Perhaps it is fitting that students and scholars interested in the medieval world have to grapple with fiefdoms in order to find information dating to the period – though that doesn’t make it any less frustrating. But the days of searching through scattered online resources will soon be history.
Researchers are in the process of pulling together a website bringing together scores of electronic resources on medieval subjects, including literature, history, theology, architecture, art history and philosophy. Creation of a centralized search engine for medieval materials would be a big step forward. At present, for example, those interested in studying the medieval era may have to visit dozens of different sites to search for documents related to their research topics, from King Arthur to church history to the Hundred Years’ War. And that’s assuming they know how to find those sites in the first place.
The new site, which is part of a larger project called the Medieval Electronic Scholarly Alliance (MESA), will allow users to search all of these sites at once – streamlining the research process and hopefully bringing to light resources a scholar may have otherwise missed. The site is scheduled to launch by the end of the year, and will initially cover Europe and the Mediterranean world from roughly 450 A.D. to 1450 A.D.
Click here to read this article from Medievalists.net
