Researchers Uncover Secrets about the Dead Sea Scrolls Using Artificial Intelligence

While archaeologists are still unsure who wrote the Dead Scrolls, thanks to a recent study that used artificial intelligence, they could be one level closer to knowing the artefacts' origins. According to the research, which was reported this week in the journal PLOS ONE, the text on the ancient Jewish manuscripts, which date from the 3rd century B.C.E. to the 1st century C.E., was likely written by two individuals.

The two scribes wrote in such a similar way that the gaps between them aren't apparent to the naked human eye, according to the analysis — information that indicates the scribes may have undergone similar training, possibly at a school or in a near social environment, according to the researchers.

The researchers started by teaching an artificial neural network to digitally distinguish a text's ink from a cloth or papyrus setting.

Smithsonian Magazine mentioned "This is important because the ancient ink traces relate directly to a person's muscle movement and are person-specific," says study co-author Lambert Schomaker, an artificial intelligence researcher at the University of Groningen, in a statement.

The Dead Sea Scrolls have long piqued people's interest, both within and outside of archaeological realms, and the latest research isn't the only piece of news about them to surface in recent times. Archaeologists discovered new samples of the Dead Sea Scrolls in a desert east of Jerusalem in March, marking the first time such a find linked to the scrolls had been made in nearly 60 years. Those new parchment fragments are thought to contain Greek text from the books of Zechariah and Nahum.