TranscriboQuest 2025 Medieval Vernacular Religious Texts

Team Medieval Vernacular Religious Texts

**Description**

This dataset was created by a collaborative working group with the aim of transcribing medieval vernacular religious texts across a range of European languages. To reflect the linguistic expertise of the group members, the project included Old and Middle French, Old and Middle Irish, Old Castilian, Old Swedish, and Early New High German (Bavarian). Religious texts were chosen as a common thread because of their wide diffusion in the European vernacular tradition, their high survival rate in manuscripts, and their relevance for the study of medieval cultural and textual practices.

The dataset is based on manuscripts preserved in France, Spain, Sweden, Germany, and Ireland, dating from the 11th to the 15th centuries, with a particular concentration in the 15th century. All manuscripts belong to the category of medium to highly decorated literary manuscripts. They are written in clearly identifiable scripts, predominantly in one or two columns; two manuscripts also include marginal texts.

**Text**

The transcribed texts represent a wide spectrum of medieval vernacular religious writing across Europe. They include hagiographic works such as the *Legend om S. Barbara* in Old Swedish and the *Legenda aurea* in Old Castilian, devotional poetry like the *Amra Colum Cille* in Old/Middle Irish, as well as historiographical and moralizing texts such as Simon de Hesdin’s and Nicolas de Gonesse’s French translation of Valerius Maximus (*Les Faits et Dits Mémorables*). Other contributions comprise Marian devotional literature (*La conception Nostre Dame*), vernacular adaptations of Latin translations (*Décadas de Tito Livio* in Old Castilian), and the widespread compendium *Der Heiligen Leben* in Early New High German (Bavarian) again based on the Legenda Aurea.

**Script**

The manuscripts reflect the diversity of medieval book hands used in different European regions between the 11th and 15th centuries. They include early Insular Carolingian minuscule, as well as various Gothic books and cursive hands characteristic of high and late medieval manuscript culture.

Our dataset is composed of following texts :

| Manuscript | Date | Language | Text | Scripta | Number of transcribed lines | Name of the transcriptor |

| :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- |

| Paris, BnF, fr. 282 | 1401 | Middle French | Les Faits et Dits Mémorables de Valère le Grant, by Simon de Hesdin and Nicolas de Gonesse | Gothic cursiva | 192 | Roxane Bougrelle |

| Paris, BnF fr. 818 | 1251-1300 | Old French | La conception Nostre Dame | Gothic | 143 | Catherine Dehaut |

| Dublin, RIA 23 E 25, pp. 5-8 | 11-12th c (MS). 8/9th c (Text) | Old/Middle Irish and Latin | Amra Colum Cille | Insular Carolingian miniscule | 19 | Ciaran McDonough |

| Stockholm, KB A 110, ff. [250r] | 1385-1400 | Old Swedish | Legend om S. Barbara, from Codex Oxenstiernianus (Järtteckensboken) | Cursiva gothica recentior | 110 | Pontus Henningsson |

| Escorial, ms. h-I-14 | 13-14th c. | Old Castillan | Legenda aurea | Gothic cursiva | 141 | María Florencia Vieira |

| Munich, University Library, 2° Cod. ms. 314 | 15th c. | Bavarian, Early Modern | Der Heiligen Leben (Sommerteil) | Bastarda | 287 | Barbara Denicolò |

| BNE ms. 12732 | 1433 | Old Castilian | Décadas de Tito-Livio (Pero López de Ayala from Bersuire’s translation) | Gothic Cursiva | 141 | Irene Salvo García |

The following metrics displayed below our corpus consisting of the manuscripts listed in the table above: in terms of its total number of documents (18); number of regions (74); total number of lines (1279); total number of words (11365); total number of characters (59696):

**Dataset structure**

The data folder contains each manuscript and its transcriptions. For each manuscript, the transcription is provided in an ALTO XML, along with a METS XML file, along with images of the manuscript pages that were transcribed. These are provided in one folder per manuscript as a subfolder to the data folder.

**Guidelines**

We followed the guidelines of the project CatMus (1.6) :

Pinche, A., Clérice, T., Vlachou-Efstathiou, M., Chagué, A., Camps, J.-B., Gille Levenson, M., Brisville-Fertin, O., Boschetti, F., Fischer, F., Gervers, M., Boutreux, A., Manton, A., Gabay, S., & Ferrante, G. (2025). CATMuS Medieval (1.6.0). Zenodo. [https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15030337](https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15030337)

And used the SegmOnto controlled vocabulary :

Simon Gabay, Ariane Pinche, Kelly Christensen, Jean-Baptiste Camps, Nicola Carboni, *SegmOnto, A Controlled Vocabulary to Describe the Layout of Pages*, version 0.9, Genève/Lyon/Paris, 2023, [https://segmonto.github.io/](https://segmonto.github.io/)

For our collective project, we decided to follow some common guidelines :

**Segmentation guidelines**

**MainZone** : see SegmOnto. MainZone contains principle text, as a single block, without any paratext. If there are many columns, we made different blocks. Interlinear glosses are part of the MainZone.

