FragmAnt

On the 772 Latin authors, of which we kept the memory, 276 are only names; for 352 of them we possess only fragments and only the 144 which remain preserved one or several works. Yet, despite the importance of the fragments for our full understanding of Latin literature and culture, fragmentary literature is still a terra incognita. In the field of fragmentary Latin literature, research has largely taken the path of ecdotics and paper editions. However, this approach often proves unsatisfactory, because it hardly highlights the process of citation of the fragments and relies on the arbritrary reconstruction of a text whose veracity is unverifiable. The FragmAnt project (Ancient Fragments: citation and reception of early fragmentary Latin literature) aims to study the citation and reception of republican fragmentary Latin literature through the analysis and study of the contexts in which the fragments are cited and the provision to the scientific community of a digital critical edition of the fragments. It is hypothesized that the digital tool will compensate for the shortcomings of paper editions and that the collection and digital processing of fragments and their citation contexts will allow for a better understanding of the reception of these authors and their works in antiquity, the networks of reception and citation, and finally the modalities of citation among the Latins.