Project for a digital repertory of engravings in books (15th-18th centuries)

Abstract

We present a project of bibliographical and documental research that consists in collecting, classifying, analyzing and digitally diffusing the illustrations contained in the printed matters (books, pamphlets, loose papers, etc.) from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries that are deposited in the libraries of the Region of Murcia. The general aim is the diffusion of information of difficult access, i.e. the engravings, taking advantage of the information technologies. We have established as partial objectives those of locating, identifying, digitizing, describing and disseminating the engravings. In order to achieve these objectives, a specific methodology has been devised, and accomplished in three successive phases: digitization, description and database management,. The result is a digital book engravings repository that allows for their retrieval by author, title, keywords, source, publisher, dates and other elements. This repository will improve the access to the information and it marks a new experience in metadata application for the description of images, whose effectiveness we will evaluate in a future phase.