About the Edition

Project team

This website is the outcome of a project funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC), Scribal autonomy in multi-scribe manuscripts: digital visualisations through the Chronicle of Melrose Abbey (Early Career Research, Development & Engagement Fellowship, Grant ref. AH/W010216/1) which ran from 1 January 2023 – 31 August 2026.

Project team

• PI: Dr Jo Tucker, University of Glasgow
• Project Research Systems Developer: Dr Luca Guariento, University of Glasgow
• Research Assistant: Dr Vivien Williams, University of Glasgow
• Editorial advisor: Prof. Dauvit Broun, University of Glasgow
• Editorial advisor: Dr John Reuben Davies, University of Glasgow
• Project coordinator: Shannon Llewellyn, University of Glasgow
• Project coordinator: Dr Rachel Macdonald, University of Glasgow
• Mentor to the PI: Dr Alison Wiggins, University of Glasgow

These are the roles of the project team according to the CRediT framework (a ‘high-level taxonomy, including 14 roles, that can be used to represent the roles typically played by contributors to research outputs’). See also the Breakdown of the editorial process for the digital edition:

• Jo Tucker was responsible for the project’s conceptualisation, the methodology and formal analysis of the text and images of the Chronicle, and the writing and review of the original documentation. She was also responsible for the funding acquisition and project administration (with continuous support from the project coordinators), and the supervision and mentorship of the Research assistant.
• Luca Guariento was primarily responsible for the data curation, software design and implementation, and the methodology and visualisation required for the digital edition. He also contributed to the supervision and mentorship of the Research assistant.
• Vivien Williams was responsible for the formal analysis and investigation of the text, in particular through the TEI-XML mark-up and decisions surrounding its implementation (supported by Guariento and Tucker).
• Dauvit Broun and John Reuben Davies each produced portions of the transcription and translation, and were therefore responsible for its investigation, formal analysis, and writing original materials.
• Shannon Llewellyn supported the funding acquisition and project administration.
• Rachel Macdonald supported the project administration.
• Alison Wiggins read various drafts of the application and other materials, meaning she contributed to the funding acquisition and project conceptualisation. She also acted as mentor to the PI.
• The University of Glasgow’s College of Arts & Humanities was responsible for supplying resources, including the provision of computing resources.

Introduction: what is the digital edition’s aim?

The primary aim of the digital edition is to draw attention to the multi-scribe nature of the Chronicle’s text.

Why does its multi-scribe nature matter?

First, chronicles like Melrose’s have often been read as single ‘texts’ which reflect an ‘official’ institutional viewpoint. The scribal activity in the Chronicle of Melrose problematises that characterisation. It suggests the text should not be read simply as one single ‘work’.

Second, this in turn can tell us about ‘scribal autonomy’ – how far those who created and ‘grew’ the manuscript were responding to the Chronicle in a creative and individual way. Such personal individuality is not typically associated with monastic chronicles or the monastic way of life generally. Through the digital edition, the Chronicle’s piecemeal growth can be visualised and the agency of the scribes further investigated. It might be that other similar texts were also originally multi-scribe projects where the compilation happened in stages: the Chronicle of Melrose offers a rare illustration of how this might happen in practice.

Third, all of this throws into question the extent to which the Chronicle was ‘controlled’ or ‘restricted’ by a central authority in the abbey. It is tempting to assume that the abbot had the final say on what was permitted to be included, and therefore we can confidently read the contents as an ‘official’ account. There likely was, of course, some level of oversight. However, the multi-scribe activity in the surviving manuscripts suggests a looser attitude may have been taken to its contents, especially over time as it began to expand. This in turn opens out questions and assumptions about other kinds of seemingly ‘official’ manuscripts (such as monastic cartularies).

Fourth, for anyone with an interest in Melrose Abbey itself, the Chronicle’s piecemeal growth provides a source for the shifting interests, perspectives and horizons of those at the abbey across the course of the 12^th and 13^th centuries. For example, it is possible to track developments in ‘national’ identity through the Chronicle, just at the period when the idea of the kingdom of the Scots was expanding and consolidating (see Dauvit Broun, ‘Becoming Scottish in the thirteenth century: the evidence of the Chronicle of Melrose’, in West over Sea: Studies in Scandinavian Sea-Borne Expansion and Settlement Before 1300, ed. Beverley Ballin Smith, Simon Taylor and Gareth Williams (Leiden, 2007), pp. 19–32 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/ej.9789004158931.i-614.12).

Fifth, when viewed at the level of individual scribal profiles, the Chronicle is a rich source for developments in handwriting across the central middle ages (especially writing styles associated with books). In order to access this information, however, each profile needs to be distinguished and its contribution dated as closely as possible.

How does the digital edition draw attention to the scribes?

The digital edition foregrounds the multi-scribe aspect in two main ways: 1) by integrating digital images side-by-side with the edited text and translation, and 2) by annotating the different scribal profiles on the text and also images. This means users can more easily see and read each scribe’s contribution in its own individual manuscript context (as far as possible in a browser).

