In today’s post, Raúl Cervera Álvarez (Universitat de Barcelona) introduces the REDIF Database, an ongoing project that allows users to learn about and research different agents of the Hispanic Monarchy across the globe. 🔗 www.ub.edu/redif/ 🔗 digitalorientalist.com/2026/01/09/t...

Old Turkic word of the day /kapan/ "basin, bowl, plate, tray" (cf. 盆 pén) as in the Magi text, p2, ll. 4-5 (image from Müller, ms now lost) /bir kapan-da urup kigürdi-lär/ "they set (the gifts) on a tray and brought them in"

In our latest blog post, So Miyagawa @somiyagawa.bsky.social presents the Bibliotheca Alexandrina's pioneering #digitalhumanities work. Through its diverse digitisation projects, the library is expanding access to Egypt’s rich documentary heritage. 🔗 digitalorientalist.com/2026/01/06/d...

Jacob of Sarug on the Christmas Star: ܫܠܝܚܐ ܫܠܝܐ ܕܐܠܐ ܒܕܢܚܗ ܠܐ ܡܡܠܠ ܗܘܐ ܐܝܟܢ ܐܟܪܙ ܡܠܦܢܘܬܐ ܘܐܬܩܒܠ ܗܘܐ "A silent messenger that didn't speak except by its radiance—how did it announce its teaching, how was it received?" šliḥā šalyā ḏ-ellā ḇ-ḏenḥeh lā mmallel-wā aykan aḵrez mallp̄ānutā w-eṯqabbal-wā

it's interesting that Ancient Egyptian (Coptic ⲟⲩⲟⲉⲓ /woy/ < <wy> */way/) and Proto-Indo-European (*wáy) have the exact same "woe!" interjection. this seems like either a wanderwort or one of those para-linguistic utterances that keep reinventing themselves (papa, mama, caca)

In our latest blog post, Leon Woltermann argues that distant reading (looking for patterns across large collections of texts) can help expose this bias by recentering the “great unread,” especially poems and short fiction scattered across periodicals. 🔗 digitalorientalist.com/2026/01/02/u...

For #TBT this week, we’re revisiting Alice Casalini’s @alicecasalini.bsky.social Jan 2024 post. In this post, Alice discusses her experiment using Canva and Leonardo.Ai to reconstruct a Gandhāran stūpa and the ethical challenges of applying AI in DH research. 🔗 digitalorientalist.com/2024/01/09/a...

Parthian word of the day /pawāg/ (cf. NP پاك pāk; Skt/Pali pāvaka) "pure, holy" as in Sundermann, MKG 1879-1881 /awāɣōn bāmistūn ispurrīg mard, čē pad hawīn panǰ padmōžan pawāgān padmōxt ištēd/ "Such is the Column of Glory, the Complete Person, who has been clothed in the five pure garments"

Parthian word of the day /wxāz-, wxāšt/ "want, seek" as in Sundermann, MKG 1610-1611 /im čē-m až tō wxāšt ō man wāžāh/ "You should tell me what I asked for!"

Old Uyghur word of the day /bursoŋ/ "community, congregation, saṅgha" (< Sgd /pursang/ < 佛僧 fó sēng) as in Zieme, FUB 109.26-27 /bursoŋ kuvragıg iki yartım kıltım ärsär/ "if we have split the community into factions" (NB hendiadys: /bursoŋ kuvrag/)

Old Georgian word of the day წარგრაგნა "wrap up" as in Lk 2:12 Ad ჰპოოთ ყრმაჲ იგი წარგრაგნილი სახუეველთა, მწოლარე ბაგასა "you'll find the baby wrapped up in blankets, lying in a manger"

For #TBT, we’re revisiting “Using Python to Analyze Greek New Testament Manuscripts” by Zach Butler. Zach demonstrates how to use simple Python code and Jupyter Notebooks to analyze New Testament Greek manuscripts stored in XML-TEI format. 🔗 digitalorientalist.com/2024/01/12/u...

