Villa of the Papyri

[Turpissimus]

@Wikipedia

The “Villa of the Papyri” is an enormous private house of ancient Herculaneum owned by Julius Caesar’s father-in-law, Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, and first excavated in 1785 by Karl Weber. Its name derives from the discovery of a library in the house containing 1,800 carbonized papyrus scrolls.

The 800 feet (245 m) long sea side villa had four levels and was the most luxurious house in all of Herculaneum and Pompeii. It was complete with swimming pools, fountains and water features.

Many of the scrolls were by the philosopher Philodemus, a client of Piso. The villa of the Papyri is said to contain a second library full of papyrus scrolls. The villa of the papyri also housed a large collection of privately owned sculptural art. The house contained 80 sculptures of magnificent quality and craftsmanship. Lucius Piso was a highly educated man and was a patron for both philosophers and poets. There is still 30,000 square feet (2,800 m²) left to be excavated of this grand estate.

link

I’ve heard that some restoration efforts are underway on the charred scrolls that have been discovered, and that some headway is being made in being able to read them. Also, as mentioned in the article, some suspect there is a further cache of volumina in the “basement” of the site. I don’t know how skeptical we should be of that claim.

Has anyone else heard of this project? What would you like them to find among the scrolls, if they are ever able to read them? What would you hope we don’t find - Cicero’s poetry perhaps? It would be most excellent if we could unearth, say, a full copy of De Rerum Natura, or, for instance, some of Aristotle’s dialogues, which he apparently wrote.

What does everyone else think?

[annis]

@Turpissimus

I’ve heard that some restoration efforts are underway on the charred scrolls that have been discovered, and that some headway is being made in being able to read them.

Unfortunately one of the major authors is Philodemus, who is a difficult read even when you have an intact text.

Has anyone else heard of this project?

The Philodemus Project. I think they have three volumes out now.

What would you like them to find among the scrolls, if they are ever able to read them?

Sappho. More Sappho. And some Ibycus and Pindar, too, I suppose. Ok, more complete poems of any of the archaic Greek poets would be nice. Of course more Homer texts are welcome, but I think new texts of the other poets has more to offer than one more variant spelling for Homer.

It would be interesting to have a more extensive account of Epicurean and Stoic writings, too.

What would you hope we don’t find - Cicero’s poetry perhaps?

Oh my. None of this please. Fortunately the neoplatonists came later.

[Turpissimus]

This article is quite interesting.

We know that at least twice as much early epic poetry as we now possess formerly existed; we have some 20% of the plays of Euripides, only 5% of those of Sophocles . . . we know, for instance, when and where the last copy of much of Callimachus’ poetry was destroyed - by Frankish knights when they sacked Athens during the Fourth Crusade of 1205

A great deal of the works of the classical world seem to have disappeared then. I had no idea of the sheer bulk of material we had lost.

That article also has an interesting part in the middle shedding some light on the thought processes of the researchers who reconstruct the texts. And it also explains an incredibly obscure in-joke in the film The Name of the Rose. A good read, ut opinor.

[Emma_85]

I’d like to find some of Epikur’s work, but what I’d like them to find too is something by Thales, as all of his stuff is lost.

[Emma_85]

Yes, loads of great works have been lost . I think that might also help to explain why many people think the ancient philosophers were so intelligent and clever. We have Plato’s works, but how do we know where he got his ideas from? It’s like quite a few people think that all his thoughts were ‘original’ and that he was just extremely clever. Maybe he was, but if someone were only to find Satres stuff and had no idea how much he had been influence by all the philosophers before him, they’d think he was some kind of really great philosopher too. That’s why it would be really nice to find some more philosophical texts from the time before Plato.