More fundamentally, it could be said to offer a ‘scribe-centred’ reading of the text. This contrasts with reading the text primarily through the prism of its content or yearly structure. The edition encourages an understanding of the text as something non-static that grew through the work of multiple hands across a long period. To enable this, the images of the scribes’ work are treated not as supplementary information but as a central route of access into the text. The images are as important as the transcription or translation.

How does the digital edition maximise its accessibility?

As an Open Access web resource, the digital edition allows a wide audience to see and read the Chronicle. Anyone with access to a browser can undertake their own investigations of the scribal contributions to the text and provide accessible citations to them. In turn, this enables the sharing of work with a broad audience. It also affords greater opportunities for the ‘verification’ of the research results (e.g., in relation to the identification of scribal profiles, or the dating of a particular contribution).

The digital edition makes use of current standards in order to maximise the reuse and sustainability of the materials: the images are based on the International Image Interoperability Framework, and the text is marked-up using the Text Encoding Initiative.

Read more about the Sustainability of the digital edition .

Other editions of the Chronicle of Melrose

The Chronicle of Melrose has been the subject of much previous editorial work, summarised below in chronological order (for a fuller discussion of this editorial history, see Broun, The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, chapter 3).

[Fulman, William] (ed.), Rerum Anglicarum Scriptorum Veterum , i (Oxford, 1684). Available online: https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_iAA-oERWO5AC/page/133/mode/2up

This is a print edition of a manuscript which was a copy of Faustina B. IX. The manuscript copy is Oxford, Corpus Christi College MS 208, ff. 1–66. It was compiled by a professional copyist in the mid-17^th century. The professional copyist (Raph Jennyngs) and editor (William Fulman) made decisions which have caused confusions about the text (see Broun, The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, p. 32).

Joseph Stevenson (ed.), Chronica de Mailros, e codice unico in Bibliotheca Cottoniana servato , (Edinburgh, 1835). Available online: https://archive.org/details/chronicademailro00bann/mode/2up

This edition for the Bannatyne Club is typical of its era. It is an original piece of work which presents a ‘clean’ text with a few footnotes and not much detail on the scribes or codicology. It is based on Faustina B. IX only. Stevenson (p. xv) noticed that Julius B. XIII, ff.41–47 was the same scribe as in the opening of Faustina B. IX, but he did not consider it part of the Chronicle of Melrose.

Joseph Stevenson (trans.), ‘Chronicle of Melrose’, in The Church Historians of England , iv, part i (London, 1856), pp. 79–241; annals for AD 1136–1270 reprinted as A Mediaeval Chronicle of Scotland: The Chronicle of Melrose (Lampeter, 1991). Available online: https://archive.org/details/thechurchhistor104fiskuoft/mode/2up

A translation by Stevenson of his 1835 edition.

Alan Orr Anderson and Marjorie Ogilvie Anderson (facs. eds), with an index by William Croft Dickinson, The Chronicle of Melrose from the Cottonian Manuscript, Faustina B. IX in the British Museum (London, 1936).

An important work comprising black and white ‘collotype’ images of Faustina B. IX, plus a detailed introductory discussion by the Andersons (including analysis of the ‘hands’) and an extensive ‘index’ of its contents by Croft Dickinson. There is no edited text as such: it is a ‘facsimile edition’.

Dauvit Broun, Julian Harrison and John Reuben Davies (eds), The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey: A Stratigraphic Edition, 3 vols (vol. 1 Woodbridge 2007).

A new study with fresh analysis of the codicology (following the disbinding of the manuscripts in 2005), the scribes (including a new numbering system), the history of the manuscript itself (including its afterlife beyond Melrose Abbey), and the text (with a new approach to editing the text as a series of ‘strata’ in the order in which they were added to the manuscript). New digital images were also provided on an accompanying DVD. Volume 1 was published in 2007 by Broun and Harrison, setting out the framework for the stratigraphic edition. Volumes 2 and 3 were set to publish the text of the strata (both Latin transcription and English translation). The text had largely been prepared: volume 2 by Dauvit Broun, volume 3 by John Reuben Davies. However, it was decided (in consultation with Broun and Davies during 2021) to instead create a digital edition, based on the draft texts of the two volumes and with a new approach to the manuscript’s growth. This would take advantage of the digital context to present the text, including integrating digital images in an innovative way. Volume 1 still acts as an essential guide to the manuscript. The digital edition will not present the text as ‘strata’ but instead in the order it appears in the manuscript to better complement the accompanying digital images.

Breakdown of the editorial process

The digital edition has been produced collaboratively across a significant period of time, beginning in the early 2000s with the drafting of text intended for the ‘stratigraphic edition’ (as conceptualised in Broun and Harrison, The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, 2007). After a pause in activities, a change of direction was decided in 2021 towards a digital edition. The project’s work began in 2023, and concluded in 2026 (including an unforeseen hiatus due to the cyber-attack on the British Library in October 2023). The digital edition was published online in 2025.

