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How DNA forensics is transforming studies of ancient manuscripts
How DNA forensics is transforming studies of ancient manuscripts. Scientists are exposing the biological information hidden in ancient parchments without leaving a mark.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries on Apr 14, 2026 at 6:59 PM
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Thanks for constantly posting the most interesting items - very much appreciated!
posted by UhOhChongo! at 8:01 PM
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But other studies have raised more questions than answers. Stinson recalls the first book he worked on with Fiddyment and Collins: a glossy twelfth-century copy of the Gospel of St Luke. To his practised eye, the manuscript seemed to be made entirely of calfskin. "When the results came back, it blew everyone's mind," he says. Testing revealed a deliberate alternation between calfskin and sheepskin6. Goatskin was also present, but only immediately after the parable of the prodigal son, which includes the text's lone mention of a goat kid. "Now, it could be a coincidence, we don't know," Stinson says. "But this book is deeply weird."
Now that's metatextual at a whole 'nother level!
posted by jamjam at 10:31 PM
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If you want to get down in the weeds, cited Sarah Fiddyment from York co-authored a 2017 biorxiv paper "The York Gospels: a one thousand year biological palimpsest" [15pp pdf] with effectives from my alma mater Trinity College Dublin (that's how I knew enough to blogaboutit):
"If you can find human DNA on the folios, you can also find traces of the human microbiome if you look for them. That's a whole other level of complexity because we are all toting about maybe 10,000 different species of bacteria and each one will have a characteristic DNA signature. The most informative way of approaching these data is a multivariate statistical analysis, comparing the Gospel traces with the known human microflora. We know that our different crevices and orifices harbour quite different communities. The bugs on the York pages fall decisively in the midst of the bacteria which inhabit our noses and skin and quite different from oral or fecal samples. This suggests that medieval scribes and readers sneezed a good bit but that they washed their hands between bathroom and lectern. Good thing too, it's The Gospel after all. "
posted by BobTheScientist at 10:52 PM
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I recall prof. Drout at Wheaton was interested in similar technology to try and figure out more about the origin of Beowulf using manuscript dna. I wonder if that ever went anywhere?
posted by Wretch729 at 6:49 AM
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