Introduction

  • Wikidata as an open infrastructure for DH knowledge representation
  • A decentralisation of authority

How, then, can expert-led projects work with a generalist platform such as Wikidata to generate new forms of knowledge?

How do these hybrid models — which combine scholarly expertise with public participation — challenge traditional boundaries between academic and amateur contributors, and between knowledge production and validation?

Overview

  • Wikidata as infrastructure in Digital Humanities
  • Case Study: Anthologia Graeca — corpus, platforms, data model (uses of Wikidata)
  • Focus: Representing the authors of the Greek Anthology through Wikidata
  • Some thoughts on authority and collective intelligence : digital infrastructures challenging and extending traditional scholarly practices.

Wikidata and Digital Humanities

  • Wikidata is a major knowledge graph for structuring and sharing data
  • DH projects use it to publish Linked Open Data without technical barriers
  • GLAM institutions rely on it for metadata curation and interoperability

Wikidata as A Linking Hub

Authority on Digital Platforms

The Greek Anthology

  • Circa 4.000 poems
  • By over 300 authors
  • From the Classical to the Byzantine period
  • Result of many compilations

→ A collaborative and digital edition of the Greek Anthology

Codex palatinus graecus 23, p. 143

A collaborative and digital edition of the Greek Anthology

https://anthologiagraeca.org/ & https://anthologiagraeca.org/api

  • Led by the Canada Research Chair on Digital Textualities
  • Funded by the SSHRC ;
    • Insight Development (2017-2019)
    • Insight (2019-2025)
    • 2 Connections (2022, 2024)

  • Large and diverse team :
    • Researchers : M. Vitali-Rosati, E. Bouchard, C. Raschle
    • Coordinators : M. Verstraete, W. Bouchard
    • Developers : D. Larlet, S. Rubio, É. Guicherd
    • Editors & contributors from UdeM (Research assistants), Naples (University Students), Bari (High School students)…
    • Institutional partners: CRIHN, Perseus, Perseids, Heidelberg Library, etc.

Project’s goals

The platform’s keywords

Reconciling Keywords with Wikidata

E.g Diodoros (ambiguous entries)

From :

  • “Diodorus, Diodoros”,
  • “Diodore de Tarse, Diodoros le Grammairien”,
  • “Diodoros Zonas de Sardes”,
  • “diodorus”

Diodoros. Trois poètes de la Couronne de Philippe ont porté ce nom : Diodore Zonas, de Sardes, orateur célèbre du temps de la guerre de Mithridate ; un autre Diodoros de Sardes ; enfin, Diodoros de Tarse. On ne sait auquel attribuer les épigrammes où le gentilicium n’est pas spécifié. (Waltz 2003, II:142–43)

Codex palatinus 23, p. 186 (VI.243 vv. 1-2)

Codex palatinus 23, p. 186 (VI.243 vv. 1-2)

To :

E.g Dionysius (uncertain attribution for common names)

How do we make ambiguity and uncertainty readable, especially in a digital context?

Results : from Metadata Cleaning to Modeling

Benefits :

  • On Anthologia Graeca :

    → Improved attributions

  • On Wikidata :

    → Created new items, multilingual labels

  • For both :

    → More consistent data

Challenges : tensions between interpretive scholarship and structured ontologies

Case study: Pseudo-authors

Some comments on the outcome and future work

Authors : Add more info?

Cities : work in progress

  • ✅ Coordinates
  • ❌ Names in different languages

Other keywords : work in progress

  • Do we want to reconcile everything ?
    • E.g. : “personification of weapons”; “bad breath”?

Conclusion

  • Wikidata = More than a technical tool

    → A collaborative, epistemic space

    → Delegating authority ≠ losing rigor

    → Toward a distributed model of expertise

Scholars as participants in open, multilingual, evolving systems

→ challenged to balance openness with academic standards.