Not just Google. On the Quality of Medieval Research on the Web

The availability of data on the web is fundamentally changing the conditions of research on manuscripts and medieval texts. As databases, corpora, and depositories of images multiply, we are developing a digital philology. In this context, the virtual nature of results becomes acceptable, and even risks being considered a virtue. Additionally, and above all, we are increasingly feeling the need for authorities that are capable of validating virtual data and of guiding our retrieval of data from the vast sea of information available on the web. Starting from a few experiences with databases pertaining to texts and both Latin and Romance language manuscripts, this talk presents a project that aims to enable the simultaneous consultation of a network of archives dedicated to medieval manuscripts.