Deadseascrolling: Deadseascrolling

Publication and preservation

By early 1948 four more scrolls had landed in the possession of the American School of Oriental research, now known as the Albright Institute, in East Jerusalem where a young student named John Trever saw them, and recognising that they were very old, photographed three of the scrolls. These photographs are extremely important since over the years the scrolls have faded and deteriorated through exposure to excessive light and careless handling by those later charged with their care. When war broke out in Jerusalem in May 1948 the scrolls were moved, for their protection, and ended up in the United States where they were exhibited in various cities. Scholars who saw them believed that they were either fake or manuscripts of no great value. In June 1954 a small advertisement was placed in the Wall Street Journal offering the scrolls for sale on behalf of the head of the Syrian Orthodox Church who needed to sell them for their own financial reasons. They were purchased for $250,000 by a Mr Sidney Esteridge who was acting on behalf of the Israeli State and soon the scrolls were back home in Jerusalem.

The three scrolls that Eleazer Sukenik had obtained in 1947 were edited and published soon after, while the American School of Oriental Research published the photographs and transcriptions of two others in 1950 with another one following a year later. In 1952 Professor Father Roland de Vaux was named as editor-in-chief of the planned publication process and the following year he assigned a team of eight men, four Catholics and four Protestants, to ensure an unbiased representation of the contents of the texts. A generous grant was secured from philanthropist John D. Rockefeller to cover the costs of the scholars working on the scrolls in Jerusalem, work that was expected to last six years.

Over eight hundred different manuscripts have been recovered. Of these fewer than twelve were intact. The rest were mere fragments, about 25,000 with many no bigger than a fingernail. The process of assembling the fragments can only be described as primitive. When piecing them together the researchers used unsuitable materials such as masking tape or even the edging from sheets of postage stamps. The fragments were often laid out in trays on desks exposed to the damaging effects of Middle Eastern sunshine streaming in through the windows. During the Suez Canal crisis in 1956 there were fears for the safety of the fragments from Cave 4. They were transferred to the Ottoman Bank vaults in the Jordanian capital, Amman. When returned a year later they were found to have deteriorated markedly, perhaps because of inappropriate storage conditions – many of the fragments had patches of mildew on them.

It wasn’t until the late 1950s that a special sawing machine was specifically invented to unroll and cut through the two pieces of metal that were the Copper Scroll. Scholars had difficulty deciphering and translating the text, which appeared to have been engraved using a hammer and chisel.

The team worked efficiently throughout the 1950s and 1960s despite occasional internal friction and disagreements. As time passed some of the original members left and other scholars were invited to join the group.

The study of ancient scripts and their relationship to each other is known as palaeography and is an art rather than a science. It works by comparing undated documents with dated ones. In 1961, Harvard professor F.M. Cross divided the texts into three categories based on general characteristics with the plausible periods being:

Archaic c.250B.C.E.-150B.C.E

Hasmonean c.150B.C.E.-30B.C.E.

Herodian c. 30B.C.E.-70B.C.E.

(B.C.E. stands for Before Common Era, the non-secterian way of referring to B.C., or Before Christ dates).