**NumberingZone** : see SegmOnto. Contains page numbers or folio numbers.

**GraphicZone** : images or decorations.

**MarginTextZone** : marginal glosses or additions.

**DropCapitalZone** : see SegmOnto. Any type of capital letters, without any subtype. Do not transcribe it.

**RunningTitleZone** : see SegmOnto. Zone containing a running title.

**DefaultLine / default (Kraken Result)** : standard textline.

**HeadingLine** : Any heading, without consideration for the level.

**InterlinearLine** : Any line between standard baseline.

Verse initials (appearing at the start of each line of a versified text, similar in size to the remaining text of the verse) should be included in the line of the corresponding verse. They should thus be segmented in the MainZone as normal text.

Some initial letters (not illuminated), which hang slightly below the line are not included in the mask, meaning that they have to be later added to the transcription.

**Transcription guidelines**

We also followed the CATMus guidelines when transcribing our documents. Given the diversity of our corpus, we chose a graphemic transcription system. Allographic variants (‘u/v’ and ‘i’/’j’) were normalised. When it comes to ‘z’/’s’, every allograph of ‘s’ was transcribed by ‘s’, and we made a difference between ‘s’ and ‘z’. We didn’t separate agglutinated words and verse initials were to be kept separated (using a space) from the rest of the word. When it comes to the choice of signs, we used four main signs: “.” for single dots, “:” for more than single dots, “/” for diastoles and signs that look like virgulas and “¶” for section markers. We didn’t normalize capital letters. We also transcribed hyphenations and diastoles. Also, if a character does not exist in MUFI but carries linguistic importance and is a common occurring character in a manuscript, a new character can be created by combining MUFI characters and symbols. Abbreviations were not developed and we transcribed them adhering to MUFI. In other words, we transcribe what we see, so that the dataset works for every vernacular language of our corpus. Every character is described in the CatMus guidelines:

[https://catmus-guidelines.github.io/html/guidelines/en/character\_table.html](https://catmus-guidelines.github.io/html/guidelines/en/character_table.html)

For the transcription of the manuscript in Old Swedish, specifically, a new combination of characters, “a̶ ” (small antiphon), was created since it is a common occurrence in Old Swedish manuscripts and carries linguistic importance. The character “a̶ ” has similar pronunciation as “ä” and “æ”, but since these letters appear in other languages with other pronunciation/meaning and look different than the small antiphon, a new character was created. A large antiphon already exists in MUFI,

[https://mufi.info/q.php?p=mufi/chars/unichar/59610](https://mufi.info/q.php?p=mufi/chars/unichar/59610), but the small one does not. In the future, hopefully the small antihpon, “a̶ “, will be added to MUFI.

**Creators of the dataset**

Ciaran McDonough, Aarhus University 0000-0002-5198-9205

Pontus Henningsson, Linneaus University, 0009-0002-8956-7312

Barbara Denicolò, Paris Lodron University of Salzburg, 0000-0001-7155-9790

Roxane Bougrelle, Université Lumière Lyon 2, 0009-0002-6343-2305

Catherine Dehaut, Université de Montréal, 0009-0000-5161-7906

María Florencia Vieira, ENS de Lyon, 0009-0001-8222-1178

Irene Salvo García, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid 0000-0003-0155-1886

# 中世纪通俗宗教文本协作数据集

**Description**
本数据集由协作工作组打造，旨在转录多语种欧洲中世纪通俗宗教文本。为体现团队成员的语言专长，本项目涵盖古法语、中古法语、古爱尔兰语、中古爱尔兰语、古卡斯蒂利亚语、古瑞典语以及早期新高地德语（巴伐利亚方言）。选择宗教文本作为核心主题，缘于其在欧洲通俗传统中传播广泛、手抄本留存率高，且对中世纪文化与文本实践研究具有重要价值。

本数据集的手抄本藏于法国、西班牙、瑞典、德国与爱尔兰，年代跨度为11至15世纪，其中以15世纪的藏品最为集中。所有手抄本均属于中等至高度装饰性的文学手抄本范畴，文本以清晰可辨的书体书写，多为单栏或双栏排版；另有两份手抄本包含页边文本。

