Vatican Library to digitize


NeuroTypical
 Share

Recommended Posts

I get excited when I hear about humans preserving the past and making it accessible to the present and future. I've always been a big fan of museums and libraries and whatnot. I remember back in college, learning about the Library of Alexandria and how it was destroyed, I actually shed a real tear. (Am I a dork or what? )
 
So when I hear about stuff like this, I get excited:
 
 

 

The Bibliotheca Apostolica, as the Vatican Library is known, is one of the oldest libraries in the world and contains nearly 90,000 historic books, documents, papyrus texts and other ancient treasures. In order to preserve and make them available to scholars and historians around the world, the Vatican is embarking upon a multi-year project to digitize, store, archive and put the entire collection on line.
EMC is working with systems integrator partner Dedagroup, and providing 2.8 petabytes of storage capacity -- enough to store the 40 million pages of digitized manuscript -- across our industry-leading Isilon, Atmos, Data Domain, Networker and VNX solutions over the initial three years of the project. Content will be preserved in an ISO-certifiable digital format that will protect the delicate texts from the deterioration and decay that can be caused by repeated handling.

 

 
 
Good job Catholics! Now, if you could also be so kind as to provide a cross-referenced english translation for all 87,000 manuscripts, I could die happy. (I know, I might have to wait a few hundred years for that one.)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

In terms of religious writings, I always thought Catholic doctrines and whatnot was kind of boring.

Even with all its history (which makes the LDS years look miniscule in comparison) it's still dull to me. LDS has a real neat history I always enjoy reading.

Less inquisitions

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is the wave of the future for librarianship. Digital librarians not only know how to digitize artifacts (that's the low level stuff that students or hourly workers do), but they know how to make the metadata and tag the items so you can find them. They classify it so it makes sense, they create useful web pages so the navigation is easy. They take computing and databases and they want to share everything with everybody.

 

That's where I come in and tell them that won't happen. There's not enough money. So put on your big girl panties and figure out how to get some grant money and work a budget and make the hard decisions about what goes online and what stays in the box. :D   I love my job.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is the wave of the future for librarianship. Digital librarians not only know how to digitize artifacts (that's the low level stuff that students or hourly workers do), but they know how to make the metadata and tag the items so you can find them. They classify it so it makes sense, they create useful web pages so the navigation is easy. They take computing and databases and they want to share everything with everybody.

 

That's where I come in and tell them that won't happen. There's not enough money. So put on your big girl panties and figure out how to get some grant money and work a budget and make the hard decisions about what goes online and what stays in the box. :D   I love my job.

Isn't that what undergrads are for? Free labor? LOL... Or even better... 1-3cr labs where they're paying to work?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

COOL!  Wait, does anyone know how to read ancient Latin?

"Ancient Latin"?  You mean Latin? 

It used to be considered that you weren't educated unless you knew Latin or Greek. I had Latin 2 years in prep school, and attended Catholic Mass in Latin (using a Latin prayer book) for years before the change over to English. I'm not as good as I used to be, but I can struggle along.

 

Newsflash - library folks are the kind of people who know Latin & Greek & Klingon & Elvish - and wonder why everyone else doesn't know these things as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Ancient Latin"?  You mean Latin? 

It used to be considered that you weren't educated unless you knew Latin or Greek. I had Latin 2 years in prep school, and attended Catholic Mass in Latin (using a Latin prayer book) for years before the change over to English. I'm not as good as I used to be, but I can struggle along.

 

Newsflash - library folks are the kind of people who know Latin & Greek & Klingon & Elvish - and wonder why everyone else doesn't know these things as well.

yIn nI' tuq Lakumi! Qapla'

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Ancient Latin"?  You mean Latin? 

It used to be considered that you weren't educated unless you knew Latin or Greek. I had Latin 2 years in prep school, and attended Catholic Mass in Latin (using a Latin prayer book) for years before the change over to English. I'm not as good as I used to be, but I can struggle along.

 

Newsflash - library folks are the kind of people who know Latin & Greek & Klingon & Elvish - and wonder why everyone else doesn't know these things as well.

 

Iay asway aughtay anday earnedlay ethay ewnay Atinlay.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share