>> Also, the situation varies from one sub-field to
>> another --- I believe,
>> for reasons stated in my second paragraph; in Greek
>> and Latin, most
>> "daring" digital work is done in "marginal" fields,
>> such as Neo-Latin,
>> medieval Latin, Biblical studies, papyrology.
>
>This is a good observation, and I wonder if there is a single
>explanation for this? One reason might be that a lot
>of work has
>already been done on the canonical classical texts
Another reason could be that in many of those fields (papyrology, epygraphy, and often also medieval and Neo-Latin) the traditions of the texts are 'monotestimonial', so one does not publish a 'text' out of many witnesses (using real 'philological' methods), but a 'document', by describing it.
This is the case when one publishes a papyrirus, an epigraphical document, a middle-age autograph (like the Zibaldone Laurenziano by Boccaccio, upon which there is an important project going on in Rome) etc.
And this way we do not face the core of textual philology: it is, as Elisabetta (a textual philologist!) correctly points out, more the work of a diplomatist (or epigraphist etc.) than of a philologist.
For a longer (too long?) discussion on the general topic, see my other post... this is an on-the-fly reply!
Best,
Paolo
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