Because of the edition’s collaborative and multi-layered nature, it was felt necessary to provide some transparency about authorship. In the transcription and translation, footnotes have been attributed to the relevant editor (whether Dauvit Broun [‘DB’], John Reuben Davies [‘JRD’], or Jo Tucker [‘JT’]), to make the phases of work more apparent. In every case, Tucker was responsible for proof-reading and sometimes updating the text of the original footnotes, and for overall editorial consistency.

The table here identifies how the manuscript was primarily consulted for each phase of work. An editor’s source can be significant. As an example, in Broun’s early work using the facsimile edition, he noted that ‘There appears to be a deletion point under the e’ at AD 739 archiepiscopus (Faustina B. IX, f. 2v). This is in fact a figment of the collotype page in the Anderson’s facsimile edition where part of the ruled line looks darker; it is not visible in the digital image or manuscript itself. Where the digital images or Andersons’ edition was the primary source, the manuscripts themselves were also consulted to check particular issues (such as erasures).

Technical documentation: website creation and design process

This section gives a fuller technical account of how the edition was designed and implemented, and how text, image, and annotation data are brought together at runtime. It complements the editorial principles below by describing the web architecture, data model, and technologies used.

Editorial-to-digital workflow

1. Editorial preparation of the transcription and translation (with harmonisation of inherited materials from earlier phases of work).
2. Encoding of the text in TEI-XML, preserving folio boundaries, lineation, additions, deletions, and note structures.
3. Encoding of scribal attribution through handShift and metadata markers (notably note type="scribe").
4. Creation and refinement of image-region annotations using IIIF-compatible Web Annotations linked to scribal profile IDs.
5. Implementation of server-side delivery and transformation logic so that a requested folio can be rendered as linked text, notes, and image.
6. Iterative quality control across TEI structure, viewer rendering, scribal filters, and search/index behaviour.

Technology stack

• Database and application runtime: Elemental (native XML database).
• Server-side logic: XQuery 3.1 modules (routing, folio extraction, JSON endpoints, search).
• Transformation layer: XSLT 2.0 for TEI-to-HTML rendering.
• Data encoding standard: TEI-XML for transcription and translation sources.
• Image interoperability: IIIF (Image API and annotation workflows).
• Image server endpoint used by the viewer: Cantaloupe.
• Annotation format: W3C Web Annotation JSON, including SVG selectors for polygon/region targeting.
• Frontend: HTML/CSS plus JavaScript (including OpenSeadragon for zoomable image delivery and overlays).
• Search: eXist-db Lucene full-text index and KWIC summarisation.

Custom IIIF annotator used in production

The project includes an ad-hoc customised annotator built specifically for this edition’s scribal workflow. It is not a generic external service: it was implemented to match the manuscript navigation, scribal profile model, and storage format used by the public viewer.

• The annotator loads a chosen manuscript and folio as IIIF info.json through OpenSeadragon, using the same folio-to-image mapping logic as the reader interface.
• Editors can create polygon and rectangle regions, switch between draw/select modes, and delete selected annotations.
• Each region is explicitly assigned to a selected scribal profile code (for example sc024) via the in-page scribe selector.
• On save, internal regions are serialised into IIIF/W3C Web Annotation JSON: type="Annotation", motivation="tagging", TextualBody with the scribe code, and SvgSelector containing polygon/rect geometry.
• Write operations are posted to /annotations, which persists manuscript-level AnnotationPages in data/faustina.json and data/julius.json.
• The save routine is merge-aware: for the current image+scribe pair it replaces that subset, while preserving annotations belonging to other scribes or canvases in the same JSON file.
• For robustness, the tool includes auto-save and browser local-draft fallback; if server persistence lags, local drafts are retained and reloaded to prevent annotation loss.
• Those same JSON files are consumed by the public read-only overlay, so editorial annotation and user-facing display use one shared data source.

How a folio request is rendered

1. A request specifies manuscript/source, language, and folio (for example ?source=faustina&lang=lat&folio=21v).
2. XQuery resolves the corresponding TEI file and locates the target folio marker (pb/@n).
3. Only the selected folio fragment is transformed server-side to HTML via XSLT.
4. The transformed sections are inserted into the viewer layout (main text, margins, notes).
5. In parallel, the viewer loads the matching IIIF image from the Cantaloupe endpoint.
6. IIIF/Web Annotation JSON is loaded and SVG-based regions are drawn as filtered scribal overlays.

TEI markup conventions used in this implementation

The edition currently uses this TEI element set: TEI, teiHeader, fileDesc, titleStmt, title, publicationStmt, sourceDesc, text, body, p, pb, lb, hi, add, del, gap, note, handShift, ref, table, row, cell.

Project-specific controlled values currently in use include:

• add/@place: above, below, left, right, left-vertical, right-vertical, top-left, top-centre, top-right, bottom-left, bottom-centre.
• hi/@rend: superscript, italic, bold, right-aligned, red, blue.
• del/@rend: erasure, cancelled.
• gap/@reason: indent, space, hole.
• note/@type: including scribe for metadata markers.
• handShift/@scribe: profile labels such as sc001–sc124, plus scEditor where required.
• ref/@type="http" for outbound links.

