Manuscript transcriptions

You can select and compare text transcriptions from any of the 113 manuscript witnesses by using the controls in the upper right-hand corner of this screen.

The “add witness” drop-down menu allows you to select and compare up to four manuscripts at any one time.

Under “Settings” you can select your preferred 'Global Viewing Mode':-

“Facsimile” displays transcriptions with a layout and visual style reflecting the original manuscript as closely as possible.

“Edition” displays transcriptions in a more readable style (resembling that of a modern edition).

“Synchronise by word” is a viewing mode in which every collated word becomes a link. Clicking on a word synchronises all open transcriptions to that word.

“DMF” is a mode in which each word becomes a link to the online Dictionnaire du Moyen Français (DMF). Clicking on a word opens a window listing the relevant lemmatised entry or entries on the DMF website.

Under 'Orientation' you can choose between 'Horizontal' and 'Vertical' viewing.

“Browse” and “Collate” are viewing modes.

“Browse” is more suitable for exploring documents generally.

“Collate” is for conducting word-by-word comparisons across manuscripts (collation of witnesses).

Once you have a transcription open, use 'Navigate' (top-right-hand corner, in RED) to navigate through the transcription by either Folio, Manuscript Chapter, or SHF Chapter (click on one of the 3 radio buttons to the left to make your choice).

Clicking on 'Preferences' (top-right-hand corner, in RED) allows you to alter the Display mode for showing transcriptions (again, click on one of the 3 radio buttons to the left to make your choice).

For the casual user we recommend selecting Besançon MS 864 Transcription and Besançon MS 865 Transcription which cover, respectively, Book I and Books II-III of the Chroniques. These have corresponding English translations for selected chapters from Book I, Book II and Book III.

High-resolution images for some of the manuscript witnesses are viewable using the Virtual Vellum external viewer, for which you will need to have pre-installed Java Runtime Environment (JRE) Version 1.5 or above. The Java Runtime download is free and can be obtained from [1]. Where an English translation of a chapter is available (e.g. Besançon BM, ms. 865, f. 201r) you can read it alongside the facsimile and transcription by clicking on the third icon from the bottom on the left-hand icon bar: the white 'book' icon opens the translation; the yellow 'scroll' icon opens the transcription.