Dr. Alexandra Trachsel (King’s College London/University of Hamburg), Presenting Fragments as Quotations or Quotations as Fragments
Tuesday, 19 February 2013
17:00-18:30
TOPOI-Haus Dahlem, Hittorfstr. 18, 14195 Berlin (map)

When dealing with the fragments of Demetrios’ work, we are facing texts which are only transmitted through indirect transmission. This means that we have to rely on quotations made by ancient authors to get access to his work. Unfortunately we do not have kept the different steps of this initial selection-process and cannot measure the difference between the original lost work and the form ancient authors gave those quoted passages when introducing them into their own works. Likewise, the modern editors, when trying to extract the passages out of the source-texts in order to compose their collections of fragments, base their choices on selective principles which depend on their own understanding of the source-texts. They choices may therefore differ widely and provide competing reconstructions of the lost work.

Both selection-processes, ancient and modern, should therefore be taken into account when dealing with the fragments, as the perception of Demetrios as a scholar and the opinions about his achievement varied substantially over time.

Also when focusing on the content of the fragments, two approaches are possible, depending again on the opinion one has about Demetrios’ work and its aims. On the one hand, the geographical aspect can be highlighted and the fragments should then be linked to a map enabling us to understand the geographical frame of Demetrios’ work. On the other hand, Demetrios’ work is also a commentary on the Homeric text and this would suggest to link the preserved comments from Demetrios to th

By Gregory R. Crane (Perseus Digital Library):

We are preparing for a new set of texts to be entered by the data entry firm with which we work (http://www.digitaldividedata.org/). The next order will be sent in mid December but a more substantial order will be placed early in 2013.

What would you like to see added to the Perseus Digital Library, both for use within the Perseus site and for download as TEI XML under a Creative Commons license? Note that we only enter materials that are in the public domain and that can be freely redistributed for re-use by others.

Some possibilities — but please suggest other things that you find important!

* Scholia of Greek and Latin authors.

* Collections of fragmentary authors

* Sources from later antiquity (esp. Christian sources)

* More English translations

Please think about (1) individual authors and texts and (2) what you would want to see if we could do something big.

If you have individual suggestions, please write gcrane2008@gmail.com. A public discussion via the Digital Classicist would probably be the best.

Let us know what you want!

Collecting fragments in the 21st century – LECTIO › Laboratory for Critical Text Editing
May 14, 2012

In recent years the attitude of scholars towards Greek and Roman authors transmitted in fragmentary form has changed. The optimism of earlier generations that one may be able to reconstruct their works by collecting and combining their ‘remains’ and, if possible, by supplementing these ‘remains’ by means of ‘Quellenforschung’ has given way to a more realistic awareness of our limits.

Building on the fundamental contributions by Brunt, Most, Lenfant, Schepens and others, a series of workshops will address various questions raised by fragmentary prose writers such as: What is a fragment? To what extent are we able to establish its degree of authenticity? To what extent is a reconstruction of a lost work possible? What role can ‘Quellenforschung’ play today? Why should we (not) collect fragments? How should a collection of fragments be organized? Are there fundamental differences between fragments of works that belong to different genres (historiography, oratory, philosophy etc.), and how are they (to be) reflected in the various collections of fragments? What is to be expected of the commentary?

Program

• Monica Berti (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata/Tufts University), Collecting quotations by topic: degrees of preservation and transtextual relations among genres
• Dominique Lenfant (Université de Strasbourg), The study of intermediate authors and its role in the interpretation of historical fragments
• Charlotte Roueché (King’s College London), Examining relationships: understanding and expressing citations
• Moderator: Stefan Schorn (KU Leuven)

Giovedì 13 Ottobre 2011, ore 15 
Università degli Studi di Genova – Facoltà di Lettere
Biblioteca della Sezione Darficlet del DAFIST (via Balbi 4, III piano)

La Prof.ssa EDITH PARMENTIER (Université d’Angers) presenterà il volume
Ex Fragmentis / Per Fragmenta Historiam Tradere. Atti della II Giornata di studio sulla storiografia greca frammentaria (Genova, 8 ottobre 2009), a cura di F. Gazzano – G. Ottone – L. Santi Amantini, Tivoli, Edizioni Tored, 2011

Seguirà il Workshop
Esperienze e prospettive di ricerca sulla storiografia greca frammentaria in Europa (vd. programma)

Interverranno
Prof. Stefan Schorn (Katholieke Universiteit – Leuven): Fragmente der griechischen Historiker Continued: Konzepte und Probleme
Prof. Francisco J. González Ponce (Universidad de Sevilla): Los periplógrafos griegos: un proyecto en marcha
Prof. Antonio L. Chávez Reino (Universidad de Sevilla): La tradición bibliográfica y el estudio de la historiografía antigua: Historiarum Reliquiae y Bibliotheca Classica Nova

Presiederanno i lavori
Prof. Franco Montanari (Università di Genova)
Prof. Guido Schepens (Katholieke Universiteit – Leuven)

Here is demo.fragmentarytexts.org, which is a site complementary to Fragmentary Texts and whose aim is to test tools and devise methods for representing fragments of lost authors and works.