| 1. GUIDED TOUR
A basic 10 minute guided tour that shows the major features of the database is available. Please CLICK here for more.2.
INTRODUCTION
2.1 Early Encounters in North America provides sophisticated searching across large numbers of primary documents, as well as table of contents access to a wide array of primary sources. It also provides databases of encounters and images. For novices who wish to get quick access to key documents, we recommend using the Tables of Contents and the Simple Search tools. For scholars who wish to conduct in-depth searches we recommend using the Advanced Search and Find Sections Search. The search value of some of the fields in the database will not become apparent until more documents are added. There are three basic ways to use the database.
2.3 DATABASE STRUCTURE - SECTIONS AND SOURCES There are three types of documents in the database
The Search Navigation Bar lets you move around the database retrieval tools, including the Search tools. It is the same as the Tables of Contents tool bar, except that the Search tools are expanded, and the Tables of Contents tools are reduced. You can toggle between the two by clicking Tables of Contents in the red section indicated above. (The graphic above is just an illustration; it does not have live links.) The Search tools are divided into three separate categories, all of which search the texts in the database and return documents:
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| 2.5 TABLE OF CONTENTS NAVIGATION BAR The Tables of Contents Navigation Bar lets you move around the Tables
of Contents tools. It works in the same way as the Search Tool bar. When
using these tools, the Tables of Contents are expanded and the Full Text
Searches are collapsed. You can toggle between the two by clicking Tables
of Contents or Search. The Tables of Contents are divided into eleven separate categories, all
of which provide quick access to specific documents within the database.
2.6 Materials in the database have been transcribed using original spellings and grammar. In some documents spelling is inconsistent, even within a sentence. For more information on mark-up conventions, contact the Editor. PhiloLogic, a suite of software developed by the ARTFL Project at the University of Chicago in collaboration with The University of Chicago Library's electronic text services, provides sophisticated searching of large encoded databases on the World Wide Web. It is an easy to use yet powerful full-text search, retrieval, and reporting system for large multimedia databases (texts, images, sound) with the ability to handle complex text structures with extensive indexed metadata. PhiloLogic in its simplest form serves as a document retrieval or look up mechanism whereby users can search relational databases retrieve given documents and, in some implementations, portions of texts such as acts, scenes, articles, or head-words. This same document retrieval mechanism serves as the basis for defining a corpus in a full-text search. One can, for example, either retrieve all documents in a database written by women from 1935 through 1945 or one can search for words or phrases within database which fit those criteria. The typical PhiloLogic search is broken down into five distinct stages: 1) defining a corpus (i.e. limiting a search), 2) word expansion, 3) word index searching, 4) text extraction, and 5) link resolution and formatting (e.g., SGML to HTML conversion). In other words, after defining a corpus (or one may search an entire database), one can execute a single term, phrase or proximity search. By looking up indices of the word(s) in a relational database, PhiloLogic extracts blocks of text containing the search term(s) with links to larger blocks of text. These extracts are formatted to display on a Web browser and sometimes include links to images, sound recordings, other texts, or even other databases. In addition to simple word and phrase searches, users can perform more sophisticated searches by using extended UNIX-style regular expressions for complex wildcard searching and, in some implementations, morphological and orthographic expansion. All of these mechanisms to expand words can be combined using Boolean operators such as OR (the vertical bar "|") and AND (a space) within a variety of searching contexts. Its functions were originally designed for scholarly research in databases of literary, religious, philosophical, and historical collections of texts as well as important historical encyclopedias and dictionaries. PhiloLogic handles notes so as not to interfere with phrase searching. Users can easily search words with diacritics (either by specifying accents or ignoring them by typing in uppercase) and non-Romanized scripts. At present there are some fifty databases on the Web under PhiloLogic containing languages such as ancient Greek, Latin, Hindi, and Urdu as well as nearly all Western European languages. PhiloLogic can also be set up to recognize or ignore manuscript notations such as different brackets, which can indicate spurious text or editorial emendations. Because the software recognizes typical text structures as real data objects, it understands units, such as words, sentences, paragraphs, sections, and pages, permitting very flexible searching and retrieval of these textual objects. Other full-text engines on the market search for strings of characters. Rather than searching for two words within the same sentence or paragraph (intellectual units), other engines must search for two words within a certain number of characters regardless of sentence or paragraph. With PhiloLogic scholars always know where they are in a given text since pagination can be displayed along side other objects. Such a high degree of indexing can lead to decreases in speed, PhiloLogic indexing has been maximized such that it is still incredibly fast on the Web. For more information on PhiloLogic, contact Catherine Mardikes, ETS Coordinator, The University of Chicago Library. |
