More than 600 years ago, someone folded, sealed and posted a letter that was never delivered. Now, scientists have digitally “unfolded” this letter and other similarly blocked letters found in a 17th-century trunk in The Hague using X-rays.
Centuries before the invention of sealed envelopes, sensitive correspondence was protected from prying eyes by complex folding techniques called letterlocking, which turned a letter into its own secure envelope.
However, the blocked letters that survive to this day are fragile and can only be physically opened by cutting them into pieces.
The new X-ray method offers researchers a non-invasive alternative, while maintaining the original folded shape of a package of letters.
For the first time, scientists have applied this method to “locked” Renaissance letters, kept in a trunk in the collection of the Dutch Postal Museum in The Hague, the Netherlands, since 1926.
Computer generated unfolding animation of the sealed letter DB-1538. (Archiving the unlocking history research group)
Related to: Photos: Thesaurus of unopened letters from the seventeenth century
The contents of the trunk include over 3,100 undivided letters, of which 577 were unopened and blocked. Known as the Brienne Collection, the letters were written in Dutch, English, French, Italian, Latin and Spanish.
For unknown reasons, once the letters arrived in The Hague, they were never handed over to their recipients, but were kept by a postman named Simon de Brienne, Live Science also reported.
Blocked letters used various mechanisms to stay securely closed, including folds and rollers; slots and holes; tucks and adhesives; and a variety of smartly built locks, according to a study published online March 2 in the journal Communications about nature.
To penetrate the folded layers of paper, the study authors used an X-ray microtomography scanner designed in dental research laboratories at Queen Mary University of London (QMU).
The researchers designed the scanner to be exceptionally sensitive so that it could map the mineral content of the teeth, “which is invaluable in dental research,” said study co-author Graham Davis, a QMU professor of 3D X-ray imaging. in a statement.
“But this high sensitivity has made it possible to solve certain types of paper and parchment ink,” Davis added.
The trunk was filled with sealed letters. (Archiving the unlocking history research group)
“The rest of the team then managed to take our scan images and turn them into letters that they could virtually open and read for the first time in over 300 years,” study co-author David Mills, a facility manager QMU X-ray microtomography, said in the statement.
From the scans, the team built 3D digital reconstructions of the letters and then created a computational algorithm that deciphered sophisticated folding, folding, folding techniques, practically opening the letters while “keeping evidence of letter blocking,” according to the study.
Scientists have digitally opened four letters using this revolutionary method, deciphering the contents of a letter, DB-1627.
Granted on July 31, 1697, it was written by a man named Jacques Sennacques to his cousin Pierre Le Pers, who lived in The Hague. Sennacques, a legal professional from Lille, France, requested an official death certificate for a relative named Daniel Le Pers, “perhaps because of an inheritance issue,” the scientists wrote.
“His request, Sennacques then spends the rest of the letter asking for news about the family and praising his cousin in God’s grace,” the authors wrote. “We do not know exactly why Le Pers did not receive Sennacques’ letter, but given the route of the merchants, it is likely that Le Pers went further.”
(Archiving the unlocking history research group)
Tens of thousands of such sealed documents can now be deployed and read virtually, the researchers reported.
“This algorithm takes us directly to the heart of a blocked letter,” the research team said in a statement. “Using virtual play to read an intimate story that never saw the light of day – and never even reached the recipient – is truly extraordinary.”
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This article was originally published by Live Science. Read the original article here.