Computer Identification of Medieval Scribal Handwriting

FAIN: RZ-50034-03

University of Maine, Orono (Orono, ME 04473-1513)
Linne R. Mooney (Project Director: August 2002 to March 2005)

The development of web-accessible computer software designed to assist scholars of medieval English in identifying scribal handwriting and a book-length study on English scribes from 1375 to 1525 that makes use of the software. (24 months)

Collaboration of an expert on late medieval English handwriting and an internationally recognized expert on computer pattern recognition algorithms to discover means for computers to assist scholars in identifying multiple manuscripts written by individual late medieval English scribes, and thereby to learn more about the dissemination of ideas on the eve of the invention of printing.