LEXINGTON, Ky. (Oct. 12, 2023) — The Herculaneum scrolls are among the most iconic and inaccessible of the world’s vast collection of damaged manuscripts. Since being burned and carbonized by the catastrophic eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 CE, they’ve been deemed “unreadable.” For more than 2,000 years, wisdom from the only library to survive from ancient times remained locked away.