Watermark recording conventions

[Virginia Tech]

Hello all,

The recent spate of postings to this list has prompted me to get my own
posting finished and out.  Those of you who attended last October's conference
may remember an evening meeting during which possibility of creating standards
for the encoding of watermark and paper information into digital form was
discussed.  At that time, I argued strongly for the adoption of SGML,
specifically that flavor described by the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI)
guidelines.  I also mentioned the possibility that the TEI might form a
working group whose task would include developing a tagset specifically for
paper and watermarks.

Well, that group is in the process of forming.  At present it includes David
Vander Meulen and David Seaman from Virginia, and Martin Butler from Leeds,
with one more European member still wanting.  I have been asked to head the
group.  The group's charge calls for the creation of a set of SGML tags
specifically for the encoding of descriptive and analytical data surrounding
the physical book.  This will include not only paper and watermarks but also
typography, presswork, composition, and related subjects.

I'll be attending the annual meeting of the TEI steering committee this
weekend in Kingston, ONT., and one of the things I'd like to report is the
cooperation of this list in developing the watermark and paper tags.  We need
to put establish what gets tagged, the relationship of an individual component
to the whole, and a vocabulary for identifying the myriad watermark images.

I have the list of those who expressed interest in this project last October,
but most of the names do not include e-mail addresses.  Anyone interested in
working to establish standards for the digital recording and exchange of
watermark and paper data are most welcome to contact me.  I'll also post a
brief report on this weekend's TEI meeting.

Dave Gants

-- 
David L. Gants *** Department of English *** Park Hall
 University of Georgia *** Athens, GA *** 30602-6205
     dgants@english.uga.edu *** (706) 542-1261