Many of you are, have or will learn about the Hellenistic period in western civilisation, and here is a primary source from that time in the news. The dead sea scrolls are ancient manuscripts of jewish text found in pottery jars around Qumran in what is now the Palestinian Authority in 1947 and considered one of the most important archaeological finds of the century. These 2000+ year old papyrus and leather manuscripts are being digitised by the Israeli antiques authority and google, and are planned to be made public when online.
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/innovation/10/19/dead.sea.scrolls.google/index.html?hpt=C1
http://www.bayeuxtapestry.org.uk/Bayeux1.htm
This is not the first historic document to be digitised, currently the whole 225 foot long Bayeux tapestry is online scene by scene. Although this manuscript is over 1000 years younger than the dead sea scrolls, it just shows the reaches and significance of online storage.
After reading this, I started to think about text books, magazines and artifacts and how we could be in the beginning of a period where everything is digitized...duhn duhn DUUUHN
