CSMC Keynote Lecture: Matthew Collins

Parchment as 11 Layers of Language

Matthew Collins (University of Cambridge)

I will argue that the future of the humanities lies in a "knowledge ecology" where in areas such as the biomolecular humanities, biologists, historians, and digital researchers should co-create meaning from the inception of research. Just as the Danish Kitchen Midden Commission of 1848 revolutionized interdisciplinary archaeology, the study of parchment today provides the foundational framework for managing the high-density molecular archives of the future. For decades, we have viewed parchment—the skin of an animal transformed into a page—primarily as a passive support for human text. However, in the emerging field of biocodicology, we are beginning to recognize parchment as a sophisticated, multi-layered information system that predates modern digital storage by two millennia. I will therefore explore parchment through this  Biomolecular Humanities lens, arguing that we should move beyond traditional "pipeline science" toward a genuinely integrated "nature-culture" episteme. By analyzing eleven distinct layers of information—ranging from the genetic code (DNA) and proteomic records of medieval livestock to microbial archives of disease and the physical engineering of the codex—we reveal that these objects are not just cultural artifacts, but biological time capsules.