Some goddesses are puzzled by this...like me...I remember hearing about the Dead Sea Scrolls when I was a kid, but I never had much of a clear idea of what they were. Yeah, they were written by dead prophets, a long time ago, and were translated on and off by scholars...so?
[my dear husband, philistine that he is, just loves the quote about the scripture written by a bunch of old guys in a cave smokin' rope, but we leave him his illusions...it's better that way. *grin*]
NOW that I'm MUCH older [don't agree with that too loudly!] , I understand the extreme sense of history and wonder in having 15,000 fragments that make up some 900 scrolls that are over 2,000 years old!
2,000....hmmm I doubt any of our ramblings on the internet will be around that long. :)
The neat part about this now is that the Israel Antiquities Authority is currently working to digitize these irreplaceable pieces of the past and place them on-line for everyone to see. There is an article on The New York Times website about it.
The part that made me grit my teeth was finding out that the original "experts" in the 1950's who were trying to piece these scrolls together used scotch tape to do it. Ouch! Anybody who has old records with crumbling pieces of scotch tape on them knows what that glue does to the paper. I have some pictures from the 50's and 60's that were pretty much ruined by the discoloration.
Seeing these eventually on-line is definitely something to look forward to.
from a puzzled goddess geeking out on the past
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2 comments:
Aaaaarrrrrgh!
Alas, that so many great discoveries were made before grid excavation, acid and lignin-free papers/adhesives /tapes and digital/photo documentation.
But, I wonder what we have left to discover, and whether our attempts to document those will be met with similar gnashing of teeth and tearing of hair.
50 years from now:
AAAAaaaarrrgh! What do you mean they didn't do an on-site DNA-sensitive MRI before they dug?!!
I know. I cringe to think of all our digitized memories and how often we are going to have to update them with technology to keep them viable. :)
Grandma used scotch tape....maybe they'll be bitching about CD's and the data degredation by then.
ttptog
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