The drop-down menu in the upper left corner of the screen offers various ways of viewing these materials, in combination or separately. Sophisticated software allows easy magnification and movement around the images. Drop-down menus in the centre of the header allow the user to choose a particular manuscript and form of the apparatus. The book-chapter-paragraph buttons to the left and the folio and paragraph buttons to the right allow easy movement around the text.
A comprehensive introduction by the editor (accessed by clicking on Editorial Materials in the top right-hand corner of the screen) explains the methodology of the transcriptions, and gives detailed transcription notes for each manuscript. It analyses the interrelationships between the witnesses (manuscripts and princeps), and presents the editorial rationale which guided the choice of readings contained in the edited text.
As well as providing all the primary evidence for scholars wishing to explore the textual tradition of Dante’s treatise, and a detailed scholarly analysis of that evidence, the web site will be a valuable teaching tool for palaeographers, codicologists and textual critics.
A new Preface (2019) explains how this second edition of the web site stands in relation to the first edition (2006). The chief difference is the inclusion of images, transcription and textual variants for ms. Y (London, BL Add. 6891). The transcription of ms. Y differs in some respects from that of the other mss.
For details of these differences, for an explanation of symbols used in the transcriptions (§ * % and ∫ ), and for more information about the project and a full account of the edition and its history, see Editorial Materials (p. 53 for Y transcription; pp. 64-66 for symbols used in the transcriptions).
