It's all Greek to me

July 22, 2010 8:01 PM

Digital Encyclopaedia of the Hellenic World is a three volume, drill down* cornucopia of information (some sections not published yet - but often with hover over info) for you to get lost in.

*e.g. Constantinople → Events → A → Armenians in Constantinople → Bardas Phokas (Doux of Chaldia).

posted by unliteral (12 comments total)

I guess we've already burned through the '80s and are up to mid-'90s nostalgia now?
posted by b1tr0t at 8:42 PM on July 22, 2010

b1tr0t: I don't know whether you're confusedly commenting on Duck Stab or Grease but either way, they were both from the '70s.
posted by unliteral at 9:12 PM on July 22, 2010

Hello, Hellenes! Thank you very much, unliteral.
posted by Iridic at 9:18 PM on July 22, 2010

I was thinking more of the awkward navigation that is strangely stuck in a book-like metaphor.

There seems to be a lot of information here, but they have gone to extraordinary efforts to make it difficult to find and read.
posted by b1tr0t at 9:33 PM on July 22, 2010

Hell yes!
posted by turgid dahlia at 9:44 PM on July 22, 2010

This has so much potential, but it seems like it needs way more people filling in holes. I mean, this is a fucking fascinating piece of history, but you get hardly anything here re: which pieces were moved and why.
posted by oinopaponton at 10:50 PM on July 22, 2010

oinopaponton: You need to Go to Entry.
posted by unliteral at 11:25 PM on July 22, 2010 [1 favorite]

I would really like to see a good interactive atlas of the ancient world. The Perseus Project started well but isn't as good now as it once was. The Barrington Atlas seems to have sucked the life out of every other project. It costs a mint and, anyway, CD-ROM is not what I'm after. Reading say, Thucydides, is difficult without good maps and they have to be keyed to the time you're reading about, have disambiguation on same-named sites, and include topography. This site has an atlas that's mostly blank.
posted by CCBC at 1:38 AM on July 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

Will this help me win Rome Total War?
posted by Trochanter at 4:59 AM on July 23, 2010

Will this help me win Rome Total War?
Yes. If you say "Got all dirty".
posted by unliteral at 5:40 AM on July 23, 2010

This is promising, despite the frequent gaps and sometimes shaky English. Thanks for the post.
posted by languagehat at 6:59 AM on July 23, 2010

On the other hand, if we had to wait for a perfect finished product, we wouldn't have what he have here right now. One of the improvements of the internet over the printed page is that things like this can be put up before they are "finished" or simply abandoned.

I speak as a die hard print guy without even a kindle, and yeah, it needs a bunch of polishing.
.
posted by IndigoJones at 6:07 PM on July 23, 2010