**Text**
转录文本涵盖欧洲各地丰富多样的中世纪通俗宗教写作，其中包括古瑞典语《圣芭芭拉传说》（*Legend om S. Barbara*）、古卡斯蒂利亚语《黄金传奇》（*Legenda aurea*）等圣徒传作品（hagiographic works），古/中古爱尔兰语《科伦姆·基尔赞歌》（*Amra Colum Cille*）等虔敬诗歌，以及西蒙·德·埃斯丹（Simon de Hesdin）与尼古拉·德·贡塞斯（Nicolas de Gonesse）合译的瓦莱里乌斯·马克西姆斯史学教化文本《名言录》（*Les Faits et Dits Mémorables*）。其他文本还包括圣母敬拜文学《圣母受胎》（*La conception Nostre Dame*）、古卡斯蒂利亚语拉丁语译本通俗改编版《提图斯·李维纪年史》（*Décadas de Tito Livio*），以及再度基于《黄金传奇》（*Legenda aurea*）创作的早期新高地德语（巴伐利亚方言）通用汇编《圣徒生平》（*Der Heiligen Leben*）。

**Script**
这批手抄本展现了11至15世纪欧洲不同地区使用的中世纪手写书体的多样性，包括早期岛型加洛林小写体（Insular Carolingian minuscule），以及中世纪盛期与晚期手抄本文化特有的各类哥特体与草书手书。

本数据集由以下手抄本组成：

| 手抄本馆藏信息 | 年代 | 语言 | 文本内容 | 书体 | 转录行数 | 转录者姓名 |
| :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- | :---- |
| 巴黎法国国家图书馆（BnF）藏 法文手稿282号 | 1401年 | 中古法语 | 西蒙·德·埃斯丹与尼古拉·德·贡塞斯译《瓦莱里乌斯名言录》（*Les Faits et Dits Mémorables de Valère le Grant*） | 哥特草书体 | 192 | 罗克桑·布格雷尔 |
| 巴黎法国国家图书馆（BnF）藏 法文手稿818号 | 1251-1300年 | 古法语 | 《圣母受胎》（*La conception Nostre Dame*） | 哥特体 | 143 | 凯瑟琳·德奥 |
| 都柏林爱尔兰皇家科学院（RIA）藏 23 E 25号手稿，第5-8页 | 11-12世纪（手抄本年代），8/9世纪（文本年代） | 古/中古爱尔兰语与拉丁语 | 《科伦姆·基尔赞歌》（*Amra Colum Cille*） | 岛型加洛林小写体 | 19 | 基兰·麦克多诺 |
| 斯德哥尔摩瑞典皇家图书馆（KB）藏 A 110号手稿，第250r叶 | 1385-1400年 | 古瑞典语 | 源自奥克森谢尔纳手稿（《雅特泰肯斯博克》）的《圣芭芭拉传说》（*Legend om S. Barbara*） | 晚期哥特草书体 | 110 | 蓬图斯·亨宁松 |
| 埃斯科里亚尔修道院图书馆藏 h-I-14号手稿 | 13-14世纪 | 古卡斯蒂利亚语 | 《黄金传奇》（*Legenda aurea*） | 哥特草书体 | 141 | 玛丽亚·弗洛伦西亚·维埃拉 |
| 慕尼黑大学图书馆藏 2° Cod. ms. 314号手稿 | 15世纪 | 巴伐利亚早期新高地德语 | 《圣徒生平》（夏季卷）（*Der Heiligen Leben (Sommerteil)*） | 巴斯塔德体 | 287 | 芭芭拉·德尼科洛 |
| 西班牙国家图书馆（BNE）藏 12732号手稿 | 1433年 | 古卡斯蒂利亚语 | 佩罗·洛佩斯·德·阿亚拉据贝尔叙尔译本译《提图斯·李维纪年史》（*Décadas de Tito-Livio*） | 哥特草书体 | 141 | 艾琳·萨尔沃·加西亚 |

以下为上述表格收录的手抄本组成的语料库的各项统计指标：总文献数18份、覆盖区域74个、总转录行数1279行、总词汇量11365词、总字符数59696。

**Dataset structure**
数据文件夹包含每份手抄本及其转录文件。每份手抄本的转录文件以ALTO XML格式提供，同时配套METS XML元数据文件以及对应转录手抄本页面的图像文件。所有文件将按手抄本分为独立子文件夹，存放于数据文件夹下。

