This unique book critically evaluates the virtual representation of the past through digital media. A distinguished team of leading experts in the field approach digital research in history and archaeology from contrasting viewpoints, including philosophical, methodological and technical. They illustrate the challenges involved in representing the past digitally by focusing on specific cases of a particular historical period, place or technical problem.

Contents: Introduction, Mark Greengrass; Part I The Virtual Representation of Text: The imaging of historical documents, Andrew Prescott; Virtual restoration and manuscript archaeology, Meg Twycross; Representations of sources and data: working with exceptions to hierarchy in historical documents, Donald Spaeth. Part II Virtual Histories and Pre-Histories: Finding Meanings: Finding needles in haystacks: data-mining in distributed historical datasets, Fabio Ciravegna, Mark Greengrass, Tim Hitchcock, Sam Chapman, Jamie McLaughlin and Ravish Bhagdev; Digital searching and the re-formulation of historical knowledge, Tim Hitchcock; Using computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software in collaborative historical research, Caroline Bowden; Stepping back from the trench edge: an archaeological perspective on the development of standards for recording and publication, Julian D. Richards and Catherine Hardman. Part III The Virtual Representation of Place and Time: Which? What? When? On the virtual representation of time, Manfred Thaller; In the kingdom of the blind: visualization and e-science in archaeology, the arts and humanities, Vincent Gaffney; Using geographical information systems to explore space and time in the humanities, Ian Gregory; Spatial technologies in archaeology in the 21st century, Paul Cripps. Part IV The Virtual Representation of Historical Objects and Events: Digital artefacts: possibilities and purpose, David Arnold; 'Oh, to make boards to speak! There's a task!' Towards a poetics of paradata, Richard Beacham; Electronic corpora of artefacts: the example of the Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland, Anna Bentkowska-Kafel; Conclusion: virtual representation of the past: new research methods, tools and communities of practice, Lorna Hughes; Appendix; Bibliography; Index.