# Missing Merlin story discovered in the Cambridge University Library **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Tags:** books-writing-myths\ **Created:** [March 26, 2025, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148 "2025-03-26T17:55:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/1 "2025-03-26T17:55:56Z")
It had been reused as a cover for another book. It’s amazing to think about how many treasures could be hidden away in some forgotten corner. Gives the world that sense of mystery it sometimes lacks in trying times. > **[Lost manuscript of Merlin and King Arthur legend read for the first time...](https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250324-the-magical-medieval-tale-revealed-by-a-100000-dollar-camera)** > > For centuries, an intriguing sequel to the tale of Merlin has sat unseen within the bindings of an Elizabethan register. Cutting-edge techniques have revealed it for the first time. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/2 "2025-03-26T18:23:35Z")
I wonder if, in this case, the “cutting-edge techniques” that revealed it consisted of, literally, cutting edges. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/3 "2025-03-26T18:44:17Z")
I don’t know what to say. The whole legend of Arthur and Camelot is fascinating. The Holy Grail is a later addition. Lancelot is a later addition. There’s so much wonderful history behind the legend as we have it today. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/4 "2025-03-26T18:59:01Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I wonder if, in this case, the “cutting-edge techniques” that revealed it consisted of, literally, cutting edges. No, it’s fantastic imaging processes, including using ultraviolet light and sequencing through the different wavelengths to infrared. “No Elizabethan books were harmed in the production of these images.” ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/5 "2025-03-26T19:01:15Z")
I mean, ultimately, everything beyond “there was this local ruler named Arturius” is a later addition. ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/6 "2025-03-26T19:03:30Z")
Are you suggesting that the parts where he slept with his sister and received a sword from a lake might be untrue? ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/7 "2025-03-26T19:39:08Z")
That is one of the things I mean. AIUI originally his sister and the evil Morgan/Morrigan/etc were two different characters. I don’t remember when exactly they were combined. Originally, Arthur died after the final battle. With the coming of Christianity the idea of somebody rising from the dead withou divine aid was blasphemous. The legend was changed that Arthur, while wounded, was in fact sleeping until the time of England’s greatest need. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/8 "2025-03-26T20:30:37Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I wonder if, in this case, the “cutting-edge techniques” that revealed it consisted of, literally, cutting edges. No. Here’s a really cool detailed explanation from the University of Cambridge (with visuals) into how they did it. [Modern magic unlocks Merlin’s medieval secrets](https://www.cam.ac.uk/stories/merlin-manuscript-discovered-cambridge) ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/9 "2025-03-26T20:51:11Z")
I don’t understand this part: > Now, the 700-year-old fragment of Suite Vulgate du Merlin – an Old French manuscript so rare there are less than 40 surviving copies in the world – has been discovered by an archivist in [Cambridge University Library](https://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/), folded and stitched into the binding of the 16th-Century register. It makes it sound like there are 40 copies of the work of which this fragment is a part already in existence. That doesn’t seem worth the uproar, so I’m guessing that it is written with some important nuance left out. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/10 "2025-03-26T20:57:43Z")
“Listen, strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of literature.” Am I reading the article right. This is a fragment of something that has 40 copies around elsewhere? So, not a lost tale? Edit: what **Roderick\_Femm** said. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/11 "2025-03-26T21:14:06Z")
Although there are a number of copies of the manuscript, where the number is less than 40, that doesn’t mean that there are that many identical copies of the manuscript. This comes from before the invention of the printing press. These are not printed copies. These are manuscripts, each of which was individually copied by a scribe. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/12 "2025-03-26T21:34:44Z")
Jewish law requires the Torah to be written by hand, using a special quill, special ink, and special paper. Thus, a cheap Torah costs about $20,000. I’m guessing most books were not quite that expensive before Gutenberg came along. But, they weren’t cheap either. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/13 "2025-03-26T22:06:11Z")
So, a mass-printed copy of the Torah is considered… what? An aide to understanding the real thing? And is there an expectation that every Jew, or at least rabbis and the like, would own their own Real Torah? EDIT: My apologies; by board tradition, I ought to have waited a couple of days to ask that. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/14 "2025-03-26T22:39:41Z")
I forget the checking process to make sure that there are no misprints. However, due to (I forget just where) the Talmud saying 'If a man finds a missing dot or line in a Torah and adds it, he gets the blessing as if he had written the entire scroll himself." some scribes will deliberately leave a single letter unfinished, point it out to the buyer, and allow them to finish it. The expectation traditionally was that all Jewish men would study the Torah and the Talmud. They were not required to own either one. Indeed, one explanation for the traditional swaying done while studying both is that before the printing press many students had to share one book at the same time. They would lean forward to look at a specific word or phrase and then lean back so others could see and study. Today, most forms of Judaism require every Jew to study the Torah and the Talmud. Both can be found in the original Hebrew or in translation on the web. There is a tradition that G-d gave not just the ten commandments to Moses on Mount Sinai, but the entirety of the Torah-everything that would be recorded including all the things that had not happened yet. The Kabbalah teaches that for a Torah