Exploring manuscripts: sharing ancient wisdoms across the semantic web

Recent work in digital humanities has seen researchers in-creasingly producing online editions of texts and manuscripts, particularly in adoption of the TEI XML format for online publishing. The benefits of semantic web techniques are un-derexplored in such research, however, with a lack of sharing and communication of research information. The Sharing Ancient Wisdoms (SAWS) project applies linked data prac-tices to enhance and expand on what is possible with these digital text editions. Focussing on Greek and Arabic col-lections of ancient wise sayings, which are often related to each other, we use RDF to annotate and extract seman-tic information from the TEI documents as RDF triples. This allows researchers to explore the conceptual networks that arise from these interconnected sayings. The SAWS project advocates a semantic-web-based methodology, en-hancing rather than replacing current workflow processes, for digital humanities researchers to share their findings and collectively benefit from each other’s work

Linking Text and Image with SVG

Annotation and linking (or referring) have been described as "scholarly primitives", basic methods used in scholarly research and publication of all kinds. The online publication of manuscript images is one basic use case where the need for linking and annotation is very clear. High resolution images are of great use to scholars and transcriptions of texts provide for search and browsing, so the ideal method for the digital publication of manuscript works is the presentation of page images plus a transcription of the text therein. This has become a standard method, but leaves open the questions of how deeply the linkages can be done and how best to handle the annotation of sections of the image. This paper presents a new method (named img2xml) for connecting text and image using an XML-based tracing of the text on the page image. The tracing method was developed as part of a series of experiments in text and image linking beginning in the summer of 2008 and will continue under a grant funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. It employs Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) to represent the text in an image of a manuscript page in a referenceable form and enables linking and annotation of the page image in a variety of ways. The paper goes on to discuss the scholarly requirements for tools that will be developed around the tracing method, and explores some of the issues raised by the img2xml method

Extending the DSE: LOD support and TEI/IIIF integration in EVT

Current digital scholarly editions (DSEs) have the opportunity of evolving to dynamic objects interacting with other Internet-based resources thanks to open frameworks such as IIIF and LOD. This paper showcases and discusses two new functionalities of EVT (Edition Visualization Technology), version 2: one improving the management of named entities (f.i. personal names) through the use of LOD resources such as FOAF and DBpedia; the other, providing integration of the published text with digital images of the textual primary sources accessed from online repositories (e.g. e-codices or digital libraries such as the Vaticana or the Ambrosiana) via the IIIF protocol

The Practice and Benefit of Applying Digital Markup in Preserving Texts and Creating Digital Editions: A Poetical Analysis of a Blank-Verse Translation of Virgil\u27s Aeneid

Numerous examples of the digital scholarly edition exist online, and the genre is thriving in terms of interdisciplinary interest as well as support granted by funding agencies. Some editions are dedicated to the collection and representation of the life\u27s work of a single author, others to mass digitization and preservation of centuries\u27 worth of texts. Very few of these examples, however, approach the task of in-text interpretation through visualization. This project describes an approach to digital representation and investigates its potential benefit to scholars of various disciplines. It presents both a digital edition as well as a framework of justification surrounding said edition. In addition to composing this document as an XML file, I have digitized a 1794 English translation of Virgil\u27s Aeneid and used a customized digital markup schema based on the guidelines set forth by the Text Encoding Initiative to indicate a set of poetic figures—such as simile and alliteration—within that text for analysis. While neither a translation project nor strictly a poetical analysis, this project and its unique approach to interpretive representation could prove of interest to scholars in several disciplines, including classics, digital scholarship, information management, and literary theory. The practice serves both as a case-in-point as well as an example method to replicate with future texts and projects

Specifying a TEI-XML Based Format for Aligning Text to Image at Character Level

International audienceThis papers presents an experience of specifying and implementing an XML format for text to image alignment at word and character level within the TEI framework. The format in question is a supplementary markup layer applied to heterogeneous transcriptions of medieval Latin and French manuscripts encoded using different " flavors " of the TEI (normalized for critical editions, diplomatic or palaeographic transcriptions). One of the problems that had to be solved was identifying " non-alignable " spans in various kinds of transcriptions. Originally designed in the framework of a research project on the ontology of letter-forms in medieval Latin and vernacular (mostly French) manuscripts and inscriptions, this format can be of use for all kinds of projects that involve fine-grain alignment of transcriptions with zones on digital images