Link to Facsimiles from Semi-Diplomatic Transcriptions

Rationale

While LEMDO does not intend to exactly recreate mise-en-page of early modern playbooks in our semi-diplomatic transcriptions, we do intend to provide access to digital surrogates for most of our editions. This allows a more accurate look at the original mise-en-page than is possible through an online transcription.
Typically, we store facsimiles on a LEMDO server and link to individual facsimile images from each corresponding <pb> element in our semi-diplomatic transcriptions. In some rare cases, we are not able to add facsimiles to our server, but we can link to an external source. In those cases, we link to a full external source using the <facsimile> element. This documentation will explain both practices.

Practice: Link to Facsimile Images

Semi-diplomatic transcriptions in LEMDO are meant to be transcriptions of a single copy of a publication. You may link to each page of that witness from the <pb> element using the @facs attribute.
The <pb> element goes at the beginning of each new page of transcribed text. Add the @facs attribute.
Note that you may also have an @n attribute on the <pb> element. See Encode Page Beginnings for more information about how to encode the values of the @n attribute and consult your anthology lead about your anthology’s practice. You will often encode @n and @facs attributes at the same time. (The order of attributes does not matter, but it is good practice to be consistent throughout your anthology. LEMDO recommends putting the @n attribute first.)
Construct the value of the @facs attribute as follows:
The "facs:" prefix
The unique part of the xml:id of the metadata file (i.e., everything after facs_ in the name of the file in the lemdo/data/facsimiles folder) (eg., H5_Q1_Y)
A pipe character |
The unique component of the surface xml:id, normally a three-digit number beginning with zero (e.g., 004)
For example, the metadata for our digital surrogates of the Beinecke copy of Henry V Q1 is captured in lemdo/data/facsimiles/facs_H5_Q1_Y.xml. The .jpg image of the title page is described thus:
<surface xml:id="facs_H5_Q1_Y_004" n="1">
  <graphic url="sourcefacs:H5_Q1_Y/H5_Q1_Y_004.jpg" mimeType="image/jpeg"/>
</surface>
The unique part of the surface ID is 004. In the transcription of this copy of the quarto, the @facs attribute on the <pb> element gets the value "facs:H5_Q1_Y|004".
<pb n="A1r" facs="facs:H5_Q1_Y|004"/>
There are three common issues when linking to facsimiles from semi-diplomatic transcriptions. This list outlines what these issues are and what to check to prevent them:
Facsimile links are formatted incorrectly. To fix this issue, check your links to ensure that they all follow the format outlined above and that there are no spelling errors in your @facs value.
The target surface does not exist in the facsimile file. To fix this issue, check that the unique part of the surface xml:id in your facs link matches with an existing facsimile file (e.g., if your @facs value is "facs:H5_Q1_Y|004", check that there is a facsimile image in facs_H5_Q1_Y.xml with the unique component 004).
The target surface element does not contain a graphic element pointing to an image. To fix this issue, navigate to the XML file associated with the facsimile that you are pointing to and check if the <surface> element that you are pointing to has a child <graphic> element with a @url attribute.

Special Case: Link to External Online Facsimiles

In some cases, you will not be able to download facsimile images and save them in the LEMDO content-management system, but you will want to point to an online facsimile hosted elsewhere. If you wish to link to an external online facsimile, add a <facsimile> element after the <teiHeader> and before the <text> element. Give the <facsimile> element a @url attribute with a value of the URL to an existing online facsimile.
<facsimile>
  <graphic url="https://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Add_MS_34063"/>
</facsimile>

