DiXiT Workshop Encoding pre-modern writing systems

Workshop information

These are the materials of my workshop Encoding pre-modern writing systems, DigiLab La Sapienza, Rome, 4 December 2014 (2.30 - 7.00 PM). My workshop is part of the DiXiT Network event The scholarly digital edition and the Humanities. Theoretical approaches and alternative tools (flyer).

The workshop plan and all materials are available below. This is a quick link to the main slideshow only.

Abstracts

English abstract

The workshop consists in a critical analysis of the question of digital encoding of primary sources whose writing systems are previous to the normalisaton brought about by the technology of print. The participants will produce a digital transcription of some lines of a Latin manuscript, analyse the relevant XML/TEI P5 guidelines, merely based on the application of Unicode, and explore alternative methods aiming to implement the "table of signs" theorised by Tito Orlandi.

Abstract in italiano

Il workshop intende analizzare criticamente la questione della codifica digitale di fonti primarie scritte con sistemi alfabetici e glifici precedenti alla normalizzazione indotta dalla stampa. Partendo dalla trascrizione digitale di una breve porzione di un manoscritto latino, i partecipanti rifletteranno sull'approccio XML/TEI P5, legato esclusivamente all'utilizzo di Unicode, ed esploreranno approcci alternativi, orientati all'implementazione della "tabella dei segni" teorizzata da Tito Orlandi.

Workshop plan and materials

1. Hands-on: transcribing the Codex Salmasianus

• Participants transcribe the first part of the Iudicium coci et pistoris of the Anthologia Latina from the digital images of the Codex Salmasianus in XML/TEI using their own XML editor
  • Manuscript details (from Gallica)
  • First digital image
  • Second digital image

2. Talk: Saussure (problem setting)

• Slides/section Saussure
• Canterbury Tales Project's documentation
  • P. Robinson & E. Solopova, Guidelines for the transcription of the manuscripts of the Wife of Bath’s Prologue, 1993 (bibtex, full-text)
• T. Orlandi, SDE and the theory of systems
  • T. Orlandi, Informatica testuale. Teoria e prassi, 2010 (bibtex)
  • T. Orlandi, Edizione digitale sperimentale di Niccolò Machiavelli, De principatibus (bibtex, website)
• Discussion

3. Hands-on: encoding a "table of signs" with TEI P5 Gaiji

• Participants create a complete plain text/csv "table of signs" (graphemes, roughly Orlandi's sistema grafico) of the Codex Salmasianus, based on the portion that they transcribed
• Participants use the Gaiji module to produce an XML/TEI P5 linearization of their "table of signs"
  • Robinson & Solopova 1993's set of graphemes for all 50 manuscripts of The Miller's Tale is on pages 5-6
  • The "sistema grafico" (table of signs/graphemes) of manuscript D in Orlandi's Machiavelli experimental edition is detailed in this page
  • P5 Guidelines, vi. Languages and Character Sets
  • P5 Guidelines, 5 Characters, Glyphs, and Writing Modes
• Slides/section XML/TEI P5 Gaiji
• P5 Guidelines, 5 Characters, Glyphs, and Writing Modes
• Discussion

4. Talk: The Vespa Project Prototype

• Slides/section Vespa Project
• Prototype's rationale and workflow
• Files (transcriptions, "tables of signs", XML/TEI)
• Discussion

5. Round table: looking for solutions

• Slides/section Looking for solutions
• Medieval Unicode Font Initiative
  • An alphabetic list of charachters in MUFI Versione 3.0
• Unicode / Private Use Area (PUA)
  • Unicode FAQ
• Gaiji / <glyph>
  • Terminology and Key Concepts in the TEI P5 Guidelines (difference between a character and a glyph)
  • P5.5.2 (different between the usage of the <glyph> and of the <char> element)
• Archaeology of methodology: SGML/TEI, P3 and the Writing System Declaration (WSD)
  • P3.25: the official TEI documentation on the WSD
  • Publications by D.J. Birnbaum: from the WSD to Unicode
    • Birnbaum 1996 (bibtex, PDF)
    • Birnbaum, Cournane & Flynn 1999 (bibtex, PDF)
    • Birnbaum 2002 (bibtex, slideshow)
    • Birnbaum, Cleminson, Kempgen & Ribarov 2008 (bibtex, PDF)
• A recent discussion on the TEI-L discussion list started in November and continued in December 2014
  • Select quotations from interesting posts
  • Thread dealing with obscure characters in Unicode
  • Thread dealing with non-existing characters in Unicode
  • Thread Describing glyphs in <msDesc>
• Snippets of XML/TEI code
  • A suggestion by Ch. Wittern using the <mapping> element to compare manuscripts with different writing systems
  • A more complex example using several types of <mapping> (encoding only at the grapheme level: only <char> declarations)
  • A version of that snippet encoding both at the grapheme level and at the allograph/glyph level: both <char> and <glyph> declarations
  • Some XSLT code by S. Rahtz sorting out to which Unicode ranges the characters used in an XML file belong: simple snippet, complete script and its result
• Final discussion

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