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

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be used to answer a specific research questi<strong>on</strong> <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> classical geography. HESTIA seeks to exam<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>e the<br />

different ways <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> which the history of Herodotus refers to space <strong>and</strong> time. 307 Their major research<br />

questi<strong>on</strong>s <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>clude study<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g his “representati<strong>on</strong> of space <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> its cultural c<strong>on</strong>text,” explor<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g whether<br />

different peoples represented <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> his history c<strong>on</strong>ceive of space differently, <strong>and</strong> test<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g the thesis “that<br />

the ancient Greek world centered <strong>on</strong> the Mediterranean <strong>and</strong> was comprised of a series of networks”<br />

(Barker 2010).<br />

Barker et al. (2010) have provided an extensive overview of the design <strong>and</strong> <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>itial f<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>d<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>gs of HESTIA,<br />

<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>clud<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g methodological c<strong>on</strong>siderati<strong>on</strong>s for other projects that seek to make use of the state of the art<br />

<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> GIS, relati<strong>on</strong>al databases, <strong>and</strong> other computati<strong>on</strong>al tools to explore questi<strong>on</strong>s not just <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> classical<br />

geography but also <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> the humanities <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> general. The authors also dem<strong>on</strong>strate how many traditi<strong>on</strong>al<br />

questi<strong>on</strong>s regard<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g the text of Herodotus (e.g., What is the relative importance of bodies of water<br />

(particularly rivers) <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> organiz<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g the physical <strong>and</strong> cultural space) can be <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>vestigated <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> new ways<br />

us<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g digital technologies. The authors also identified a number of themes that HESTIA would pursue<br />

<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>-depth regard<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g the th<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>k<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g about space <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> Herodotus Histories:<br />

…namely, the types of networks present <strong>and</strong> their <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>terpretati<strong>on</strong>, the <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>fluence of human<br />

agency <strong>and</strong> focalisati<strong>on</strong>, the idea of space as someth<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g experienced <strong>and</strong> lived <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>, <strong>and</strong> the role<br />

of the medium <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> the representati<strong>on</strong> of space—<strong>and</strong> to emphasise that close textual read<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g<br />

underp<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>s our use of ICT throughout (Barker et al. 2010).<br />

One major po<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>t reiterated by Barker et al. was that a close textual read<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g of Herodotus was the first<br />

c<strong>on</strong>siderati<strong>on</strong> before mak<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g any technological decisi<strong>on</strong>s.<br />

The methodology <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> creat<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g HESTIA <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>volved four stages: (1) utiliz<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g the digital markup of a<br />

Herodotus text obta<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>ed from Perseus; (2) compil<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g a spatial database from this text; (3) produc<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g<br />

basic GIS, GoogleEarth, <strong>and</strong> Timel<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>e maps with this database; <strong>and</strong> (4) creat<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g <strong>and</strong> analyz<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g<br />

automated network maps. One particularly <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>terest<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g feature of the HESTIA project is that it<br />

repurposed the TEI-XML versi<strong>on</strong>s of Herodotus available from the PDL, <strong>and</strong> <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> particular the place<br />

names tagged, al<strong>on</strong>g with coord<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>ates <strong>and</strong> identifiers from the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names<br />

(TGN) 308 <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> the English file. N<strong>on</strong>etheless, this process of reuse was not seamless, <strong>and</strong> HESTIA needed<br />

to perform some procedural c<strong>on</strong>versi<strong>on</strong>s. Specifically, they c<strong>on</strong>verted the TEI P4 file from Perseus to<br />

TEI P5; the Greek text was transformed from Beta code to Unicode us<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g a transcoder tool developed<br />

by Hugh Cayless.<br />

The HESTIA project also decided to use <strong>on</strong>ly the English versi<strong>on</strong> of the Histories to probe spatial data<br />

s<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>ce the Greek text would have to have had top<strong>on</strong>yms tagged by h<strong>and</strong>. N<strong>on</strong>etheless, s<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>ce they still<br />

wanted to make use of the Greek text, they assigned unique identifiers to each secti<strong>on</strong> of the text <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g><br />

Greek <strong>and</strong> English so that associati<strong>on</strong>s could still be made. In additi<strong>on</strong>, the project needed to perform<br />

some data clean<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g of the geographic markup <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> the Perseus TEI XML file, <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>clud<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g remov<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g<br />

duplicate entries <strong>and</strong> correct<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g coord<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>ates, entity categorizati<strong>on</strong>s, <strong>and</strong> references to false locati<strong>on</strong>s.<br />

This work by HESTIA illustrates that while the creati<strong>on</strong> of open-access texts by digital classics<br />

projects supports reuse, this reuse is not without its own computati<strong>on</strong>al challenges <strong>and</strong> costs.<br />

307 Explorati<strong>on</strong>s of how time <strong>and</strong> space were c<strong>on</strong>ceived of <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> the ancient world is also the focus of the German research project TOPOI, “The Formati<strong>on</strong><br />

<strong>and</strong> Transformati<strong>on</strong> of Space <strong>and</strong> Knowledge <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> Ancient Civilizati<strong>on</strong>s” (http://www.topoi.org/<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>dex.php). Recent details <strong>on</strong> <strong>on</strong>e TOPOI project can be<br />

found <str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g> Pappelau <strong>and</strong> Belt<strong>on</strong> (2009).<br />

308 http://www.getty.edu/research/c<strong>on</strong>duct<str<strong>on</strong>g>in</str<strong>on</strong>g>g_research/vocabularies/tgn/

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