From Networks of Texts to Networks of Topics?

On the Classification of (Texts in) Compilations with a View towards Manuscript Transmission

Abstract

As medieval manuscripts often consist of more than one text, the application of network analysis can show textual connections between codices and therefore shed light on the circulation of texts, of manuscripts, and thus of knowledge. But a text-based analysis often faces difficulties that result from insufficient manuscript descriptions and lacking normalization of work titles. A broader view that would compare not particular texts, but rather genres, areas of interest or fields of knowledge may on the one hand help circumvent these problems, but has to deal, on the other hand, with problems regarding classification. Instead of finding connections between subjectively classified texts, one can make use of topic modeling as a method to computationally classify and hence characterize miscellany manuscripts. On the basis of automatically detected topics, topic-based networks can be generated which help to further investigate the connections between the codices of a specific corpus and to develop a better understanding for the copying and transmission of premodern manuscripts.