Scientists have recently deciphered part of a scroll, burnt by the Vesuvius eruption, that describes the philosopher Plato’s last night alive and where he had been buried, CNN reports. The text also reveals new information that scholars didn’t know about Plato’s life as a slave.
The scrolls had originally been charred and buried by the Vesuvius eruption that destroyed Pompeii in 79 A.D. and experts have been using artificial intelligence technology to decipher them. Professor Graziano Ranocchia from the University of Pisa shared with CNN that the scrolls detail what Plato did during his final hours, including criticism about the music being played at his deathbed and “running a high fever.”
While on his death bed, Plato had listened to a Thracian slave girl play the flute and “retained enough lucidity to critique the musician for her lack of rhythm,” per The Guardian.
Experts had only known that Plato had been buried at the Academy of Athens, the world’s first university, which was founded by Plato, according to The Guardian. But the scrolls have revealed more details, including that he was buried in a specific garden there. But the academy was destroyed in 86 B.C., per CNN.
The scrolls have also revealed when Plato may have been sold as a slave. CNN reports that scholars previously thought Plato was sold into slavery in 387 B.C. during his time in Sicily, but the scrolls explain that he could’ve been sold earlier, in 399 B.C. (which is after the death of Socrates) or in 404 B.C. at Aegina when the Spartans took control.
The scrolls had originally been found in 1750 in Herculaneum and are believed to have belonged to Julius Caesar’s father-in-law, The Guardian reports, and researchers were able to decipher part of the scrolls by “an unrolling process using a mechanical technique that disrupted whole fragments of text,” according to Ranocchia.
Who was Plato?
Plato was an ancient Greek philosopher who studied ideas related to human nature, such as ethics, virtue and justice, per National Geographic. He was the student of famous philosopher Socrates and taught his pupil Aristotle.
National Geographic also explains that Plato wrote his famous “Republic” piece, which examines justice and its relationship with happiness within our world. His works influenced current Western philosophies, some of which include epistemology and ethics.
But one of his most famous works would have to be the story of Atlantis, according to National Geographic. He originally shared the story in 360 B.C., about a utopian society that eventually faced the wrath of the gods for becoming greedy and the gods sank the city.