In our latest blog post, Lu Wang (Western University) introduces the database "China’s Historical Products" (中華歷代物產數據庫), featuring a full-text serachable collection of "Products in Local Chronicles" (方志物產). 🔗Read more: digitalorientalist.com/2025/12/23/p... 🔗 中華歷代物產數據庫: wuchan.ancientbooks.cn

A friend of mine is now the social media manager for Digital Orientalist. She ordered me to repost everything and told me to make my Bluesky friends do the same. Choose your friends wisely 😱😱😱

In out latest blogpost "AI Bias-Cancelling for the Interpretation of a Late Qing Dynasty Text," Hong-Yu Hsien (Independent Scholar) introduces the "Bias-Cancelling" method: using AI to reduce a reader's subjective bias, paving the way for a deeper understanding of historical texts. link below⬇️

🌲1️⃣9️⃣🎁 DiⒶgnostic On 31 August 2023, the very last day of my sabbatical year 2022/3, I was informed by the IRC (@researchireland.ie) of the award of an Advanced Laureate Award for ‘DiⒶgnostic – Tracing Diatopic Variation in a Corpus of Old Irish’. This four-year project started in December 2023. 📖

For this week's #TBT Throwback Thursday, we’re revisiting "The Biblical Hebrew Reader Generator" by Jonathan Robker (Universität Münster). In this post, Jonathan introduces a powerful tool that allows you to create a list of Hebrew verses with an automatically generated glossary. (link below)⬇️

Weekly Georgian Etymology: ზღარბი zğarbi 'hedgehog', from Middle Georgian გძღარბი gdzğarbi, from Old Georgian ႢႰႻႶႠႡႨ grdzğabi, compound of Kartvelian *grdz- long and ğab- jowl, from Arabic غَبْغَب ğabğab- chin. The Southern White-Breasted species is endemic to the Caucasus.

Syriac sentence of the day: ܚܡܪܐ ܥܠ ܐܪܥܐ ܐܫܕ ܗܘܐ. ܘܡ̈ܐܢܐ ܒܚܢܗ ܣܐܡ ܗܘܐ. ḥamrā ʕal arʕā āšeḏ=wā w-mānē ḇ-ḥanneh sā'em=wā "He was spilling the wine on the ground and putting the goblets in his lap." (Alexander the Great, in disguise as his own ambassador, being a dick in the court of Darius III)

Why are older generations embracing Hallyu? Our latest piece by Virgine Borges de Castilho Sacoman (University of North Texas) explores how pop culture is rewriting the narrative of aging through the lens of Digital Humanities. Read more: digitalorientalist.com/2025/12/16/d... #DH #Kpop #Hallyu

Parthian word of the day /dibīrīft/ "script, scribal knowledge & practice" as in Sundermann, MKG 1316-1320 /kadām dibīrīft ast čē hasēnagistar ud abardar až harwīn dibīrīft čē pad wisp šahr/ "Which script is the oldest, the supreme script among all the scripts in the whole world?"

Five time-words in this Coptic sentence (Epist. Mani, 82.4-7, ed. Gardner): ϯⲣ̅ⲙⲛ̅ⲧⲣⲉ ⲛⲏⲧⲛ̅ ⲛⲁϣⲏⲣ[ⲉ …] ϫⲉ ⲁⲛⲁⲕ ⲛ̅ⲥⲁⲡ ⲛⲓⲙ ⲙⲛ̅ⲟⲩⲛⲟⲩ ⲛⲓⲙ ⲛ̅ⲧⲉⲡⲁ[…] ϯⲉⲓⲣⲉ ⲙ̅ⲙⲁϥ ⲛ̅ⲧⲟⲩϣⲏ ⲙⲛ̅ⲡϩⲟⲟⲩⲉ· ⲙ̅ⲡⲛⲉⲩ ⲉ[ⲓ̈ⲥ]ⲁⲡⲥⲡ̅ ⲙ̅ⲡⲙ̅ⲧⲟ ⲁⲃⲁⲗ ⲙ̅ⲡⲁⲓ̈ⲱⲧ ⲥⲁⲡ occasion, time (S ⲥⲟⲡ) ⲟⲩⲛⲟⲩ hour ⲟⲩϣⲏ night ϩⲟⲟⲩⲉ day (S ϩⲟⲟⲩ) ⲛⲉⲩ hour, time (S ⲛⲁⲩ) ET ⬇️

