Technology in the service of history

Building replicas of historic sites to save them from tourism.

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Only one is the real thing

FOR 3,000 years it was unknown—and that is what kept it safe. But so many people have visited the tomb of Tutankhamun, since Howard Carter, a British archaeologist, unearthed the steps leading down to the royal burial-chamber in November 1922 that it is now in critical condition. Shifting temperatures and humidity are affecting the delicate painted surfaces and conservation of the plasterwork has led to a build-up of salts under the plaster, pushing it off the walls. In January 2011 Zahi Hawass, then (1) secretary-general of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, announced that the tomb would soon have to close until a solution was found.

(1): hồi đó

Mr Hawass lost his job soon after, in the tumult that followed the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak, but a solution to the problem of Egypt’s tombs and tourists may be at hand. Ninety years after Carter’s discovery, on November 13th, an exact facsimile (2) of the royal tomb will be unveiled in Cairo. Replicas of delicate historic sites are becoming increasingly common; facsimiles of the painted caves at Lascaux, in France, and Altamira, in northern Spain, between them attract nearly 5,000 visitors a day. And the digital technology used in creating three-dimensional replicas is improving all the time (see comparisons pictured).

(2): bản sao – các bạn nhớ nghe cách phát âm từ này ở đây.

The Tutankhamun facsimile is the most ambitious yet and is the work—and gift—of a Madrid-based artists’ workshop, Factum Arte, and a Swiss philanthropic foundation. The workshop made its name in 2007 with a facsimile of Veronese’s giant painting “The Wedding at Cana”, which has been placed in its original location, the Palladian refectory of the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice. If making an exact colour reproduction of a painting is technically difficult, copying a three-dimensional object poses even more of a challenge (3).

(3) linking technique –> COHESION

In 2009 Factum Arte’s founder, Adam Lowe, and his team spent five weeks in Egypt making a forensic study of the tomb walls and sarcophagus (4). Without touching the surface, they made three different kinds of recordings: laser scanning—which operates like a bar code reading—to record the surface detail, white-light scanning to capture the relief and a close examination of the decoration to match up the colours.

(4): quan tài đá

There is a plan to erect the facsimile, which weighs nearly four tonnes, permanently in the Valley of the Kings. Others may follow. Factum Arte’s first Egyptian facsimile, of the burial-chamber of Tuthmosis III, unveiled in 2003, has already had more than 3m visitors.

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In Vietnam, you are still be able to enjoy the real things, so please, don’t forget to help preserve our historic gems.

Source: www.economist.com

Technology in the service of history