SEMINAR: The Vienna Dexippus: New Contributions from Multispectral Imaging to Third Century History and Literature

The recovery of the ‘Vienna Dexippus’ has been one of the most significant discoveries in recent Classical palaeography. The text, recovered from the reused leaves of an 11th century manuscript, later bound into a 13th century Greek codex, now in the Austrian National Library, sheds considerable light on the otherwise poorly documented history of the Gothic invasions of the Roman Empire during the 250s and 260s C.E. The recovery of the text is due to the innovative use of multi-spectral imaging, a technique which has already revolutionised the study of palimpsests and which has the potential to expand our knowledge of classical literature. Ivan Lozic will give an introduction to multi-spectral imaging technology, and Chris Mallan will consider some of the major outcomes of this project from the perspective of an historian who has worked with this particular text, as well as some thoughts on the uses of digitised texts in the study of Classics and Ancient History more generally.