The Third Way: Philology and Critical Edition in the Digital Age

Abstract

In 2006, as I prepared to begin my doctorate, I met with my supervisor-to-be to discuss prospective research topics. It became clear during the meeting that he already had a project in mind: I would produce a critical edition of the Armenianlanguage Chronicle of Matthew of Edessa, and it would be a digital critical edition. Some time later, at the celebration that followed my viva examination, my supervisor cheerfully admitted that he had not had the least idea what a “digital critical edition” might be when he had set me on the path to making one. He simply trusted that I, as a software engineer turned humanist, would figure something out along the way. The fact that I now write this suggests that I did produce something that was accepted by my supervisor and examiners as a digital critical edition. So where is it? What does it look like? And if, as recently as that, a lone doctoral student had to work out for herself what a digital critical edition should be, does it not go some way toward explaining why there are so few of them about?