Rome Wasn't Digitized in a Day - Council on Library and Information ...

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This manual analysis provided a classification of the different types of text variation, <strong>in</strong>clud<strong>in</strong>g regular
text differences, irregular text differences, word omission, text <strong>in</strong>sertion, and word substitution. The
algorithm that was ultimately developed has not yet been put <strong>in</strong>to the production PDL.
Other research by Perseus has explored automatic citation and quotation identification by utiliz<strong>in</strong>g
quotation <strong>in</strong>dexes, or <strong>in</strong>dices scriptorum, which typically listed all of the authors quoted with<strong>in</strong> a
classical text and were manually created by editors for critical editions of classical texts. Fuzzy pars<strong>in</strong>g
techniques were applied to the OCR transcription of one such <strong>in</strong>dex from the Deipnosophistae of
Athenaeus to then automatically mark up all the quotations found with<strong>in</strong> the <strong>in</strong>dex <strong>in</strong> a digital version
of the text (Romanello et al. 2009c).
THE DISCIPLINES AND TECHNOLOGIES OF DIGITAL CLASSICS
This section explores a variety of subdiscipl<strong>in</strong>es or related discipl<strong>in</strong>es of digital classics and presents
an overview of some important projects and relevant literature <strong>in</strong> each. These overviews are by no
means exhaustive; the goal was to identify the major projects <strong>in</strong> each field that illustrate the key
challenges faced.
Ancient History
In many ways the study of ancient history is less a subdiscipl<strong>in</strong>e of classical studies than an
overarch<strong>in</strong>g field that makes use of all the sources that are studied <strong>in</strong>tensively <strong>in</strong> each of the other
subdiscipl<strong>in</strong>es; consequently, various aspects of this topic are covered <strong>in</strong> many of the subdiscipl<strong>in</strong>e
sections rather than <strong>in</strong> this section exclusively. The popularity of this topic is evidenced by
<strong>in</strong>numerable academic and enthusiast websites on the history of Greece, <strong>Rome</strong>, and the Ancient Near
East. One of the larger enthusiast websites is Attalus.org, 183 which provides detailed “lists of events
and sources for the history of the Hellenistic world and the Roman republic” and <strong>in</strong>cludes translations
of many of the relevant sources, such as Livy and Tacitus. The Livius 184 website, managed by Dutch
historian Jona Lender<strong>in</strong>g, offers a search eng<strong>in</strong>e to a large number of onl<strong>in</strong>e articles on Roman and
Greek history.
The subject of ancient history makes up a large component of many digital classics projects, albeit not
necessarily as a specific focus; <strong>in</strong>stead, the sources provided (whether primary texts or documentary
sources such as <strong>in</strong>scriptions, papyri, or co<strong>in</strong>s) support the study of ancient history. As one report
recently noted, digital archives are provid<strong>in</strong>g access to all of these materials at a rapid rate:
Scholars of ancient history study particular documentary rema<strong>in</strong>s (such as <strong>in</strong>scriptions, papyri,
ancient maps, classical literature and drama, and art and architecture) to exam<strong>in</strong>e early
societies. These materials may be excavated from multiple archaeological sites, and are
generally found <strong>in</strong> archives. While documentary editions have traditionally provided scholars
with wider access to archival sources, the growth of digital archives is perceived as a great
boon. On the one hand, digital archives are allow<strong>in</strong>g scholars to search, study, and make
connections between more archival materials. On the other hand, different archival materials
are be<strong>in</strong>g digitized at various rates, and look<strong>in</strong>g at a digital surrogate may not replace the value
of see<strong>in</strong>g the physical artifact. The “next generation” of digital archives, accord<strong>in</strong>g to some
183 http://www.attalus.org/
184 http://www.livius.org/