Search and index implementation

Full-text search is implemented through eXist-db’s Lucene integration. The index configuration targets key TEI content nodes (including body, p, add, note, and hi), while range indexes support selected attribute lookups. Query handling is performed in XQuery and snippets are generated with KWIC summary output for context display in results.

Maintenance and sustainability practice

• Maintain structural synchronisation between Latin and English TEI files at folio level.
• Extend TEI @place/@rend vocabularies only when corresponding rendering support is added.
• Keep TEI as the canonical scholarly data layer; treat rendering as a replaceable interface layer.
• Maintain IIIF/annotation interoperability so image and region data remain reusable beyond the current viewer.

Editorial principals 1: scribal profiles

A quick guide to scribal profiles

The edition is innovative in that (i) it identifies distinct ‘scribal profiles’ (rather than ‘scribes’ or ‘hands’), and (ii) it is inclusive in the range of scribal activity it incorporates (within the realms of what is feasible).

In total, 124 scribal profiles have been identified across the Chronicle. They have been numbered not chronologically but according to their position in the manuscripts today (from Julius B. XIII f. 2r through to Faustina B. IX f. 75v).

Not all scribal activity can be assigned to a scribal profile: where the sample of writing is too small, it is attributed to an ‘unassigned scribal profile’.

While all of the scribal activity in the manuscript has been the subject of scribal ‘profiling’, the transcription and translation present only a selection of the scribal profiles’ work.

A more detailed guide to scribal profiles

The Chronicle of Melrose contains a diverse range of scribal activity, all of which is important for understanding the text and the manuscript’s history. The digital images allow viewers to pursue any aspect of this that they wish (within the constraints of a web browser). In order to appreciate and discuss the creation and growth of the Chronicle, however, a framework is required which discerns different scribes’ work among all of the activity.

Other studies of manuscripts (including the Chronicle of Melrose) generally tend to focus on the ‘main text’, excluding some or all of the ‘paratext’ (i.e., anything beyond what is considered the primary text, such as marginalia or later additions). Typically this means dealing only with those scribes that contributed a substantial amount of text. This makes palaeographical analysis of their work more manageable; it also makes editing the text more practicable. This way of distinguishing a hierarchy of text inevitably impacts upon our thinking about the manuscript. It potentially feeds ideas about ‘the chronicle’ as an institutional record with a singular ‘voice’.

The approach here attempts to make no judgement about what is the ‘main text’ of the Chronicle. Neither does it make a simple physical distinction between ‘text block matter’ and ‘marginalia’. Nor does it distinguish by the date of the scribe’s work (e.g., by only including the 12^th- and 13^th-century contributions). Here, the aim is to find a way to identify and refer to as many of the Chronicle’s scribes as is feasible, regardless of the apparent ‘function’ of their contribution or their date of writing. As such, this will allow us to distinguish and refer to as much of the scribal activity in the Chronicle as possible. Importantly, this stage of distinguishing scribes is not the same as deciding what text to edit (transcribe and translate). A separate decision can be made about what, if any, scribal activity to present as edited text.

But there is a practical challenge for this ‘non-hierarchical’ approach. How can we be inclusive about all the scribes and their work without it becoming overwhelming (for the editor and reader alike)?

First, it is important to acknowledge our limitations: it is not possible to number each ‘person’. There is not enough information to distinguish every individual through their writing, and for good reason: in their performance and contributions, the scribes were not trying to be distinct and identifiable; plus, much of their work is too minimal for confident personal identifications. We have to abandon any notion that scribe numbers identify ‘people’.

What is possible is to distinguish different scribal stints using established methods of palaeographical analysis. These methods are based on identifying handwriting features which are unique, regular, and unconsciously executed (such as the scribe’s particular way of tracing the ampersand or the letter g). This work can be gruelling, and does not pretend to be objective. But it is possible to arrive at an editorial assessment of the distinct scribal stints in the manuscript.

The first question is how to label these distinct scribal appearances. It could be argued that ‘scribe’ has too strong an association with a ‘person’: it is entirely natural, for example, to assume ‘Scribe 13’ is a different person from ‘Scribe 14’. Alternatively, ‘hand’ is often used for something more like distinct stylistic performances, with one person potentially capable of multiple ‘hands’. In general, ‘hands’ tends to suggest a single and consistent ‘style’ of handwriting and so does not easily allow for variation across one person’s body of work. Applying a ‘hands’ method would mean splitting the work of a single scribe whose writing is clearly identifiable even though they vary their style (their ‘hand’).

What is it, then, that we are actually trying to describe in each case? In reality, it is a set of consistent palaeographic features and also patterns of scribal approach in terms of their placement on the page or the consistent content of their addition (for example, a repeated signpost, or foliations, or quire signatures). It is a scribal ‘profile’, meaning a combination of their distinct and regular palaeographical features and potentially also a recognisable approach in the given context. This is what we are perceiving on the manuscript pages when we differentiate between different contributors.

