Locals here have long stashed ancient documents under the brick floors of their houses, or under furniture, out of an enduring fear of invading armies.

WSJ: Historic Timbuktu Texts Saved From Burning

His examples are drawn from a wide array of sources: Albanian, ancient Hebrew, film dubbing and graphic novels, legal documents (huge amounts of translation required) and the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible.

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The citizens of Timbuktu have rallied to protect these ancient documents, and I salute their courage and dedication.

UNESCO: MEDIA SERVICES

Besides looking at ancient scrolls, the multispectral scanner can compare things like bank notes and passports with reference documents of known provenance.

ECONOMIST: Monitor

For example, iron-gall ink, commonly used on ancient documents, is transparent to infra-red light and most visible in the ultraviolet region of the spectrum.

ECONOMIST: Monitor