The most important thing I learned in Vienna this week: I always thought the logo said “univeristät wien”, until a friend told me it’s actually “տiversität”. The first letter is an Armenian տ (t)! 😆

Syriac word of the day ܕܝܘܬܐ /dyuṯå/ "ink" as in BL add. 14615, f. 20r ܠܐ ܐܫ̇ܟܚܬ ܕܠܟܪܛܝܣܐ ܘܠܕܝܘܬܐ ܐܗܝܡܢ ܐܢܘܢ /lå ʔeškḥeṯ da-l-karṭiså w-la-ḏyuṯå ʔehaymen-ennon/ "I couldn't entrust them to paper and ink" /dyuṯå/ has analogs in OJ/JBA/Mand, alongside Heb /dyō/; also Arabic /dawāh/ "inkwell"

Weekly Georgian Etymology: ტყვია ṭq̇via 'bullet', from Old Georgian ႲႷჃႥႨ ṭq̇wivi lead, from Kartvelian *ṭq̇wi- lead, poss. an ancient loan from a north Caucasian source: Lezgic *naIƛ̣:(ʷ)V blue, Abkhaz-Adyghean *ƛ̣ʷV blue, iron. Metals often get their names from their color.

Kind of a funny experiment: I created a word cloud for Balavariani (the Georgian version of Barlaam and Josaphat). As I can’t find a list of stopwords for Old Georgian, I used the tokenizer and PoS tags from Stanford Stanza to remove stopwords. See what the most frequent words are after that 😂:

Why does the statue of Moses in Palais de Rumine (Lausanne) have horns? This is a long-lasting iconographic convention of Moses in the Latin West, stemming from a (mis)translation in the Latin Vulgate Bible (Exodus 34:29, 30, 35):

Old Georgian word of the day სიბნელჱ "darkness" (< ბნელი "dark") as in Autobio ps-Dion (Peeters/Abuladze), §8 დაადგრა სიბნელჱ იგი ექუს ჟამით გან ვიდრე მეცხრედ ჟამადმდე "the darkness lasted from the sixth hour to the ninth"

Why should Tangut script be classified as chaotic evil? Here is one example: 𗡮𗵽 śwo² nllu² '美好, 端正, beautiful'. See the difference between the two? 😆 Source: shs.hal.science/halshs-00174...

Chinese word of the day 樂 lè "enjoy, like, love" as in Traité (ed. Lieu & Mikkelsen), 230-231 一者不樂久住一處 yizhe bule jiuzhu yichu "first, they don't like staying in one place too long" The subject is 電那勿 diannawu ≈ Sgd /δēnāβar/, Pa /dēnāβar/ religious, devout (cf. MP /dēnwar/).

Some Parthian taste-words from Sundermann, MKG 849ff.: /wxašan/ "taste" /nameδk/ "salt" /trifšīft/ "bitterness" /dažnagīft/ "spicyness, sharpness" /šiftagīft/ "sweetness"

Old Georgian word of the day შეწუხება "annoy, bother, irritate" as in Limonarion, ed. Abuladze, 11.2-3 შემაწუხებს ჩუენ იგი "he's bothering us" (შე-მ-ა-წუხ-ებ-ს pres 3s O1)

Georgian/Armenian word of the day: Ge. ქურუმი kurumi 'pagan priest' Arm. քուրմ kʿowrm 'pagan priest' <- Syr. ܟܘܡܪܐ kūmrā 'pagan priest'

Georgian compound words with ცა ca 'sky'

Parthian word of the day /wašend/ "hungry" as in Sundermann, MKG 805-806 /pad wuzurg aβɣām, wašend ud tišend/ "in great agony, hungry and thirsty"

Today I stumbled upon an open-access article in the new edited volume "Connected Philology" by someone who has the exact same name as me and also works at the Université de Lausanne. Very suspicious 👀 #shamelessselfpromotion www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...