The digital edition will, then, distinguish between ‘scribal profiles’ in the Chronicle. These identifications incorporate analysis of the palaeographical features and a contextual reading of each one’s approach. While the term ‘scribal profile’ might jar, its virtue is that it brings to the surface the reality of analysing a multi-scribe manuscript: that we cannot categorically say that every recognisable profile is the work of a single, distinct individual.

While we may still want to identify distinct people who contributed to the Chronicle of Melrose, it must be acknowledged that one person (‘scribe’) may have been responsible for multiple ‘scribal profiles’. In this way the profiles are closer to ‘hands’ (as conventionally understood), but again it is not about conscious choice of stylistic features or script: it is primarily about unique, regular and unconsciously executed palaeographical features, regardless of style. Put simply, one profile is almost certainly one person/scribe; but one person/scribe may be responsible for multiple profiles if they were able to adapt their handwriting and approach. For example, the only profile that can with some confidence be attributed to a known individual is Scribal profile 16, which was very likely the antiquarian John Leland (d. 1552) who added a series of signposts. It may be, however, that Leland was also responsible for other palaeographical profiles, such as those responsible for various catchwords, signposts and cross references (Scribal profiles 42, 47, 51, 79, 80, 84, 86, 101, 103, 121 and 123). (Leland was not the only person in this period who interacted with the manuscript though: see The Chronicle’s journey: from Melrose Abbey to the British Library.)

This process of ‘profiling’ the scribal activity in the manuscripts has been undertaken by the editor, Jo Tucker (though building on the work of Broun in The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, 2007). It should be remembered that this is a process of analysis, not simply description, and is therefore to an extent guided by personal perceptions and inclinations. It is likely that in future the scribal profiles will be developed as others look at the manuscript in this light. The availability of the digital images and text promises to further enable this process.

In principle, scribal profiling has been applied to everything in the manuscript. There are, however, some caveats:

• The profiling only relates to scribal activity, so it does not take into account, for example, folio prickings or British Museum ink stamps of ownership. It does, however, include all scribal contributions, even foliations or quire signatures which are usually omitted from scribal analysis (especially if they are modern).
• Some scribal activity is too narrow to allow identification as a distinct scribal profile. This includes: ruled lines; tiny additions of a single letter or word; enlarged or rubricated initials; illegible erased text; and symbols. An editor could take a maximal approach and number each of these interactions as a distinct profile; but this is likely to be overwhelming for the editor and reader. A more discerning approach has therefore been adopted here. Scale of contribution is only a criterion insofar as it affects the editor’s ability to recognise a ‘profile’. In other words, the interaction must be substantial enough in its palaeographical distinctiveness and/or approach to be considered a distinct profile. It is not about simply omitting all corrections or foliations, for example. In cases where the contribution is too narrow to allow identification, that scribal activity is omitted from the numbering process. In the transcription and translation, such ambiguous contributions are attributed to an ‘unassigned scribal profile’.
• It should be acknowledged that of course there may be some scribal activity that the editor(s) could not see in the manuscript or images (notably erased text) which by default has been excluded from the scribal profiling.

Some of the most notable profiles are those which appear in multiple places across the manuscript: these indicate a scribe that contributed repeatedly, potentially at different times. When identifying one scribal profile in different places, there must be a clear positive case for identifying them as one. For example, Scribal profile 33 is particularly distinctive in its palaeographical style, as well as the nature of the text it was responsible for. By contrast, the quire signatures which were likely all added at a similar time while in Cotton’s library are not sufficiently similar palaeographically to be a single profile (hence, Scribal profiles 5, 11, 14, 25, 30 and 31).

Broun’s analysis and numbering of the scribes in the Chronicle of Melrose has been a vital guide in this process (Broun, The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, chapter 7 on ‘Scribes’). On the whole, the edition’s identifications broadly match Broun’s. However, there are some differences, and moreover Broun’s scope was more limited in terms of what scribal activity was taken into consideration, hence he arrived at 66 ‘scribes’ whereas here there are 124 ‘profiles’. Also, while Broun numbered the scribes according to his assessment of their relative chronology of working, here the scribal profiles are numbered according to their position in the manuscript today (from Julius B. XIII, f. 2r through to Faustina B. IX, f. 75v) in order to keep editorial interpretation to a minimum. (There is one exception: Faustina B. IX, f. 41 has been misplaced in the current binding arrangement, but the scribal profiles have been numbered as though this folio was in its correct position between ff. 40 and 42.) A description of each profile and their dating can be found under Scribal profiles.

The total number of profiles is not, therefore, the same as the total number of people involved in writing the Chronicle. There are likely to be people not accounted for (in the work attributed to ‘unassigned scribal profiles’, for example); equally, one ‘person’ may be responsible for two or more scribal profiles. What the profiles provide is a framework for referring to the manuscript’s scribal activity in a meaningful way, and beyond simply the ‘main text’. An effort has been made in the edition not to treat scribal profiles as ‘people’ with agency (such as avoiding the phrasing ‘Scribal profile 39 added a text’) but instead to retain the sense that it is a palaeographical profile (‘the text attributed to Scribal profile 39’). As such, the appropriate pronoun for a scribal profile is not ‘he/she’ but ‘it’.

