(Oct. 19) -- The more than 2,000-year-old Dead Sea Scrolls -- one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of all time -- will soon be available for free, widespread access on the Internet, thanks to combined efforts from Google and the Israel Antiquities Authority.
Already, Google Books offered excerpts of the Dead Sea Scrolls reprinted in English, including "Scrolls From the Dead Sea," an exhibition by the Library of Congress that ran over two decades ago, as well as several other academic versions.
The new project, however, will widen access to the historical treasure -- addressing the limited use issue that scholars have long complained of -- and ensure that the original 30,000 fragments are preserved.
In addition, the exact copies will be searchable and available in their original languages: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. An English translation will be available at first, with additional translations to follow. Both the general public and scholars can expect the scrolls to be available online within the coming months.
"Anyone in his office or on his couch will be able to click and see any scroll fragment or manuscript that they would like," antiquities official Pnina Shor told The Associated Press.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are considered an immensely important artifact because they contain segments of the Hebrew Bible and have played a critical role in explaining the origins of Judaism and Christianity.
Google is already considered the bookworm of search engines, based on the company's efforts to count all of the world's books as step one in an even more ambitious plan to digitize all the world's books. (Although not everyone is buying it.)
Not to be outdone, Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities recently discovered a fifth-dynasty tomb near the Great Pyramids of Giza. Too bad they can't upload that to the Internet (yet).
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