City and Community. Social Networks in Medieval ViennaI) Structure of the database
The project’s aim is to systematically record large quantities of data. To this end, we developed a semi-structured XML database which is based on the ‘factoid prosopography’ model. The data collected includes persons, organisations, events and places as well as attributes that characterise these entities, such as professions, gender or title, and relationsthat link these entities, such as kinship, activity-related relationships or titles associated with places. Moreover, we model the functions which these entities had in the legal transaction recorded, e.g. issuer, recipient or witness.
We extract data by encoding the original texts of our source material and simultaneously keep indices in XML and in accordance with the guidelines of the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI). Programming (Python, XSLT) is used to convert the structured information included in the source texts and indices (as XML files) into tables (as CSV files). These are linked relationally in a MySQL database (analytical database) and searchable with the help of queries.
A detailed description (in German) including the entity-relationship model can be found in the following article:
Korbinian GRÜNWALD, Die digitale Erfassung von mittelalterlichen Rechtsgeschäften – Beschreibung der semistrukturierten XML-Datenbank db_for_medieval_legal_transactions [Digital recording of medieval legal transactions – a description of the semi structured XML database db_for_medieval_legal_transactions], in: DHdBlog: Digital Humanities in the German-speaking world (2021).
II) Contents of the database
In the framework of the City and Community project and its precursors, large parts of two corpora of source material on medieval Vienna have been recorded and curated. These are:
- abstracts of collected charters written and edited by Karl Uhlirz in the volumes of the “Sources of the History of the City of Vienna” (Quellen zur Geschichte der Stadt Wien) which are available online at monasterium.net
Status: from the collection’s beginning in 1177 up to and including the year 1412
Karl UHLIRZ (ed.), Verzeichnis der Originalurkunden des Städtischen Archives 1239-1411, Vienna 1898 (Quellen zur Geschichte der Stadt Wien, Abt. 2: Regesten aus dem Archiv der Stadt Wien 1).
- entries from the “Viennese City Books” (Wiener Stadtbücher) edited by Brauneder, Jaritz et al. and converted into XML format using automatic text recognition
Status: Volume 1 (1395-1400)
Wilhelm BRAUNEDER – Gerhard JARITZ (eds.), Die Wiener Stadtbücher 1395-1430. vol. 1, Vienna/Cologne/Graz 1989 (Fontes Rerum Austriacarum 3/10/1).
III) Quality assurance of the database
The database does not contain a collection of data as in a biographical encyclopaedia, but a collection of statements that can be traced back directly to the historical source in which they are made. The advantages of this approach include that
- contradictory statements can be modelled;
- original spellings are preserved;
- efficient quality control options are available.
Despite continuous and thorough curation, errors can still occur, as is the case for any database of comparable size. However, as each statement’s direct traceability back to the source text makes it instantly verifiable, errors can be corrected quickly by editing sources or indices.
Also, as we continue adding new source material, new information will require us to edit existing data. For example, two individuals who were previously recorded separately might eventually be identified to be identical.
To account for this constantly growing knowledge about medieval Vienna’s prosopography, the database is continuously updated.