#172 Add scribal indication of metrical quantity & scribal enotikon (=hyphen)

[Mike Sampson]

As a lexical aid, scribes occasionally indicate the metrical quantity of a vowel/syllable on a papyrus. A good example is P.Köln 2.59, fragments of Alcaeus on which both long and short syllabic quantities are indicated.

I propose that EpiDoc support the markup of these via <hi rend="breve"> and <hi rend="longum">, on the model of other scribal diacriticals such as the asper, lenis, diairesis, etc. The appropriate Unicode points for the Stylesheets would be U+0304 (combining macron) for a longum and U+0306 (combining breve) for a breve.</hi></hi>

It would also be good to add support for the scribal enotikon (=hyphen), which is a lot less common, but for which the combining character U+035C is ideal. A good example of a text that requires it is PSI 16 1594. Papyri.info currently indicates these via <g>, but I suspect that <hi rend="hyphen"> is more appropriate. </hi></g>

[BODARD Gabriel]

There's nothing currently to prevent the use of <hi rend="breve"|"longum"> in the EpiDoc schema (I believe the values of hi/@rend are recommended, not constrained). Adding handling of this to the Stylesheets would be trivial. (Presumably under the ddbdp Leiden-style?)

I think "enotikon"/"hyphen" needs a bit more discussion. (It might also be useful to raise this on the EpiDoc-Markup list, where you could explain why you think the slightly unintuitive <hi rend="hyphen"> is preferable?)

[Hugh A. Cayless]

A not-inconsequential part of my brain thinks using <hi> to indicate combining characters was a category error in the first place.

[BODARD Gabriel]

It was a bit weird, but I'm not sure <g> would be less weird. :) I think the reasoning was by analogy with apex, which looks similar to a diacritic, but is clearly highlighting in exactly the same way as long i or similar.

I suppose it depends if we think we're marking up symbols on the stone/papyrus, or qualitative features of a vowel, which diacritics (almost?) all are.

[Hugh A. Cayless]

I'd argue we are almost exclusively marking up symbols on the surface.

[BODARD Gabriel]

I won't argue sematics on this one—because it looks like we're probably both arguing the same thing, that at least the hyphen case suggested by Mike should best be tagged as a <g/>?

(I'm not sure what role the enotikon plays in papyrological text, but I assume it's not analogous to paragraphos or other features that we might also propose tagging with <milestone/>?)

[Mike Sampson]

As advised, I posed this to the MARKUP list yesterday, and so we'll see if there is any community input. That query includes a bit more information about the role of the enotikon: "The enotikon serves is a lexical aid in scriptio continua, serving not to divide words from one another (for which purpose there is the diastole or hypodiastole) but instead to indicate that a single word is meant. A good example of a text that requires it is PSI 16 1594.6, where it indicates πρ]ο̣σγενό̣μ[ένοι] (instead of πρ]ὸ̣ς γενό̣μ[ένοι]): the enotikon is a bowl-shaped tie written below sigma+gamma."

As I track the back and forth about <g> vs <hi>, I'm now even less certain where I stand, and will be relieved to have oversight and guidance on this point.

[BODARD Gabriel]

Great, let's discuss a bit on Markup, and then come back here with a plan of action!