pioneering studies exploiting synchrotron techniques for the humanities and art As demonstrated by the extensive experience (Hwu et al, 1999) with other types of specimens, this could allow the recognition of faded-out or very weak characters
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