Paper doesn't easily survive for thousands of years.
You know that pleasant used bookstore smell? It's paper slowly decomposing.
You know that pleasant used bookstore smell? It's paper slowly decomposing.
Modern acid-free paper might last 1000 years; 500 is more typical. Acid paper breaks down in less than a century.
Parchment was so expensive it was often scraped and reused; old texts can sometimes be recovered after being overwritten (palimpsests).