Weekly Georgian Etymology: ბაჟე baže 'walnut sauce with garlic', from Megrelian ბაჟა baža, from Georgian ბაჟი baži toll, duty, tax, from Old Georgian ႡႠႯႨ baži, from Middle Persian bāǰ tax, from Old Persian 𐎲𐎠𐎪𐎶 tribute. It gets its name metaphorically from its enriched flavor.

Parthian word of the day /angaw-/ "rest, find rest" as in Sundermann, MKG 802-804 /kaδ ahād kaδ ōδ yādān ud angawān ud āb wxarān/ "When will I ever get there, and I can rest and drink some water?" (including four subjunctives: one 3s and three 1s)

Richard Sproat: "The Relevance of Heraldry to Writing Systems" @ www.youtube.com/watch?v=jF4c... Many thanks for the upload! 🙏 Couldn't attend the talk on that day unfortunately.

Parthian word of the day /dašnag/ "dagger" 🗡️ (< /dašn/ "right hand/side") as in Sundermann, MKG 807-809 /aδyān mard ēw bazzakkar až hō kadag bēh āsēndēh kē dašnag pad dašt dārēd/ "then a bad guy came out of the house with a dagger in his hand"

Old Uyghur word of the day /edi/ owner, possessor as in T II K 2a I v, top (ed. Lieu, Old Turk., p. 46) /kutlug bolzun bo bitig edisi/ "May this book's owner be favored!"

Weekly Georgian Etymology: კეცი ḳeci 'ceramic pan', from Old Georgian ႩႤႺႨ ḳeci wine vessel, from Proto-Kartvelian *ḳec- ceramic vessel, loan from/into Nakh-Daghestanian *kɨ̄ṭV- vessel: cf. Chechen kad pot, Tsez ḳoṭi cup, Udi kot:o-war pan. Ancient pan-Caucasian Wanderwort.

Another 3 vols. (110-112) of the journal Acta Asiatica went online today, meaning that after almost a decade my paper on "Foreign Sources on the History of the Japanese Language" (2016) is finally accessible online: doi.org/10.69382/act... 🙏 Make sure to check out the other contributions as well!

Syriac word of the day ܐܬܢܬܦ /ʔeṯnṯep̄/ "be drawn, dragged, enticed, distracted" as in Evag., Lett. to Melania, BL add. 14578, f. 191vb ܠܗܠܝܢ ܟܠܗܝܢ ܐܬܢܬܦ ܪܥܝܢܝ /l-hålēn kul-hēn ʔeṯnṯep̄ reʕyån/ "my mind got distracted by all these things"

Weekly Georgian Etymology: ლეკვი leḳvi 'puppy', from Old Georgian ႪႤႩႥႨ leḳvi, from Georgian-Zan *leḳw-, an ancient loan from Indo-European *lúkʷos, metathesis of *wĺ̥kʷos 'wolf': cf. Greek λύκος, Proto-Italic *lukʷos. It is thus cognate to English wolf and Latin lupus.

News story on the book launch for /The Pearlsong/ a few weeks ago

Nice blogpost on (Chinese) Missionary Linguistcs by Otto Zwartjes (Paris), "[Q]uand les langues du monde s’ouvrent aux regards européens", tinyurl.com/yx9sttae.

The Quran displays various arrangements of mysterious, disconnected letters. The magico-sacred aspect of the alphabet stretches far into the pre-Islamic past. This Safaitic text begins with a prayer to Allāt followed by a partial abecedary. Find more: ociana.osu.edu/inscriptions...

Sanskrit/Tibetan/Tangut quote of the day: Bodhicaryāvatāra 6.10 (ed. Solonin 2025 www.academia.edu/144598049/Bo...)

#Incredible ! There is good evidence that Greek literacy was relatively widespread among the ancient Arabs east of Ḥawrān. Here, our #Safaitic author partially writes out the Safaitic letters in the Greek order, omitting vowels! Find more on #OCIANA: ociana.osu.edu/inscriptions...