Building an ecosystem of digital resources on the written heritage of Ancient Arabia
- Title
- Building an ecosystem of digital resources on the written heritage of Ancient Arabia
- Creator(s)
- Irene Rossi
- Date
- 2025
- Volume
- 36
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 469-480
- Language
- eng
- Abstract
- The Digital Archive for the Study of pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions (DASI, https://dasi. cnr.it/) currently provides open access to the digital editions of nearly 8800 ancient epigraphic texts from the Arabian Peninsula. After presenting an outline of DASI ecosystem through its 25-year history, this paper focuses on the recent enrichment of its data model, carried out within a pilot project of the E-RIHS infrastructure under the H2IOSC programme. The aim was to optimise DASI as an up-to-date tool for the digital critical edition of a broad spectrum of epigraphic sources from ancient Arabia, including graffiti, instrumenta inscripta, coins, and inscribed sticks, alongside ‘monumental’ inscriptions. Most of the interventions targeted the description of the visual aspect of writing and related contextual information, enhancing the digital representation of the material dimension of written heritage, which is often overlooked in philological studies. Ongoing work is targeting the FAIRification of DASI data, which has so far resulted in the sharing of an extensive bibliography of 1800 records through Zotero.
- References
-
Digital Archive for the Study of pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions
-
Corpus of South Arabian Inscriptions
- Zotero References Collection
- https://www.zotero.org/groups/5293298/bidiar/collections/DIEBRHD7
- Cites
- Encoding, Interoperability, Lexicography: Digital Epigraphy Through the Lens of DASI Experience
- By Land and by Sea. A History of South Arabia before Islam Recounted from Inscriptions
- The digital Gazetteer of Ancient Arabia: An example of reuse and exploitation of annotated textual corpora
- ΕΓΡΑΨΕΝ ΔΕ ΚΑΙ ΤΙΤΛΟΝ Ο ΠΙΛΆΤΟΣ (Gv 19,19) Verso una nuova definizione di iscrizione
- What is Ancient North Arabian?
- Reflections on the linguistic map of pre-Islamic Arabia
- What Is an Inscription? Problems of Definition and Identity of an Historical Source
- Epigraphic heritage and digital practices: The case of pre-Islamic Arabia
- Corpus of South Arabian Inscriptions bibliography
- Studying the ancient Arabian society through a digital prosopography approach: Reuse and enrichment of DASI onomastic data in the ProsA database
- Ancient South Arabian
Linked resources
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- Media
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DASI-Digital Archive for the Study of pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions: homepage of the data-entry interface. -
Examples of Ancient South Arabian inscriptions’ text appearances obtained by different execution techniques: a) cast bronze openwork stamp seal (BM 1993,0126.1); b) agate stamp seal with engraved inscription and its relief impression (BM 120361); c) cast bronze hand with engraved inscription (BM 139443); d) bronze altar with cast inscription in relief (BM 135323); e) stone inscription with engraved texts – one of which results in relief (BM125130) (photos © The Trustees of the British Museum) -
Ancient South Arabian silver coin with figurative elements and monograms (BM 2002,0101.1826, photo © The Trustees of the British Museum). -
Ancient South Arabian vertical inscription running counterclockwise, realised ante-cocturam on a jar rim (MAA 1951.589) (facsimile by G. Buono; photo © Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge).
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