Digital text editing | Editio latissima
Editio latissima is a pilot project which aims at bringing together existing and new resources for Medieval Nordic texts.
![Detail of fol. 3r in The Old Norwegian Homily Book, AM 619 4to](https://www.uib.no/sites/w3.uib.no/files/styles/content_main/public/media/am-619-4to-bl3r-initial_0.jpg?itok=X6WHokBa×tamp=1605005639)
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The project Editio latissima aims to publish original texts at one or more levels of textual representation, supplemented by high-quality photographic facsimiles. Furthermore, the project will offer a translation (where available) of the text into Modern Norwegian or another appropriate language. Texts in the project will include a full morphological annotation, i.e. stating the dictionary entry and grammatical form of each running word. There may also be a full syntactic annotation of the texts. Other types of content are possible, too. The encoding is compatible with the guidelines given in The Menota Handbook.
The project was set up in April 2020 and is intended to be a textual laboratory, not a new publication channel. Editio latissima includes two Old Norwegian texts, The Homily Book in AM 619 4to and the Law-code of Magnús Hákonarson in Holm perg 34 4to, and one text in Latin, Vita et Passio St. Hallvardi, in four witnesses.
The personnel behind the project is Odd Einar Haugen (chair) (Univ. of Bergen), Anna C. Horn (Univ. of Oslo), Åslaug Ommundsen (Univ. of Bergen), Robert K. Paulsen (Univ. of Bergen) and Nina Stensaker (Univ. of Bergen).
The digital application behind the project has been developed by Paul Meurer at the University Library in Bergen. It is a development of his Corpuscle application which already is being used for the texts in the Menota archive.
The Old Norwegian Homily Book in AM 619 4to
A broad edition of the Homily Book is available in Menota’s archive (look for AM 619 4to in the first column). It includes:
Introduction by Odd Einar Haugen and Åslaug Ommundsen (first draft)
Diplomatic text according to the edition of Gustav Indrebø (1931), converted and digitised by Christian-Emil Smith Ore and colleagues at the University of Oslo and revised by Odd Einar Haugen and Nina Stensaker at the University of Bergen
Facsimiles of the manuscript in full colour, courtesy of The Arnamagnæan Manuscript Collection in Copenhagen
Morphological annotation by participants in the Menotec project
Translation into Modern Norwegian bokmål by Astrid Salvesen (1971)
Syntactic annotation by participants in the Menotec project (not yet activated)
In the Menotec project, the morphological and syntactic annotations were carried out by Kari Kinn, Eiríkur Kristjánsson, Signe Laake and Fartein Th. Øverland. During the preparation of the text at the University of Oslo, Rune Flaten and Mette G. Ekker participated in the project, and Alex Speed Kjeldsen (Copenhagen) helped in validating the file. The XML file may be downloaded from Menota’s archive (look for the final column, Download). It contains a full overview of all those who participated in the preparation of this edition (cf. <titleStmt> and <revisionDesc> in the header of the file).
The law-code of King Magnús Hákonarson in Holm perg 34 4to
A broad edition of the law-code of King Magnús Hákonarson the Law-mender [Magnus Lagabøtes landslov] is available in Menota’s archive (look for Holm perg 34 4to in the first column) and includes:
Introduction by Anna C. Horn (first version)
Text at three levels (facsimile, diplomatic, normalised) edited by Anna C. Horn and Robert K. Paulsen
Facsimiles of the manuscript in full colour, courtesy of the Royal Library in Stockholm
Morphological annotation by Robert K. Paulsen
Translation into Modern Norwegian bokmål by Anna C. Horn
Syntactic annotation by participants on the Menotec project (not yet activated)
In the Menotec project, the syntactic annotation was carried out by Kari Kinn, Eiríkur Kristjánsson, Signe Laake and Fartein Th. Øverland.
Vita et passio St. Hallvardi in four versions
A broad, synoptic edition of the legend of St. Hallvard is in preparation, and a draft has been published in Menota’s test archive. The edition will include:
Introduction by Åslaug Ommundsen (under preparation)
Text according to Oslo, NRA norr fragm 98, with corresponding facsimiles of the fragment
Text according to Stockholm, Fr. 7708, with corresponding facsimiles of the fragment
Text according to Acta Sanctorum (1680) with corresponding facsimiles of the printed edition
Text according to Breviarium Nidrosiense (1519) with corresponding facsimiles of the printed edition
Translation from Latin by Åslaug Ommundsen (under preparation)
As the next step in the digitisation of these texts, a synoptic edition will be produced. In this, the corresponding parts of the texts will be linked.
The project continues in 2022.