| Search Texts | Find Tools | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simple Search | Advanced Search | Letters Only | Find Author | Find Sources | Find Encounters | Find Images | ||
| 1 | Age at Death | x | ||||||
| 2 | Artist | x | ||||||
| 3 | Author Name | x | x | x | x | x | ||
| 4 | Author of Source Work | x | ||||||
| 5 | Author's Gender | x | x | x | x | |||
| 6 | Cultural Affiliation | x | x | x | ||||
| 7 | Cultural Events | x | ||||||
| 8 | Cultural Groups | x | x | |||||
| 9 | Description [of Encounter] | x | ||||||
| 10 | Document Type | x | x | x | ||||
| 11 | Editor or Translator | x | ||||||
| 12 | Encounter Code | x | ||||||
| 13 | Encounter Name | x | x | x | x | |||
| 14 | Encounter Type | x | ||||||
| 15 | Estimated Number of People | x | ||||||
| 16 | Expedition | x | x | x | ||||
| 17 | Fatalities During Encounter | x | ||||||
| 18 | Fauna | x | ||||||
| 19 | Flora | x | ||||||
| 20 | Geophysical Features | x | ||||||
| 21 | Image Color | x | ||||||
| 22 | Image ID | x | ||||||
| 23 | Image Medium | x | ||||||
| 24 | Image Source | x | ||||||
| 25 | Image Subjects | x | ||||||
| 26 | Image Title | x | ||||||
| 27 | Image Type | |||||||
| 28 | Keyword in Caption | x | ||||||
| 29 | Keyword in Content Note | x | ||||||
| 30 | Keyword in Descriptive Note | x | ||||||
| 31 | Keyword in Titles | x | ||||||
| 32 | Language of Edition | x | ||||||
| 33 | Location | x | ||||||
| 34 | Month Written | x | x | |||||
| 35 | Nationality | x | x | x | x | |||
| 36 | Natural Phenomena | x | ||||||
| 37 | Note | x | ||||||
| 38 | Occupation | x | x | |||||
| 39 | Original Language | x | ||||||
| 40 | Participants | x | x | |||||
| 41 | Personal Events | x | ||||||
| 42 | Place of Birth | x | ||||||
| 43 | Place of Death | x | ||||||
| 44 | Place of Publication | x | x | |||||
| 45 | Places Discussed | x | x | |||||
| 46 | Previously Unpublished | x | ||||||
| 47 | Publication Year | x | ||||||
| 48 | Publisher | x | ||||||
| 49 | Race | x | x | x | x | |||
| 50 | Recipient | x | x | |||||
| 51 | Record Number | x | ||||||
| 52 | Religion | x | x | x | x | |||
| 53 | Search Texts | x | x | x | ||||
| 54 | Societal Role | x | x | |||||
| 55 | Start Day | x | ||||||
| 56 | Start Month | x | ||||||
| 57 | Start Year | x | ||||||
| 58 | Subject Headings | x | x | x | x | x | x | |
| 59 | Title of Source Work | x | ||||||
| 60 | Where Sent (Geographical) | x | x | |||||
| 61 | Where Written (Geographical) | x | x | |||||
| 62 | Where Written (Setting) | x | x | |||||
| 63 | Year of Birth | x | ||||||
| 64 | Year of Death | x | ||||||
| 65 | Year Written | x | x | x | ||||
5.2 FIELD DESCRIPTIONS WITH SAMPLE SEARCHES
How to use this field: Key in the number of days or range of days in the box Age at Death. For example, 25 or 40-50.
Practical Example:
Find authors who were aged 50-100 before they died.
Click on the navigation bar to Search Texts
Description: This is the name of the artist who created an artistic work. This will include all variant forms of the artists name including pseudonyms, pennames, nicknames or aliases. The same official form of the name is used regardless of the form used by the artist at the time of creation. It is required.
How to use this field: Enter the name of the artist in the Artist field. This field can be searched using Find Images only.
Practical Example: See Author.
5.2.3 Author NameDescription: This is the name of the author who wrote the text. The name will include all variant forms of the author's name, including pseudonyms, pennames, nicknames, and aliases. The same official form of the name is used regardless of the form used by the author at the time of writing.
Practical Example: Find all text written by John Hariot.
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5.2.4 Author of Source Work
Description: See Author
Description: This field indicates gender of the author.
How to use this field: Use this field to restrict your search to authors of one or the other gender. This option is available in Find Authors, Simple Search, Advanced Search, and Letters Only. Gender is indicated by an M or an F.
Practical Example:Find all letters written by women authors.
Description: This field is used to capture an author's cultural affiliation (i.e. English, American Indian).
How to use this field: Use this field to find works by author's of a particular cultural affiliation. This can be searched in Simple Search, Advanced Search, Letters Only, and Find Authors.
Practical Example: Find all texts by American Indian authors.
Description: This field indicates that a cultural event is being discussed in the document.
How to use this field: Use this field to find information about specific cultural events, such as feasts or gift-giving. Cultural events can be found through the Advanced Search.
Practical Example:
You are looking for documents that are about weddings.
Description: This field contains the names of the cultural groups discussed in the documents.
How to use this field: Use this field to find documents about specific cultural groups. This field is available in Advanced Search and Find Encounters.
Practical Example: Find all documents about encounters with the Huron.
5.2.9 Description [of Encounter]
Description: This field contains descriptions of the encounters found in the database.
How to use this field: Use this field to search descriptions of the encounters found in the database. This field is only available in Find Encounters.
Practical Example: Find all encounters that concern kidnappings.
Description: This field enables you to restrict the kinds of documents you search and retrieve.
