Multispectral Visualizations and the Mystery of Page 141

To the unaided eye, the blank space below the last eight lines of Matthew's gospel appears as if to contain erasure. If this is the case, recovering any text from this area could prove highly beneficial for better understanding the St Chad Gospels, including its early provenance.

I am working through various visualization techniques in an attempt to increase what is visible in this area. These visualizations attempt to enhance what can be seen beyond the ultraviolet images for the page. Ultraviolet light is proficient at revealing worn or damaged text. Unfortunately, the ultraviolet images for page 141 did not reveal much additional data about the possibly erased area.

To enhancing what can be seen, multispectral visualizations generate a single image from a set of images taken using different bands of light. The images are ordered by wavelength and values calculated across the images for each pixel. Using various formulas for different visualizations, variances are calculated and assigned to each pixel and a single image generated. A colormap is then applied to increase ocular contrast.

The potential for erased text has inspired intriguing speculation, especially given the early Welsh entries on this page. Here, I briefly discuss these speculations and provide a mapping of the Welsh memorandums.

Note: If you desire to overlay the RGB or ultraviolet image, they are found at the bottom of the drop-down list of images.

Special thanks to Ryan Baumann for his work on these visualizations.