**Guidelines**
本项目遵循CatMus（中世纪手抄本书体目录，Medieval Catalog of Manuscript Scripts）1.6版指南：
Pinche, A., Clérice, T., Vlachou-Efstathiou, M., Chagué, A., Camps, J.-B., Gille Levenson, M., Brisville-Fertin, O., Boschetti, F., Fischer, F., Gervers, M., Boutreux, A., Manton, A., Gabay, S., & Ferrante, G. (2025). CATMuS Medieval (1.6.0). Zenodo. [https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15030337](https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15030337)

并采用SegmOnto受控词汇表：
Simon Gabay, Ariane Pinche, Kelly Christensen, Jean-Baptiste Camps, Nicola Carboni, *SegmOnto, A Controlled Vocabulary to Describe the Layout of Pages*, version 0.9, Genève/Lyon/Paris, 2023, [https://segmonto.github.io/](https://segmonto.github.io/)

针对本协作项目，我们制定了以下通用指南：

**Segmentation guidelines**
**MainZone**：参见SegmOnto标准。主文本区（MainZone）包含核心文本，以单一区块呈现，不含副文本；若存在多栏排版，则划分为多个独立区块。行间注属于主文本区范畴。
**NumberingZone**：参见SegmOnto标准。页码区（NumberingZone）包含页码或叶码。
**GraphicZone**：图像或装饰元素区。
**MarginTextZone**：页边文本区，包含页边注或增补内容。
**DropCapitalZone**：参见SegmOnto标准。首字母大写区（DropCapitalZone）包含各类大写字母，不区分亚型，无需转录。
**RunningTitleZone**：参见SegmOnto标准。页眉区（RunningTitleZone）包含页眉文本。

**DefaultLine / default (Kraken Result)**：标准文本行。
**HeadingLine**：任意层级的标题行。
**InterlinearLine**：位于标准基线之间的行间行。

诗行首字母（出现在每行诗行开头，尺寸与诗行其余文本一致）应归入对应诗行的区块，因此需作为普通文本在主文本区中进行分割。

部分非装饰性首字母，若其悬挂位置略低于行基线，则不包含于掩码范围内，需后续补充至转录内容中。

**Transcription guidelines**
转录过程同样遵循CatMus指南。鉴于语料库的多样性，我们采用字形转录体系。对异体变体（如“u/v”与“i/j”）进行了归一化处理；针对“z/s”变体，所有“s”的异体均转录为“s”，并区分“s”与“z”。未对黏合词进行拆分，诗行首字母需与单词主体以空格分隔。在符号选用方面，我们使用四类核心符号：“.”表示单点符号，“:”表示多点符号，“/”表示音节分隔符与类virgula符号，“¶”表示章节标记。未对大写字母进行归一化处理，同时转录连字符与音节分隔符。若某字符未收录于中世纪Unicode字体计划（Medieval Unicode Font Initiative，简称MUFI），但具备语言学重要性且在手抄本中高频出现，则可通过组合MUFI字符与符号创建新字符。未对缩写进行归一化，严格按照MUFI标准转录，即如实转录所见内容，以确保本数据集适用于语料库中的所有通俗语种。所有字符的说明详见CatMus指南：
[https://catmus-guidelines.github.io/html/guidelines/en/character_table.html](https://catmus-guidelines.github.io/html/guidelines/en/character_table.html)

针对古瑞典语手抄本的转录，我们创建了新型组合字符“a̶ ”（小型应答圣歌字符），因其在古瑞典语手抄本中高频出现且具备语言学重要性。该字符发音与“䔓æ”相近，但因后两者在其他语言中发音与含义不同且外观有别，故创建新字符。大型应答圣歌字符已收录于MUFI：[https://mufi.info/q.php?p=mufi/chars/unichar/59610](https://mufi.info/q.php?p=mufi/chars/unichar/59610)，但小型字符尚未收录。未来有望将“a̶ ”小型应答圣歌字符加入MUFI。

**Creators of the dataset**
基兰·麦克多诺（Ciaran McDonough），奥胡斯大学 0000-0002-5198-9205
蓬图斯·亨宁松（Pontus Henningsson），林奈大学 0009-0002-8956-7312
芭芭拉·德尼科洛（Barbara Denicolò），萨尔茨堡巴黎洛顿大学 0000-0001-7155-9790
罗克桑·布格雷尔（Roxane Bougrelle），里昂第二大学 0009-0002-6343-2305
凯瑟琳·德奥（Catherine Dehaut），蒙特利尔大学 0009-0000-5161-7906
玛丽亚·弗洛伦西亚·维埃拉（María Florencia Vieira），里昂高等师范学院 0009-0001-8222-1178
艾琳·萨尔沃·加西亚（Irene Salvo García），马德里自治大学 0000-0003-0155-1886