Visualising the work of scribal profiles

The next challenge is how to communicate all of this. Images now make it much easier to visualise the editor’s workings and their conclusions. The edition here exploits annotation of IIIF images as a methodology for formulating and communicating analysis of scribal profiles in a way that should be replicable for other manuscripts. In fact, the images are not just about transmitting ‘results’; they can also empower the editor to make decisions that might otherwise be too difficult for a reader to follow. Because the user can browse the images independently, it is possible for the scribal profiles to be more explicitly understood as an editorial ‘layer’ of analysis, rather than the user’s only point of entry to the text.

Editing the text of scribal profiles

For the edition of the text itself, it would be possible to transcribe every scribal profile’s entry, but this is somewhat overwhelming for editor and reader alike, and potentially unnecessary. For example, many of the signposts are relatively obvious in their function and content, and are often repetitive. The same is true of the multiple layers of foliation, or the quire signatures or catchwords. Only certain textual contributions have therefore been transcribed and translated in order to enable readers to understand the text on the images: the list of Scribal profiles communicates where these have been provided. Most editions are, in some way, selective about how much ‘paratext’ they include. Here, it is simply more explicit because the images of the pages are side-by-side. For any user, it is still possible to keep an eye on the whole range of scribal activity through the images.

Editorial principles 2: transcription and translation

This section describes how the text has been transcribed, by Dauvit Broun, John Reuben Davies and Jo Tucker. For how the resulting electronic text has been ‘tagged’, see Editorial principles 3: text mark-up conventions (TEI-XML) .

The benefit of a side-by-side image-text edition is that users can see information in the manuscript for themselves in the images. The spirit of the transcription and translation is, therefore, to help users read the text in the digital images. It should be clear from looking at the images that the transcription is not ‘the text’ but simply one representation of it which meets the editor’s aims (in the same way that the translation is obviously not ‘the text’ but a particular representation of it which suits the editor and their audience).

The transcription might technically be described as ‘semi-diplomatic’: an attempt has been made to follow the scribes’ work and keep editorial interpretations to a minimum. However, the transcription is not an exact replica of the manuscript page. Certain editorial interventions have been made to aid the modern reader in understanding the text in the images (such as expanding abbreviations, or following modern capitalisation, as described further below). Some elements of the written text (such as later underlining) have not been represented in the transcription but can be seen in the digital images.

The Englishtranslation makes the Chronicle of Melrose accessible to a wide audience. However, it attempts to provide modern readers with an experience of reading the text in the manuscript, rather than acting as a ‘cleaned-up’ version with all the corrections or erasures or additions silently incorporated. For example, in order to maintain the sense of reading the manuscript text itself, Anno m ^o c ^o xc ^o iiii ^o has been translated as ‘In the 1194^th year’ rather than the more familiar ‘In the year 1194’. Of course, it is not possible to indicate all original features of the Latin text in translation. For example, an obviously misspelled name like Willmus for Willelmus (Faustina B. IX, f. 22r) has been simply given as ‘William’ in the translation. Errors in the year numbers are sometimes communicated in translation, but this is not always possible (e.g., where cxc was written instead of cc but the x was then marked for deletion, in the translation it is simply ‘200’). Folio divisions in the translation are an estimation of how this relates to the transcription but obviously cannot exactly match the Latin. It does, however, give a sense of the interrupted flow of the text (for medieval scribes and readers) over a folio boundary.

A decision has been made not to ‘itemise’ the annals (i.e., breaking up a year into 1194.1, 1194.2, 1194.3, as was anticipated in the edition by Broun, Davies and Harrison: The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey, pp. 50–2). This is because it interrupts the view of the scribe’s work, and potentially adds layers of assumptions about how to read the text. The easiest way to refer to text in the chronicle is by folio number, potentially also with line numbers.

Abbreviations: these have been expanded silently (e.g., dni’ > Domini). Where there is ambiguity in the Latin (especially with proper nouns), unexpanded abbreviations are signalled with an inverted comma (e.g., Inger’, A’).

Capitalisation: to avoid ambiguity with interpreting the scribes’ intentions, capitalisation is editorial (e.g., for placenames, year numerals, titles such as rex before a name, after a punctus).

Punctuation:

• The punctus is represented by either a comma (,) or full stop (.) according to editorial interpretation. In some instances, the punctus has not been reproduced, such as around numerals (e.g., m.c.xc.iii. is given as mcxciii and .iii. as iii) or in its use after abbreviations, especially names (e.g., Scott’. is given as Scott’). More work could be done to study punctuation patterns in the Chronicle: for example, some scribes used the punctus relatively routinely after abbreviations whereas others did not.
• The punctus elevatus is reproduced in every instance (there being no exact modern equivalent).
• The punctus interrogativus is represented as a question mark (?) (e.g., Faustina B. IX, f. 29v, line 9).
• The punctus flexus (which was specific to the Cistercians initially) is represented by an exclamation mark (!) (Faustina B. IX, e.g., f. 25v).
• In Scribal profile 24’s work, there is a form of punctuation like a dash, rather than a punctus, represented here with a hyphen (-).

