Gallica -- a Quick Look

This isn't much of a review, I'll probably do a longer one in the future, but here's a blog entry I made for my class on public history.

I’d like to talk about my favorite sort of public history-- archives and archival science. One of my favorite archives is Gallica, the online digitized library of the National Library of France: http://gallica.bnf.fr/accueil/?mode=desktop .

The site is in French but you don’t have to know any French to enjoy it. Many documents are in other languages, and it’s fun just browsing the collection, which spans the Middle Ages to the 20th century. The acquisition pages are very interesting (interesting to me that is, your mileage may vary). Each page for a document has the document digitized, which you can flip through on the page or download, and a box to view the acquisition details. Here’s an example:

Titre :  Recueil de poésies de Charles d'Orléans.
Date d'édition :  1401-1500
Sujet :  Orléans, Charles, duc d', fils de Louis d'Orléans.
Sujet :  Poésies.
Type :  manuscrit
Langue :  français
Format :  Parchemin. - 537 pages. - 165 × 110 mm. - Reliure maroquin vert
Droits :  domaine public
Identifiant :  ark:/12148/btv1b105325836Source :  Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Français 25458
Notice du catalogue :  http://archivesetmanuscrits.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cc538881Provenance :  Bibliothèque nationale de France
Date de mise en ligne :  07/03/2016

This tells you the title, the approximate date, the subject, type, language, format, who owns the rights to it, the identification link, the source, the catalogue notice (which is the same as the identification link0, the provenance, and the date it was put online. This is a parchment manuscript of the poetry of Charles, Duke of Orleans, which was made between the years 1401 and 1500 (we know it was made in the mid-1400s, that’s just an approximation for archive use), it’s in French and held in the National Library of France, the Bibliothèque nationale de France, and was put online in March of 2016. It tells you everything you need to know about the document right there! The acquisition information like you might see on an information plate is hidden in there: it’s BnF. Ms. Fr. 25458, which tells you the library, the department (Ms.: manuscripts), that it’s in French, and the acquisition number, 25458. All you have to know is that string of information, and you can search for it easily (nerd that I am, I have that particular info memorized).

So, go check out Gallica, I’m sure there’s something that will interest you. And, it even has a mobile app, which I highly recommend.

Bringing About the Past in Ancient Rome

To begin this blog, here is an old paper I wrote for a class on the philosophy of time several years ago. This paper seeks to explain how time and fate function in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar.