Anyone know ancient Greek? Archimedes text survives.

I love this story.

A 2000+ year-old text written by the greek mathematician, archimedes, was discovered in 1899 beneath prayers which were written over the erased scholarly writing 700 years ago. Technology wasn't able to recover much of the 'hidden text. The current owner hired a group to 'read' the original text by using ultraviolet light, first, and now by using a particle accelerator which emits x-ray bursts to pick up the text where it can be viewed on a computer screen.



The scribe not only erased the text lived during a 'parchment shortage' - funny to consider a parchment shortage - he also forged bits and pieces to make the book look more authentic. The man responsible for connecting the book with the accelerator is a man who studies photosynthesis in spinach. Imagine the turn his life took!

These chunks of time are astounding for something so fragile, paper text and natural dye.

Anyway, you can read about it, see more pictures or lsiten to the story at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5583668