J/I: this is always rendered as I (e.g., Ierusalem, Ianuario, Iohannes, Iesus).

U/V: an attempt has been made to follow the scribe in each case.

Tailed ę (aka, e-caudata, e-cedilla): this is only found in the writing of Scribal profile 24. The transcription follows the manuscript in every instance. In cases where a potential tailed ę is hidden by an abbreviation, a judgement has been made based on other usages in Scribal profile 24’s work. For example, where pre- words are abbreviated, it has been expanded as pre- rather than prę-. This is because prę- only appears in two confined and adjacent cases (AD 135 pręfuerant, AD 136 pręceptum). In all other instances, scattered throughout Scribal profile 24’s writing, when pre- was expanded tailed ę was not used (AD 33 precursor, AD 63 predicationis, AD 95 precipitatus, AD 744 prelium, 832 predauerunt, 841 predauerunt, 882 prelio, 883 predictus). In the case of hæc, this appears four times as hęc (AD 63, 67, 219, 222, 871) and never as hec or hæc, so the two instances of abbreviations have also been spelled hęc (AD 62, 249).

‘And’: the manuscript has been followed in every case, whether as et or the Tironian symbol (7) or the ampersand (&).

Names: in the English translation, Gaelic names follow the spellings in www.poms.ac.uk (e.g., Ferteth, earl of Strathearn). Where a name is represented in the manuscript only as its initial (e.g., M’ for Máel Coluim, H’ for Henry), the translation expands the name in square brackets only where known (e.g., M[ael Coluim], H[enry]), to communicate that the scribe only gave the initial.

Dates: in the translation these are usually given in a modern form (e.g., xi kalendas Iunii is given as ‘22 May’ not ‘11^th kalends of June’), to allow the text to be read as fluently as a medieval reader probably would have done so.

Numerals: in the translation, an attempt has been made to follow the manuscript, whether numbers are given as numerals (e.g., iv is given as ‘4’) or as words (e.g., quattuor is given as ‘four’). Superscript abbreviations for numeral word endings have been used by the Chronicle scribes frequently but not consistently (e.g., iv ^o anno regni, xx ^ti librarum; in these cases, they would still be represented in the translation as numerals ‘4’ and ‘20’). Sometimes editorial interpretation has been required to determine whether a numeral represents a cardinal or ordinal number (e.g., ivanno regni is translated as ‘4^th year of the reign’; Anno Domini mccxxxiii is translated as ‘In the 1233^rd year of the Lord’).

Deletions: where a letter, word or words have been indicated for deletion in the manuscript somehow (e.g., having been underpointed or scored through), this appears as a strikethrough. Deletions are represented in the translation where feasible. Where an alteration to the text is more complex, it is explained in a footnote.

Insertions: where a letter, word or words have been indicated for insertion in the text block, this appears in slashes for those either \above/ or /below\ the line of writing, even if there is no ‘caret’ symbol in the manuscript indicating precise position. Insertions are represented in the translation where feasible. Where an alteration to the text is more complex, it is explained in a footnote.

Marginal textual additions: these have been presented in the margins in the edition. Where relevant, symbols have been used to indicate the intended location in the text block (e.g., * /\ /. \\ // .’.).

Changes to word order: where a scribe has used symbols to suggest a change to word/phrase order, the text and symbols in the edition follow the manuscript (approximating the symbols with punctuation such as // or *) and the suggested re-wording is noted in a footnote.

Erasures: some erased text is legible and is therefore transcribed (but presented as faded text); other erased text is not legible but is still represented (as faded, indistinct characters). Where fresh text has been written over an erasure, this is noted in a footnote (the fresh text is not presented in \slashes/ like an insertion). Erasures are represented in the translation where feasible.

Modern editorial comments,additions or clarifications: these are added in [square brackets] in the transcription or translation. In general, such editorial interventions have been kept to a minimum. They have been used where letters have been smudged, or where the parchment has been cropped and letters lost, or where space has been left for an initial capital which was never filled, or where Anno is missing at the beginning of an annal. More often, any editorial comments or clarifications are explained in a footnote.

Quotations: quotations from scripture, liturgy or classical authors are signalled by ‘quotation marks’ in the translation, with a footnote identifying the source.

¶Paragraph markers: these are only noted if they are within the text which has been edited. Various paragraph markers in the margins have not been included in the edited text.

Ink colours: the few occasions of red and blue ink have been indicated in the transcription and translation. Colour decoration on paragraph markers or other characters can be observed in the digital images.