Prosopography

Janelle Jenstad

Janelle Jenstad is a Professor of English at the University of Victoria, Director of The Map of Early Modern London, and Director of Linked Early Modern Drama Online. With Jennifer Roberts-Smith and Mark Beatrice Kaethler, she co-edited Shakespeare’s Language in Digital Media: Old Words, New Tools (Routledge). She has edited John Stow’s A Survey of London (1598 text) for MoEML and is currently editing The Merchant of Venice (with Stephen Wittek) and Heywood’s 2 If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody for DRE. Her articles have appeared in Digital Humanities Quarterly, Elizabethan Theatre, Early Modern Literary Studies, Shakespeare Bulletin, Renaissance and Reformation, and The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies. She contributed chapters to Approaches to Teaching Othello (MLA); Teaching Early Modern Literature from the Archives (MLA); Institutional Culture in Early Modern England (Brill); Shakespeare, Language, and the Stage (Arden); Performing Maternity in Early Modern England (Ashgate); New Directions in the Geohumanities (Routledge); Early Modern Studies and the Digital Turn (Iter); Placing Names: Enriching and Integrating Gazetteers (Indiana); Making Things and Drawing Boundaries (Minnesota); Rethinking Shakespeare Source Study: Audiences, Authors, and Digital Technologies (Routledge); and Civic Performance: Pageantry and Entertainments in Early Modern London (Routledge). For more details, see janellejenstad.com.

Joey Takeda

Joey Takeda is LEMDO’s Consulting Programmer and Designer, a role he assumed in 2020 after three years as the Lead Developer on LEMDO.

Laura Estill

Laura Estill is a Canada Research Chair in Digital Humanities and Associate Professor of English at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, Canada, where she directs the digital humanities centre. Her monograph (Dramatic Extracts in Seventeenth-Century English Manuscripts: Watching, Reading, Changing Plays, 2015) and co-edited collections (Early Modern Studies after the Digital Turn, 2016 and Early British Drama in Manuscript, 2019) explore the reception history of drama by Shakespeare and his contemporaries from their initial circulation in print, manuscript, and on stage to how we mediate and understand these texts and performances online today. Her work has appeared in journals including Shakespeare Quarterly, Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, Digital Humanities Quarterly, Humanities, and The Seventeenth Century, as well as in collections such as Shakespeare’s Theatrical Documents, Shakespeare and Textual Studies, and The Shakespeare User. She is co-editor of Early Modern Digital Review.

Mahayla Galliford

Project manager, 2025-present; research assistant, 2021-present. Mahayla Galliford (she/her) graduated with a BA (Hons with distinction) from the University of Victoria in 2024. Mahayla’s undergraduate research explored early modern stage directions and civic water pageantry. Mahayla continues her studies through UVic’s English MA program and her SSHRC-funded thesis project focuses on editing and encoding girls’ manuscripts, specifically Lady Rachel Fane’s dramatic entertainments, in collaboration with LEMDO.

Martin Holmes

Martin Holmes has worked as a developer in the UVic’s Humanities Computing and Media Centre for over two decades, and has been involved with dozens of Digital Humanities projects. He has served on the TEI Technical Council and as Managing Editor of the Journal of the TEI. He took over from Joey Takeda as lead developer on LEMDO in 2020. He is a collaborator on the SSHRC Partnership Grant led by Janelle Jenstad.

Navarra Houldin

Training and Documentation Lead 2025–present. LEMDO project manager 2022–2025. Textual remediator 2021–present. Navarra Houldin (they/them) completed their BA with a major in history and minor in Spanish at the University of Victoria in 2022. Their primary research was on gender and sexuality in early modern Europe and Latin America. They are continuing their education through an MA program in Gender and Social Justice Studies at the University of Alberta where they will specialize in Digital Humanities.

Tracey El Hajj

Junior Programmer 2019–2020. Research Associate 2020–2021. Tracey received her PhD from the Department of English at the University of Victoria in the field of Science and Technology Studies. Her research focuses on the algorhythmics of networked communications. She was a 2019–2020 President’s Fellow in Research-Enriched Teaching at UVic, where she taught an advanced course on Artificial Intelligence and Everyday Life. Tracey was also a member of the Map of Early Modern London team, between 2018 and 2021. Between 2020 and 2021, she was a fellow in residence at the Praxis Studio for Comparative Media Studies, where she investigated the relationships between artificial intelligence, creativity, health, and justice. As of July 2021, Tracey has moved into the alt-ac world for a term position, while also teaching in the English Department at the University of Victoria.

Orgography

LEMDO Team (LEMD1)

The LEMDO Team is based at the University of Victoria and normally comprises the project director, the lead developer, project manager, junior developers(s), remediators, encoders, and remediating editors.

Metadata