Solving the Jigsaw Puzzle (08/15/2016)

In my first entry, I wrote about how I assisted Josephine in photographing uncatalogued documentary papyri. A couple days later, Dr. Kevin Funderburk, a scholar from Baylor University working on papyri from the Museum Collections, called in. He told us that one of the fragments we had photographed turned out to be another part of a papyrus document he was working on. Dr. Funderburk already had two fragments of this document, but these pieces were not connected. Our new find filled the gap between them and completes most lines except for the first six.

After Kevin had told us about the relevance of this particular fragment, Josephine had me “stitch together” the images of all three pieces using Photoshop—not an easy task for someone who is (at best) a beginner with this software. The infrared pictures were particularly difficult to deal with. Such images are represented in grayscale, which results in less contrast between the papyrus and the background of the photo, especially when it is also combined with strong backlight. The contrast between the two is, however, essential for erasing the background. It took some experimenting, but I finally got it.

By the way, you might ask why we use Photoshop to “stitch” the papyrus together. Would it not be easier to actually put the pieces together and photograph them? Maybe it would, and it might even take less time, but as I have learned from Francisco, historical artifacts usually survive the longest if they are stored properly and then simply left alone. Every time you handle an object you cause some kind of damage to it, even if it is only microscopic. Handling artifacts should be avoided whenever possible. This is why digital stitching makes more sense than actually putting them together (which would mean putting them all into new glass covers, repeatedly adjusting their position with tweezers, etc.).

Towards the end of the of the week, Brian suggested we go again through some of the other uncatalogued—and not yet photographed—papyri to see if we could find the piece that was still missing from the upper-right part of the document. After going through folder after folder, we had almost given up hope of finding the piece when, in the very last box, we found a piece that looked promising (and no matter what Brian says, I saw it first!). We took a quick picture of the piece, mailed it to Kevin Funderburk, and he confirmed that it was the missing piece! The left part of it contains only the lower layer of the fibers and fits perfectly underneath the edge of the large piece. You can even see traces of letters because the ink went through the upper layer.

Unfortunately, I cannot disclose any details about the papyrus until it is published. The only thing I can tell you is that its content is a kind of contract. The upcoming book series about the collections’ papyri, however, will feature high-resolution images, detailed descriptions, transcriptions, and analyses of numerous fragments.

For me, finding these fragments, stitching them together, and learning about them was a kind of academic adventure—almost like Indiana Jones. Yet for Kevin Funderburk, the papyrus becoming “bigger” means additional work. At the time we discovered the new fragments, Dr. Funderburk had almost finished writing about this papyrus for the above-mentioned book. Now he needs to revise the article because of the new information that can be drawn from the fragments we found. Considering that they are almost one third of the document, that might take some work. Surely, this is very nice for scholarship, but maybe not so much for Dr. Funderburk (although he is definitely happy that he can publish a more complete piece).

Next week Dr. Funderburk and several other papyrologists are coming to Oklahoma City to work on some of the collections’ papyri. I am already curious to see what they are like and how they work. I’ll tell you more next time.

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