Editorial principles 3: text mark-up conventions (TEI-XML)

The electronic text in this digital edition has been marked up in XML, following the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) standards. (For newcomers to this framework, see ‘A Gentle Introduction to XML’ https://www.tei-c.org/release/doc/tei-p5-doc/en/html/SG.html [accessed 11 July 2025].) The scholarship on digital editing/digital editions is substantial, and an array of digital scholarly editions successfully deploy the TEI-XML framework. A resource currently exists for discovering such editions in https://www.digitale-edition.de/exist/apps/editions-browser/$app/index.html. There, for example, one can filter to find that there are currently (as of 11 July 2025) sixteen other examples of ‘Latin’, ‘single manuscript’ digital editions from the ‘high ma [middle ages]’.

Much like with traditional editorial methodologies, electronic mark-up of a text also involves a series of decisions, which collectively amount to the edition’s ‘conventions’ or ‘principles’. In practice, this means deciding what ‘tags’ to use for what features. For manuscripts, while there are some general standards (thanks to the TEI), there is still scope for personal choice about what tags to use in what context, and whether they are more descriptive (i.e., labelling how the text looks in the manuscript today) or more explanatory (i.e., explaining why the scribe did something). The mark-up in this edition attempts to be more ‘descriptive’. For example, spaces left in the text block are sometimes encoded as ‘gaps’, but sometimes as ‘indents’ and sometimes as ‘right alignment’, depending on how the text is best understood and rendered by the computer, rather than as any statement on the scribe’s intention.

The ‘schema’ for the Chronicle of Melrose is relatively simple (compare, for example, the extensive tagging guidelines in something like The Newton Project: https://www.newtonproject.ox.ac.uk/about-us/tagging-and-transcription-guidelines [accessed 11 July 2025]). Below is a list of the tags used in the edition. This allows the XML text files to be downloaded and reused, equipped with the knowledge of what the tags signify.

Editorial principles 4: the digital images and annotations

The digital images are supplied by the British Library via a IIIF manifest.

The images themselves were taken on [date].

[Further technical details on image annotations.]

Sustainability of the digital edition

Against the backdrop of rapidly developing web and Digital Humanities capabilities, the project team acknowledge that there is no simple way to ensure sustainability of a given digital resource. Bearing in mind the FAIR principles, a variety of measures have been adopted here to maximise the sustainability of the edition and its potential for re-use and interoperability, while not compromising on the scale and principles of the original project:

• The resource’s functionality will be maintained by the University of Glasgow on a local server. The web address therefore has the best chance of remaining stable. There will also be routine and responsive software updates by University staff.
• The British Library’s commitment to persistent web resources and reuse ought, in theory, to make the images available indefinitely (specifically, the IIIF manifests).
• Drawing on the British Library’s IIIF manifests reduces the amount of data the project requires (and hosts on its server), therefore reducing its environmental impact.
• The transcription and translation are marked up in TEI-XML, the main standard for digital editions in the humanities, maximising potential for future interoperability or re-use.
• The project team will continue to promote the use of the edition for the public and in teaching, to bolster its human sustainability and wider interest in the chronicle.

For further discussion of this general topic, see Joanna Tucker, ‘Facing the challenge of digital sustainability as humanities researchers’, Journal of the British Academy 10 (2022), pp. 93–120 (doi.org/10.5871/jba/010.093).

Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) for funding the project (Grant reference AH/L008041/1).

We would also like to thank the University of Glasgow for providing resources and materials, and to the College of Arts & Humanities Research office and ArtsLab for supporting various stages of the project conceptualisation and realisation.

We also thank the British Library (especially Julian Harrison) for supporting the delivery of the IIIF manifests at an early stage of the British Library’s expansion of its IIIF offerings.

Glen Robson (IIIF) advised on elements of the image annotation and kindly offered some ongoing support for the Simple Annotation Software.

Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0

How to cite the digital edition

[JT to check: The images are licensed by the British Library under a creative commons license…]

Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0

Long reference

The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey: a digital edition, ed. Joanna Tucker with Luca Guariento and Vivien Williams, incorporating text and translation by Dauvit Broun and John Reuben Davies (Glasgow, 2025), <www.melrosechronicle.gla.ac.uk> (accessed on [date]).

Short reference

Tucker et al., The Chronicle of Melrose Abbey.

Abbreviations used in the edition

REFERENCES TO ADD TO THE LIST (FROM JRD)

• Gregory I the Great, Dialogorum libri [English, p.115]
• Petrus de Vineia [English, p.167; Latin p.178]
• Matthew Paris [Latin, pp.175–177]
• Clemens Romanus, Recognitiones [English, pp.119 and 120]
• Gaius Julius Solinus, De mirabilibus mundi, chapter 40 (ed. Mommsen) [English, pp.222 and 225]
• Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia, 8. 51 (Loeb) [English pp.222, 223 and 227]
• Prester John, Letter to Emanuel of Constantinople [English p.222]
• ChrL [Latin pp.115 and 116]

Questions & feedback

If you have any questions about the website or digital edition, or would be willing to provide some feedback, we’d love to hear from you. Please email joanna.tucker@glasgow.ac.uk.