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X-Rays Help Scientists Read Letterlocked Renaissance Mail

Algorithm reveals contents of fragile letters sealed for 300 years

Unlocking History Research Group Sealed letters folded in intricate patterns have gone unread for more than 300 years, but now people have been able to tease out their contents with a combination of X-ray imaging and unfolding algorithms. Such folded letters were common before the invention of the envelope. Letters were folded multiples times with tucks or slits and often sealed with wax. The paper they are written on is now so fragile that opening them up can damage them. Advertisement “Studying folding and tucking patterns in historic letters allows us to understand technologies used to communicate,” says Jana Dambrogio at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Now, her team is able to reconstruct what is inside without damaging the letters.

New technology reads 300-year-old letter without opening it

The 1697 letter sent by Jacques Sennacques in Paris to his cousin Pierre Le Pers in the Hague © Unlocking History Research Group A letter posted more than 300 years ago from Paris to the Hague, but never delivered or opened, has been read for the first time through X-rays and computer algorithms, preserving the complex folds used to turn the letter into its own envelope at a time when paper was scarce and expensive. The letter was sent on 31 July 1697 by Jacques Sennacques in Paris to his cousin Pierre Le Pers, a French merchant in the Hague, requesting a certified copy of the death notice of of their relative Daniel le Pers. It was never delivered but remained with hundreds of orphaned letters in a leather trunk owned by the Dutch postmaster. The trunk was given to a postal museum in 1926 but only opened and studied in the last decade by the Unlocking History Research Group, an international team including historians, conservators, scientists and comp

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