to be of any mystical value, it must be exactly as Moses received it on Mount Sinai. There is a story that some gentile king asked for a Torah to study. You don’t refuse a king or you get executed. Plus, if he really was interested in studying the Torah it could lead to him being sympathetic to the Jews or even converting. But, you don’t give a gentile a great mystical force that he could misuse or use against you. The solution was to give the king a Torah written with gold ink. He would be pleased and flattered. The Torah, not being written with the same kind of ink Moses used, would be magically inert. Rabbis are expected to have done truly extensive studying. They are not required to own their own copies either. A synagogue OTOH is required due to the weirdness of the Jewish calendar and Jewish law to own three Torah scrolls. Besides the expense of the pen, ink, parchment and the labor of the scribe, the scroll is mounted on two fine wooden handles. These handles may be capped at the top (the Torah is stored upright) with silver caps. When not in use, a Torah is covered with a custome made facbric cover. Most of the ones I have seen are velvet embroidered with Hebrew letters. On top of the cover is usually a silver shield on a silver chain. The shiled is a few inches in area and inscribed in Hebrew. (If you watch Frisco Kid-and you should- with Gene Wilder playing a rabbi, there is a big scene featuring the shield.) The three Torahs must be kept in an ark. I don’t recall the specifications for that. Some are all wood. Some are a wood frame with cloth over it. Some are built into a wall. Some are free standing. ETA > [@Chronos](#): > > So, a mass-printed copy of the Torah is considered… what? An aide to understanding the real thing? Basically yes. The difference would be like the original Van Goghs displayed at the Philly Art Museum and the Van Gogh images printed on post cards at the gift shop. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/15 "2025-03-26T22:58:38Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > Although there are a number of copies of the manuscript, where the number is less than 40, that doesn’t mean that there are that many identical copies of the manuscript. This comes from before the invention of the printing press. These are not printed copies. These are manuscripts, each of which was individually copied by a scribe. So is the implication that, among the 40 (or less than 40? were they wrong about the number?) copies of _Suite Vulgate du Merlin_, none of which is considered complete, and no two of which are identical, this fragment did not yet exist? ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/16 "2025-03-26T23:08:29Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > So is the implication that, among the 40 (or less than 40? were they wrong about the number?) copies of _Suite Vulgate du Merlin_, none of which is considered complete, and no two of which are identical, this fragment did not yet exist? Possibly the others were made slightly later and they weren’t aware of this fragment. ---
**Author:** ![APB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e8cbc/32.png) [@APB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/APB)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/17 "2025-03-26T23:46:48Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > It makes it sound like there are 40 copies of the work of which this fragment is a part already in existence. That doesn’t seem worth the uproar, so I’m guessing that it is written with some important nuance left out. There are indeed lots of manuscripts of the _Suite Vulgate du Merlin_ in various states of completeness. [This list includes quite a few of them](https://www.lancelot-project.pitt.edu/LG-web/Arthur-LG-ChronGeog.html) (along with lots of other related manuscripts). But textual scholars love trying to work out how different manuscripts of the same text relate to each other. However, the real story here is the cool science involved. These techniques will doubtless be used on lots of other bindings. Some of that will bring to light texts that are genuinely new. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2025, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/18 "2025-03-26T23:51:06Z")
> [@APB](#): > > the real story here is the cool science involved. That is the part that makes this newsworthy, indeed. And very gratifying these advances must be for the textual scholars and their work. I remain more interested in the stuff the textual scholars are studying, rather than the tools that they use. ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_is\_the\_new\_Analog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e4f/32.png) [@Digital\_is\_the\_new\_Analog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_is_the_new_Analog)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2025, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/19 "2025-03-27T13:32:14Z")
> [@APB](#): > > But textual scholars love trying to work out how different manuscripts of the same text relate to each other There’s a cool book called [Misquoting Jesus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misquoting_Jesus) that goes through this process relative to the Bible. Looking at numbers of differences between versions, timelines, etc, to try to figure out what changes were introduced when, and what was close to original. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2025, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148/20 "2025-03-27T15:18:26Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > A synagogue OTOH is required due to the weirdness of the Jewish calendar and Jewish law to own three Torah scrolls. It’s certainly convenient to have multiple torahs, so you don’t have to stop in the middle of a service and roll a long way forward or back in the reading. But i don’t believe it’s required. And i certainly know of small congregations that only own one or two Torah scrolls. > [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > It makes it sound like there are 40 copies of the work of which this fragment is a part already in existence. That doesn’t seem worth the uproar, so I’m guessing that it is written with some important nuance left out. There are probably some bits of this version that are different from others. But it’s clear from the article that the exciting part is the new technology for non-destructively “cutting” open the pages and flattening them to make them readable. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/missing-merlin-story-discovered-in-the-cambridge-university-library/1016148.md?page=2)