Page "Beowulf" Paragraph 56

It suffered damage in the Cotton Library fire at Ashburnham House in 1731.

Since then, parts of the manuscript have crumbled along with many of the letters.

Rebinding efforts, though saving the manuscript from much degeneration, have nonetheless covered up other letters of the poem, causing further loss.

Kevin Kiernan, professor of English at the University of Kentucky, is foremost in the computer digitalisation and preservation of the manuscript ( the Electronic Beowulf Project ), using fibre-optic backlighting to further reveal lost letters of the poem.