icms 2015 burrows
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The Provenance and Histor y of the Manuscripts formerly in the Phillipps Collection
Department of Digital HumanitiesToby Burrows
The Phillipps manuscript collection
• Phillipps’ own printed catalogue
(1837-1871) goes up to no. 23,837
• Thomas Fitzroy Fenwick (grandson,
d. 1938) spent fifty years
reorganizing and renumbering: up to
no. 38,628
• Fenwick’s estimate of the total was
close to 60,000 volumes and
individual documents
• Phillipps also owned 50,000 books,
as well as many prints, photographs,
drawings and paintings
Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872)
Assembling the collection
Meerman 1824
Meerman 1824
Celotti1825
Celotti1825
Craven Ord
1829-32
Craven Ord
1829-32Page-Turner1824
Page-Turner1824
Lang1828
Lang1828
Drury1827
Drury1827
Guilford (North)
1830
Guilford (North)
1830
Heber1836
Heber1836
Van Ess1823-6
Van Ess1823-6
PHILLIPPSPHILLIPPS
Libri1859-62Libri
1859-62
Re-creation of Phillipps’ shelves, Grolier Club
Dispersal of the collection
Fenwick family (1886-1945):
• Sales to interested libraries and governments (Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, France, Ireland, Wales) – more than 2,500 items
• Auctions at Sotheby’s, 1886 to 1938 – 22 auctions, more than 22,000 lots, raised £97,000 (over £30 million)
• Residue (12,000 items) sold to the Robinson brothers in 1945 for £100,000 (£11-12 million)
W.H. Robinson Ltd (1945-1958):
•Series of sale catalogues, 1945-1954
•Donation to the Bodleian Library of the remaining materials, 1958
Sotheby’s (1946-1950, 1965-1977):•Series of sale catalogues
Data sourcesS our ce F orma t C omments
Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts
Relational database Incorporates other sources, esp. sales catalogues6,000 Phillipps MSS; 20,000 Phillipps events
Library catalogues (BL, KB etc.) Relational databases
Generally MARC recordsProvenance in notesExport can be awkward
Union cataloguesRelational databases
Printed bibliographies
Formats varyCoverage variesExport can be awkward
Sale catalogues
Printed books (some digitized)
Online sources (PDFs, Web sites)
Many included in Schoenberg MSS in ABE, eBay etc.
Phillipps catalogues and lists
Printed book; Partly digitizedSupplemented by handwritten notes
Partly included in SchoenbergHandwritten notes not digitized
Phillipps provenance indexes (BL, IRHT) Handwritten; Not digitized
Arranged by Phillipps numberNo longer updated
Annotated sales catalogues & printed catalogues Handwritten; Not digitized
Researchers (Munby), owners (Phillipps), auctioneers (Sotheby’s)Held in Cambridge UL, Bodleian, BL
Project summary
• Two main research questions: – The history and significant characteristics of the transmission
of a major group of European manuscripts between collections
and collectors over the centuries (provenance)– The applicability and value of Linked Data technologies as a
methodology for the large-scale analysis of the history of
cultural objects and collections (“network archaeology”)• Project plan– Ingest the data; transform them to a common Data Model;
represent them computationally; analyse and visualize them;
make them available to other researchers• Tools– Excel, OpenRefine, Neo4j, Nodegoat, visualization tools
In 1862, Sir Thomas Phillipps bought Phillipps MS 16402 in London as part of the Sotheby’s sale of the collection of Guglielmo Libri.
London
1862MS16402
Libri
Phillipps
Sotheby’s
Neo4j: graph database
• Nodes and relationships (each
with properties)• Various tools for data import• Cypher query language for
creating nodes, relationships
and properties• Cypher is also used to run
queries, analyse paths, count
and list• No schema as such – develop
and define as you go• Own visualization interface, but
also works with others• Data export – JSON
Neo4j Data Model – nodes (entities)
Node (entity: label) Type Properties
AGENT Person Organization
name
OBJECT Manuscript
id titlefoliationlayoutbindingillustration
WORK TextDescriptionExhibition
titleincipit language
PUBLICATION
CatalogueBookArticle
title
Neo4j Data Model – relationships
Relationship Properties
GAVESOLDCONSIGNEDOWNSACQUIRED
dateidcertitudeprice
PRODUCED
datecertitude
CONTAINS locus
SAME_AS certitude
Relationship Properties
COMPOSEDTRANSLATEDCOMPILED
date certitude
ANNOTATEDINSCRIBED
datelocuscertitude
DESCRIBED_IN dateitem no.
DESCRIBED_AS dateitem no.
Neo4j Data Model – relationship statements
Node Relationship NodeAGENT: Person GAVE OBJECT: Manuscript
AGENT: Organization SOLD OBJECT: Manuscript
OBJECT: Manuscript CONTAINS WORK: Text
AGENT: Person COMPOSED WORK: Text
PUBLICATION: Catalogue CONTAINS WORK: Description
OBJECT: Manuscript DESCRIBED_AS WORK: Description
AGENT: Organization PRODUCED PUBLICATION: Catalogue
WORK: Exhibition DESCRIBED_IN PUBLICATION: Catalogue
DATA MODEL – Nodegoat
Object Sub-objects Related to:
PERSON Nationality (country) ManuscriptTextCatalogue
ORGANIZATION Location (city; country) ManuscriptTextCatalogue
MANUSCRIPT SoldDonatedOwnedDescribed InProducedContents
Person/Organization: Agent, Owner, Buyer, Donor, Recipient, Scribe, Artist, ProducerLocation (city; country)CatalogueText
TEXT Person: AuthorManuscript
CATALOGUE
Organization: PublisherPerson: CompilerManuscript
Current status of the project
• Data imported: selections from Schoenberg data, other sample
data • Data Model: theoretical work + working versions• Demo versions of Neo4j and Nodegoat databases• Tested and documented queries, analyses and visualizations• To come:– Adding much more data in a production environment
(Nodegoat)– Carrying out more extensive visualizations and analyses• Across the whole collection• In relation to specific “use cases”
– Exporting data for reuse by other researchers
Dr Toby BurrowsMarie Curie FellowDepartment of Digital HumanitiesKing’s College London26-29 Drury LaneLondon WC2B 5RL
[email protected]@tobyburrowstobyburrows.wordpress.com