Digital Humanities and Legal History Can the computer read and classify ordinances?

As Researcher-in-Residence at the KB National Library of the Netherlands (The Hague), I – Annemieke Romein – I look for early modern norms in books of ordinances (‘plakkaatboeken’). These books hold mainly administrative laws, varying from norms against beggars, safety, but also laws intended to stimulate the economy, and international treaties are frequently included too. Together with colleagues at the library, we are looking for means to have the computer take over the process of categorising these texts. The question is: Can a computer recognise the texts containing rules, and distinguish between texts on religion, maintenance of dykes, colonial affairs, etc.?

(Full blog in English)

Published at:

http://esclh.blogspot.com/2019/08/project-presentation-digital-humanities.html?m=1 (30 August 2019)

https://lab.kb.nl/about-us/blog/digital-humanities-and-legal-history-can-computer-read-and-classify-ordinances (10 October 2019)