About


The project


The initiative of an electronic open-access corpus of the ancient Arabian inscriptions was launched in 1999 at the University of Pisa by Prof. A. Avanzini, with the aim to make available to specialists and to the broader public a wide array of documents often underestimated because of their difficulty of access. Published online in 2001 as an SGML-based corpus, later XML-based, the Corpus of South Arabian Inscriptions (CSAI) was gradually implemented with contents over the years, until an ERC Advanced Grant in 2011 supported the creation of a more complex system, called the Digital Archive for the Study of pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions (DASI). During the course of the DASI ERC project, the University of Pisa team under the direction of Prof. Alessandra Avanzini made nearly 8,200 Ancient South Arabian inscriptions and 600 more anepigraphic objects openly accessible. The digitization of the Ancient South Arabian corpus has been continued after the end of the funded project and is currently conducted at the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - Dipartimento di Scienze Umane e Sociali, Patrimonio Culturale - Istituto di Scienze del Patrimonio Culturale (ISPC).

The digitization of the ancient Arabian inscriptions is done by means of a data entry system, which ensures uniform and secure cataloguing, archiving and indexing of data. This is collected in a relational database, whose structure is centred on the inscription as the main entity, relating to other entities which complete its description (information about the support of the text, its translation, its bibliography, geographical information about the site, visual material). Epigraphic texts are transliterated according to the Unicode Standard and encoded using a standard XML language (TEI/Epidoc), in order to annotate information concerning the structure and the onomastics of the text, and editorial interventions. 

One of the aims of the ERC DASI project was to expand the textual corpus by completing the cataloguing of ASA inscriptions and, where possible, including North Arabian and Aramaic inscriptions from the region. Collaborations with research centres specializing in these textual traditions enabled the optimisation of shared vocabularies and the integration of some hundreds of non-ASA inscriptions into DASI. The material gathered by some of the projects was being directly incorporated into the DASI database, while other projects were compiling their own databases and providing direct access to them via the DASI website. The subsequent development of dedicated archives for these corpora, such as OCIANA and DiCoNab, led to a pause in the inclusion of non-ASA texts, with a view to future interoperability.
 


Terms of use


INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
The exclusive aim of the DASI project is to provide an instrument for scholarly research. Data are intellectual property of the University of Pisa and the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, and of the individual scholars and students that have collaborated to the archive over the years. 

LICENSE
A CC-BY 4.0 license applies to data in the CSAI records, but not to any images displayed in the website. Visual materials on this website, unless otherwise stated, are protected by laws of copyright that may change depending on the country. The images are the property of third parties and are either used with permission or reproduced from publications (see the credits below each image).
Even though every reasonable effort has been made to identify copyright holders and seek permission, if you recognize visual materials for which the authorization has not been granted, please contact us via email.
 

DASI AS A DATA PROVIDER
DASI inscriptional records are exposed in an OAI-PMH repository for data harvesting by service providers and in an API endpoint (https://dasi.cnr.it/api). DASI currently acts as an official data provider to a number of initiatives under institutional agreements, contributing data to Europeana,  Trismegistos, and the Digital Atlas and the Gazetteer of the Ancient Arabia portal (stemming from the MAPARABIA Project). 

Any other initiative reusing DASI data — while it may be legitimate under the CC-BY 4.0 licence — does not stem from any collaboration, agreement, endorsement, or review on the part of DASI. Anyone interested in reusing DASI data is invited to get in touch with the contact indicated at the foot of this page.

Any reuse of DASI materials requires retaining and displaying, for each resource, the authorship information and DOI given in its "Record's details".

CITATION
To cite the entire archive:

To cite a record, use the citation provided in the particular record's page. Here is an example:

 

DISCLAIMER
We disclaim all warranties as to the accuracy of information in the website; materials will at all times constitute work in progress which may be changed without notice. We will not be liable for any loss or damage deriving from their use or reliance on their veracity. Users are encouraged to report errors and malfunctions to the contact person (below).
 

 

Credits

 

DASI ERC PROJECT DIRECTOR
Prof. Alessandra Avanzini
 

DASI ARCHIVE SCIENTIFIC COORDINATORS
Alessia Prioletta (May 2011 - July 2015)
Irene Rossi (January 2017 - ongoing)
 

DASI ARCHIVE ASSISTANT COORDINATOR
Giulia Buono (January 2017 - ongoing)


CSAI CONTRIBUTORS

University of Pisa

Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche

Participant scholars from other institutions

 

DASI TECHNICAL PROJECT

Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa

Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche


OTHER COLLABORATIONS

University of Oxford
Prof. Jeremy Johns, Michael C.A. Macdonald, María del Carmen Hidalgo-Chacón Díez, Ali Al Manaser, Daniel Burt, Jennifer Brooke Lockie, Crispin Smith
CNRS-UMR8167 Orient & Méditerranée
Laïla Nehmé, Yann Gayet
Université de Paris VIII
Maria Gorea
 
 

Acknowledgements

The research leading to this output has received funding from:

DASI system is currently maintained by the CNR-Istituto di Scienze del Patrimonio Culturale of the CNR-Dipartimento Scienze Umane e Sociali, Patrimonio Culturale with the technical support of the CNR-Ufficio Agenda Digitale e Processi.

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Related Publications

 


How to contribute

If you would like to suggest corrections to the records' editions, we will be happy to receive your notification! Please write to the contact below.
 


Contact person

Irene Rossi (CNR-ISPC): irene.rossi@cnr.it