How to use this field: Use this field to find specific types (i.e. letters, diaries, narrative, etc.) of documents. This is available in Advanced Search and Find Sources.
Practical Example: Find all speeches by American Indians.
Description: This field enables you to find sources or documents edited or translated by a particular person.
How to use this field: Use this field to find all sources edited or translated by a specific person. This search is available in Find Sources and Find Images.
Practical Example: Find all sources edited by Reuben Gold Thwaites.
Description: Enables you to search for encounters by a numeric code.
How to use this field: Use this field to find a specific encounter. This is only available in Find Encounters.
Practical Example: Find a specific encounter between the Spanish and American Indians.
Description: This field enables you to search encounters by a specific name.
How to use this field: Use this search to find a specific encounter. This is only available in Find Encounters.
Practical Example: Find me all encounters involving the Spanish.
Description: This field contains the type of encounter described in the text.
How to use this field: Use this field to find specific kinds of encounters between cultural groups (i.e. kidnap, battle, trade, etc.). This field is only available in the Find Encounters Field.
Practical Example: Find me all encounters that centered around trade.
5.2.16 Expedition
Description: This field contains names of recognized expeditions.
Expeditions are named based on The Atlas of North American Exploration:
From the Norse Voyages to the Race to the Pole by William H. Goetzman and
Glyndwr Williams.
How to use this field:Use this field to find documents about
specific expeditions.
Practical Example: Find all documents about the the Hernando de Soto
expedition to Florida.
Description: This field contains subject headings related to
animal life in North America.
How to use this field: Use this field to find documents
discussing animal life. This field can only be searched from the Advanced
Search screen.
Practical Example: Find all documents that talk about beavers.
Description: This field holds subject topics which describe plant life in North America.
How to use this field: Use this field to find all documents in the database that discuss a specific plant. This field is available only in Advanced Search.
Practical Example: Find all documents in the database that are about tobacco.
Description: This field holds subject topics which describe North American geophysical feature, such as mountains, rivers, etc.
How to use this field: Use this field to find documents that describe geophysical features found in North America. This field is only available in Advanced Search
Practical Example: Find all documents in the database that describe mountains.
Description: This field allows you to restrict to images with color, or that are black and white. This field does not search all images in the database. It is restricted to images that have value outside of the texts in which they were originally found.
How to use this field: Select the option you want from the pick list. This field is only available in Find Images
Practical Example: Find black and white images in the database.
Description: This field is intended for quick access to a particular image.
How to use this field: Key in the exact Image ID number in the box. Image IDs always take the format Sxxxx-Ixx, where Sxxxx is the source from which the image came and Ixx is the image number within that source. This field is only available in Find Images
Practical Example: Find image S2995-I03.
Description: This field lets you restrict to woodcuts, drawings and other media.
How to use this field: Key in the medium you are looking for into the Image Medium box. This field is only available in Find Images
Practical Example: Restrict your search to Woodcuts.
Description: This field lets you identify all images from a particular archive, or museum. This field is not mandatory and is populated only for manuscript material.
How to use this field: Key in the source you are looking for into the Image Source box. This field is only available in Find Images
Practical Example: Find all images from the University of California.
Description: This field lets you find images of particular topical subjects.
How to use this field: Key in the subject you are looking for into the Image Subject box. To find out what subjects are available, click the terms button to the right of the Image Subject box. This field is only available in Find Images
Practical Example: Find all images of farming.
Description: This field searches the titles of images in the database.
How to use this field: Key in the title you are looking for into the Image Title box. To find out what titles are available, click the terms button to the right of the Image Title box. This field is only available in Find Images
Practical Example: Find all images with Indian in the title.
5.2.27 Image Type (Not currently implemented)
Description: This field describes the kinds of images available in the database (paintings, woodcuts, etc.).
How to use this field: Use this field to limit searches of images to one specific kind of image. This field is not currently implemented.
Practical Example: Find all woodcuts indexed in the database.
Click on the navigation bar to Find Images.
Go to the Image Type field and select woodcuts from the pick list.
Click on the SEARCH button.
The system responds with a list of all woodcuts indexed in the database.
5.2.28 Keyword in Caption
Description: This field contains captions taken directly
from the originals. In cases where the images are referred to within texts, the referring text is included.
How to use this field:
Use this field to search for keywords in captions.
This field is only available in the Find Images.
Practical Example: Find all captions that contain the word dance.
Click on the navigation bar to Find Images.
Go to the Keyword in Caption field and key in dance.
Click on the SEARCH button.
The system responds with a list of all images whose captions contain the word dance. 5.2.29 Keyword in Content Note or Keyword in Descriptive Note
Description: Content Notes are created by our editors to describe the contents of images. Descriptive Notes are created by
our editors for information about the image itself - for example, questions of provenance, earlier versions etc...
How to use this field:
Use these fields to search for keywords in content notes or descriptive notes.
This field is only available in the Find Images.
Practical Example: Find all content notes that contain the word Indian.
Click on the navigation bar to Find Images.
Go to the Keyword in Content Note box and key in Indian.
Click on the SEARCH button.
The system responds with a list of all images that have content notes that contain the word Indian.
How to use thi