2. Ela Majocha Toby Burrows ARC Network for Early European Research University of Western Australia Building e-Research infrastructures for Collaboration in Humanities Research Networks

3. Activities  Collaborative Grant Programs  Symposia  International conferences  Co-sponsored events  Postgraduate/ECR  Digital agenda

4. NEER’s Digital Strategy “The full use of innovative digital technologies, both to facilitate and promote communication between researchers and to develop and provide shared research resources.” (ARC Research Network application, 2004)

5. Digital Initiatives: Digital Initiatives: Shared resources  Commercial databases: ProQuest (EEBO), Brepols (5 databases)  Skills and training: Brepols internships  Electronic publication: Parergon / Project Muse  Heritage collections: Europa Inventa  Research repository: PioNEER

6. PioNEER  NEER’s digital repository of research outputs  Representative and retrospective  Beyond “publications” – other types of outputs and data  Links to institutional repositories  Self-archiving + central deposit

7. PioNEER  DigiTool software  Hosted by UWA Library  Available later in 2007

8. Digital Initiatives: Digital Initiatives: Communication  Web site, newsletters  e-mail lists  Collaborative working tools and workspaces: Confluence

9. NEER Confluence  Web-based collaborative software  Commercial Wiki product (Atlassian)  Communication, discussion, annotation, collaborative writing  News and blogs  Personal spaces & group spaces  Searchable

10. Further information NEER Web site http://www.neer.arts.uwa.edu.au/ Confluence http://confluence.arts.uwa.edu.au/http://confluence.arts.uwa.edu.au/ Ela Majocha elzbieta.majocha@uwa.edu.auelzbieta.majocha@uwa.edu.au Toby Burrowstburrows@library.uwa.edu.autburrows@library.uwa.edu.au

11. Europa Inventa  Envisaged in the original NEER application to the ARC  A gateway to all Early European items in Australian collections  Main focus would be on unique items and those with specific associations  Link from descriptive catalogue records to digitized images held on the servers of the holding institutions, rather than storing copies of images centrally  The possibility of commissioning some digitization work in these institutions was also envisaged

12. Some basic questions  How many Early European manuscripts, artworks, etc. are there in Australian collections?  Where are they held?  Where are they listed and described?  Have they been digitized?  Have they been studied?  What has been written about them?

13. Some (preliminary) answers  How many? 250 manuscripts in Sinclair catalogue, 200 paintings in NGV and 300 in NLA. Thousands of items overall.  Where? All types of cultural institutions: galleries, museums, libraries; large and small.  Listings? Library catalogues, gallery & museum databases, printed catalogues (Sinclair, Manion & Vines)  Digitized? Some, but proportion unknown.  Studied and written about? Yes, but scattered.

14. Functional desiderata  Browse by subject, name, type of object, holding institution, place of origin (and by combinations of these characteristics)  Search the database and browse the results using various facets  Link to more detailed descriptions  Link to works about the objects  Link to digitized versions  Add information about the objects

15. Processes for building  Import catalogue records from libraries, galleries, museums, archives  Normalize these records into a consistent structure  Apply a consistent “names and concepts” framework  Make the database available for searching and browsing  Make the database available for annotation by researchers  Augment and enrich the records with links to more detailed descriptions and to secondary works

16. Scope of the service  Which forms of material should be included?  Focus initially is on unique objects (especially artworks, manuscripts)  Could expand later to cover incunabula, early printed books, early printed maps, prints and engravings  What date range should be covered?  The initial cut-off date is 1800  Could expand later to cover 1801-1850  Any limits on the geographical origin of material?  Focus on material relating to or produced in Western Europe

17. Current status  Record formats and standards: CDWA Lite for artworks, MODS for textual materials  Artworks database has been set up  Gathering records from gallery/museum/library catalogues (in a variety of formats)  About to set up database for manuscripts and texts (collaboration with IVRLA)

18. Next steps  Export records in XML  Load to software environment based on MuseumFinland  Develop and apply ontologies for describing Early European objects, concepts, places and events  Establish framework for contributors to annotate and expand  “People of Early Europe” service?  A service for Europe?