Written by Denise Siyum, master’s student at Universität Hamburg
The program of the summer school is all about digital palaeography. The lectures cover a range of topics, from learning about the different hands and scripts of the Middle Ages to digital methods including HTML or MSI that allow a deeper investigation of the manuscripts, I learned a lot that I can also apply to my own research.

About this summer school
On Sunday, the day before the school officially began, we all met each other over dinner where we had the chance to talk and connect casually while getting familiar with the city. People came from all over the world, and everyone was friendly and open-minded, last but not least the organiser of the summer school, Dr Anna Dorofeeva. She made sure everyone felt included, also throughout the summer school, and that no one was left behind.
The main events of the school took place in the Institute for Digital Humanities, and usually the first half of the day was spent on lectures and exercises on palaeography in general, different scripts and introduction to digital tools. On Monday, we were introduced to the State and University Library as well as the Conservation Department before we head to lunch together in the Mensa. The afternoon was spent with presentation by us where we introduced ourselves, our research or our general background. This was really interesting as most of us had similar interests but were familiar with different methodologies.
On the following days, we regularly switched from the Institute to the library and back, getting to know MSI (=multi spectral imaging) technology, digitisation conventions, entry-level coding with HTML and CSS and early medieval scripts. Everyone also tried out their crafts ability in sewing quires together (supported sewing as well!). These practical parts of the school were really fun and helpful in understanding not only the structure of books, but also programming under supervision and getting the first gist of it.
On Friday, the end of the first week, we all became excited for our first hands-on research on manuscript fragments. Everyone was handed an unknown fragment and started researching. Anna and Mona Kirsch, the head of the collection, offered their help so it was a lot of fun and not just frustrating when you couldn’t decipher much of the script.
After this, we were glad to be out in the heated streets of Göttingen. It was a lot of information in this week, interesting and helpful, but still a lot to digest. The weekend was our free time, and many used it to explore the surroundings of the city (like the Harz region, good for hiking) or other nearby cities (like Hildesheim or Fulda).
The train ride to Wolfenbüttel– Discovering more manuscripts

Upon arrival, we were greeted with some refreshments, before we locked away our stuff and listened to an introduction about the library and its collectors presented by the head of the manuscript department, Dr Christian Heitzmann.
Afterwards, we spread out to walk around the small village that is Wolfenbüttel (beautiful Fachwerkhäuser!) where we had lunch.
Everyone was back on time for the manuscript session – some of us ordered specific manuscripts to look at, the others randomly chose one of the offered objects and started their research on them.
After working through the whole afternoon plus an additional half an hour, we were really tired and glad to walk to the train station to start our two-and-a-half hours journey back to beloved Göttingen.
Looking Back on the summer school
Dr. Dorofeeva was so kind as to shift the starting time of the next day half an hour back so that everyone could get enough sleep for the second week. It was again a mixture of the introduction of different scripts like Uncial and sessions about book bindings, book furniture, or digital tools like digital microscopy that allows a very close look at inks and parchment. The second week flew by so fast, and on Friday we were allowed to look at some precious objects that the library of Göttingen holds before we all had to say goodbye to Dr.Dorofeeva and her great team. It was a wonderful two weeks that taught us a lot.
The use of digital tools is a growing aspect in research and all the more important in palaeography, where computational methods could help identify local scripts and even more. The field is growing, and learning about digital humanities and methods is inevitable. The summer school and Anna Dorofeeva showed me just how important and gave a great introduction to a diverse field of possibilities that need further investigation to apply them to individual research.
I would highly recommend this summer school as it is intense, but it is so valuable, well-structured, and fun.





















