• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.329-336
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• 2022

Unreadable Khitan scripts of ancient documents written by indian ink on parchment(sheepskin) are visualized by active infrared thermography without contacting and damaging the document which are deteriorated and aged presumably over many years. Sinusoidal infrared thermal wave using Halogen lamp is applied to the surface of the document in order to selectively magnify and record the thermal response of indian ink. The infrared image of the document captured in real time by infrared camera under the active external excitation shows the better sharpness and readability of Khitan characters than the optical image, from which many Khitan letters like ' ' and ' ' sounding as 'd' and 'ri' in English alphabet are detected and deciphered. It is concluded from the experiment that the active infrared thermography can be used as a promising method for digital reconstruction and preservation of ancient documents in the future.