Codex Climaci Rescriptus palimpsest | Photo Credit: Jacqueline Ramseyer Orrell

A thousand years ago, much writing was done on parchment — stretched animal skin. But since parchments were expensive, sometimes they were reused after erasing existing writing (known as palimpsest).

Now, we know that particle accelerators — cyclotrons and synchrotrons — accelerate subatomic particles (protons, electrons) along a tube, at mindboggling speeds. Scientists sometimes drive two particles from the opposite ends, so that they collide and break, allowing the scientists to examine their entrails.

A synchrotron accelerates electrons at near-light speeds along a curved path; as the electrons bend they emit extremely intense electromagnetic radiation, such as X-rays. What links ancient parchments to a synchrotron?

Well, a group of scientists at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, USA, placed the Codex Climaci Rescriptus manuscript — a 10th-century Syriac palimpsest whose scraped parchments conceal earlier Greek and Aramaic writings, including ancient astronomical material — under X-rays from a synchrotron.

To their fascination, they found that the original writing was a map of stars, believed to have been created by the Greek astronomer Hipparchus.

How does the X-ray read it? Ancient ink contained traces of metals. Metal ions diffuse into the collagen — a kind of protein — and show up under X-rays (X-ray fluorescence).

Yes, history can never be erased.

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Published on February 9, 2026