Who needs a digital text when digital facsimiles are available? I do. When I'm hunting citations or comparing versions, I need to be able to annotate, rearrange, and copy and paste. In addition, it's much faster to read an early modern text in a modern font, especially if I'm scanning a text I've read to find something I remember seeing previously. It's what makes the effort required to use OCR4all worth it.
Here's one result, for example: a complete digital text of Pseudo-Methodius' Revelationes in German, published in 1497 (ISTC im00526000, GW M23065; fascimile from the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek).
I've prepared the text for my own purposes, so:
- The numbers count images starting from the title page, not anything useful like leaves.
- I've made minimal effort to resolve abbreviations or normalize spelling.
- I'm using modern equivalents for s and z.
- I read through the text once to straighten out the formatting and catch errors, but there are undoubtedly still errors in the text.
The German text was more useful to me than the Latin text, and it uses fewer abbreviations. That does mean that this text doesn't include Wolfgang Aytinger's commentary on Methodius, so I might have to deal with it separately. I'm currently digitalizing a Latin work for the first time, and I don't know how well OCR4all will handle abbreviations yet.
I have several more texts like this that I'll post eventually, and I'm working on more as time permits. One goal is to end up with a workable electronic text of Lichtenberger's Prognosticatio.
Hopefully someone will find these working notes useful. If you need to cite something, cite to Albrecht Kunne's edition or a modern critical edition of Methodius.
