Encode Split Elements

Rationale

Because of the hierarchical organization of elements, it is sometimes impossible to capture fragmented parts of a text within a single element. Thus, we need a way to connect these parts even when they are wrapped in separate elements. The linking attributes @next and @prev attributes are one way to point to discontinuous segments. Combined with the @xml:id attribute, they can be used to connect parts of the text that are separated because of the need to maintain the hierarchy of TEI elements.

Practice: Encode Split Elements

You will most commonly use the @next and @prev attributes to connect quotations that span multiple lines and letters that are interrupted by dialogue, but they are not limited to these usages.
When adding the @next and @prev attributes to a series of elements, you must give each element a value on the @xml:id attribute that is unique to the file it is in. The @xml:id value for each element includes the prefix "emd", which stands for “early modern drama”; the abbreviation of the play; the name of the element that the @xml:id attribute is on; and a number unique to the file, all connected by underscores. By making each element in a series unique, we can assign them a place in the sequence in relation to the other unique elements.
After assigning @xml:id values to each element in the series of fragments you want to connect, add the @next and @prev attributes to the elements. We use the @next attribute to indicate, by assigning it a unique number, which element follows the one that the @next attribute is on. Similarly, the @prev attribute includes the unique number of the preceding line to indicate which element comes before the one that the @prev attribute is on.
Note that the first fragment in the sequence that you assign a @next attribute to will not have a @prev attribute because there is no previous fragment in the series to point to. Likewise, the last fragment in the series will have no @next attribute. All fragments between the first and last must have both the @next and @prev attributes.
See also Chapter 16: Linking, Segmentation, and Alignment in the TEI Guidelines.

Common Split Elements

This is a list of elements which most commonly need the @next and @prev attributes, with some scenarios in which they will be required:
<lg> : In modernized texts, a character may interrupt a song or verse letter with prose. We want to indicate that the separate lines of the song are part of a larger whole of the song, so we must link the <lg> elements with @next and @prev.
<p> : Similarly, a character in a modernized text may interrupt their reading of a prose letter, and we want to indicate that the lines of the letter are part of a larger whole.
<q> and <quote> : In modernized texts, characters’ quotations may span multiple lines, although quotation elements cannot, so we need to link the separate quotation elements together.
See also Encode Letters and Songs in Modernized Texts to learn how to encode fragmented sequences in letters and songs.

Special Case: Split Lines

Although split lines are also cases of fragmented pieces of the text being linked together through encoding, we do not use @next and @prev to link split lines. Since split lines are so common, we developed a unique encoding practice for them.
For split lines, we add the @part attribute and one of three values, "I", "M", or "F", to the <l> element wrapping the split line. The "I", "M", and "F" values stand for initial, medial, and final respectively and indicate the line’s position in the sequence of split lines:
<div>
<!-- ... -->

  <sp who="#emdAYL_M_DukeFrederick"><!-- ... -->
    <l part="I">And get you from our court.</l>
  </sp>
  <sp who="#emdAYL_M_Rosalind">
    <speaker>Rosalind</speaker>
    <l part="M">Me, uncle?</l>
  </sp>
  <sp who="#emdAYL_M_DukeFrederick">
    <speaker>Duke Frederick</speaker>
    <l part="F">You, cousin.</l>
  </sp>
  <!-- ... -->
</div>

Quotations Spanning Multiple Lines

Sometimes a character’s quotation spans more than one line of verse, however, the hierarchical structure of XML means that quotation elements cannot span multiple <l> elements. In this case, you must use the @next and @prev attributes to connect the fragments of the quotation:
<lg>
<!-- ... -->

  <l>
    <q xml:id="emd2H4_M_q_16" next="#emd2H4_M_q_17">Happy am I that have a man so bold</q>
  </l>
  <l>
    <q xml:id="emd2H4_M_q_17" prev="#emd2H4_M_q_16" next="#emd2H4_M_q_18">That dares do justice on my proper son</q>
  </l>
  <l>
    <q xml:id="emd2H4_M_q_18" prev="#emd2H4_M_q_17" next="#emd2H4_M_q_19">And no less happy having such a son</q>
  </l>
  <l>
    <q xml:id="emd2H4_M_q_19" prev="#emd2H4_M_q_18" next="#emd2H4_M_q_20">That would deliver up his greatness so</q>
  </l>
  <l>
    <q xml:id="emd2H4_M_q_20" prev="#emd2H4_M_q_19">Into the hands of justice.</q> You did commit me,</l>
  <!-- ... -->
</lg>
<lg>
<!-- ... -->

  <l>
    <quote>Poor deer</quote>, quoth he, <quote xml:id="emdAYL_M_quote_3" next="#emdAYL_M_quote_4">thou mak’st a testament</quote>
  </l>
  <l>
    <quote xml:id="emdAYL_M_quote_4" prev="#emdAYL_M_quote_3" next="#emdAYL_M_quote_5">As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more</quote>
  </l>
  <l>
    <quote xml:id="emdAYL_M_quote_5" prev="#emdAYL_M_quote_4">To that which had too much</quote>. Then, being there alone,</l>
  <!-- ... -->
</lg>

Prosopography

Isabella Seales

Isabella Seales is a fourth year undergraduate completing her Bachelor of Arts in English at the University of Victoria. She has a special interest in Renaissance and Metaphysical Literature. She is assisting Dr. Jenstad with the MoEML Mayoral Shows anthology as part of the Undergraduate Student Research Award program.

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 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.

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.

Nicole Vatcher

Technical Documentation Writer, 2020–2022. Nicole Vatcher completed her BA (Hons.) in English at the University of Victoria in 2021. Her primary research focus was women’s writing in the modernist period.

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

Authority title Encode Split Elements
Type of text Documentation
Publisher University of Victoria on the Linked Early Modern Drama Online Platform
Series Linked Early Modern Drama Online
Source
TEI Customization created by Martin Holmes, Joey Takeda, and Janelle Jenstad; documentation written by members of the LEMDO Team
Editorial declaration n/a
Edition Released with Linked Early Modern Drama Online 1.0
Encoding description Encoded in TEI P5 according to the LEMDO Customization and Encoding Guidelines
Document status prgGenerated
Funder(s) Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
License/availability
This file is licensed under a CC BY-NC_ND 4.0 license, which means that it is freely downloadable without permission under the following conditions: (1) credit must be given to the author and LEMDO in any subsequent use of the files and/or data; (2) the content cannot be adapted or repurposed (except in quotations for the purposes of academic review and citation); and (3) commercial uses are not permitted without the knowledge and consent of the editor and LEMDO. This license allows for pedagogical use of the documentation in the classroom.