Reviel Netz and William Noel's The Archimedes Codex, How a Medieval Prayer Book Is Revealing the True Genius of Antiquity's Greatest Scientist, published by Da Capo Press in 2007, is a co-authored account of the Archimedes Palimpsest, a Byzantine prayer book whose parchment had been scraped and reused, found on scientific and technical imaging to preserve underneath it the oldest surviving copies of several Archimedes treatises. Noel, curator of manuscripts at the Walters Art Museum, led the palimpsest's imaging project directly, while Netz is a historian of ancient mathematics who worked on interpreting the recovered text. Its strength is that dual authorship pairing the actual imaging project's own director with a specialist able to interpret the mathematics revealed, an unusually direct combination of technical and scholarly authority for a general-audience book. Its limit is that as a book aimed at a general readership it moves quickly through technical mathematical detail that the specialist scholarly publications from the same project treat more rigorously.
Facts
Assessment
Reliability Tier1
Published by Da Capo Press in 2007, co-authored by the palimpsest imaging project's own director alongside a historian of ancient mathematics interpreting the recovered text, treated at the top tier for that direct combination of technical and scholarly authority. NotesCo-authored by William Noel, curator of manuscripts at the Walters Art Museum who led the palimpsest's imaging project; the standard account of both the erased mathematics and the prayer book that carries it.
Citation
AuthorReviel Netz and William Noel
PublisherDa Capo Press
Publication Year2007
Source Typebook
Claims Backed By This Source (26 claims)
This source backs 26 claims across the atlas. As facts: 18 well-attested. As cited relationships: 4 holds. Plus 4 entities citing it as a general reference with no single fact or relationship attached.
Disposition By Topic
- Textual Witnesses, 9 claims: 6 well-attested, 2 holds, 1 general references.
- Sources, 7 claims: 7 well-attested.
- Custodians & Museums, 6 claims: 3 well-attested, 2 holds, 1 general references.
- Articles, 4 claims: 2 well-attested, 2 general references.
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