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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

New Technique Unfolds Centuries of Secrets in Locked Letters

New Technique Reveals Centuries of Secrets in Locked Letters M.I.T. researchers have devised a virtual-reality technique that lets them read old letters that were mailed not in envelopes but in the writing paper itself after being folded into elaborate enclosures. The computer-generated unfolding sequence of a sealed letter.Credit.Unlocking History Research Group Published March 2, 2021Updated March 4, 2021 In 1587, hours before her beheading, Mary, Queen of Scots, sent a letter to her brother-in-law Henry III, King of France. But she didn’t just sign it and send it off. She folded the paper repeatedly, cut out a piece of the page and left it dangling. She used that strand of paper to sew the letter tight with locking stitches.

Scientists Just Jury-Rigged a Dental X-Ray Machine to Read a 300-Year-Old Letter Without Unfolding Its Delicate Paper

Scientists Just Jury-Rigged a Dental X-Ray Machine to Read a 300-Year-Old Letter Without Unfolding Its Delicate Paper The method allows researchers to avoid damaging delicate documents. March 2, 2021 Virtual unfolding algorithms allow us to read this unopened letter with a paper lock from the Brienne Collection in The Hague, Netherlands. Photo courtesy of the Unlocking History Research Group archive. Opening a letter may seem like a straightforward task, but that’s only in the age of mass-produced gummed envelopes, first invented in the 1830s. For hundreds of years before that, many people relied on “letterlocking,” sealing their mail with a sequence of elaborate creases, folds, tucks, and slits. There were hundreds of different ways this could be deployed to secure mail from prying eyes.

High-Tech Scan Peeks Inside Sealed Letters From The Renaissance : NPR