Towards a linked open data resource for direct speech acts in Greek and Latin epic

The Digital Initiative for Classics: Epic Speeches (DICES) research group reports here on preliminary work to integrate research on Greek and Latin epic speeches into the larger ecosystem of linked open data (LOD) for classical scholarship. The ability to collate speech data from different researchers and to leverage external repositories of texts and characters opens up new possibilities for interrogation of the epic corpus. We briefly survey the current state of scholarship on epic speeches and of the digital infrastructure on which we propose to build. We outline a model for harmonizing speech data across studies and aligning it with existing LOD standards. Finally, we discuss some early proof-of-concept results and the larger implications of this approach for the field. The long-term aim of the DICES project is to build a database of metadata on direct speech in Greek and Latin epic, not only covering canonical texts such as Homer and Virgil, but also including the less-studied texts of the late antique period, which will benefit greatly both from the increased accessibility and also from the diachronic perspective afforded by a corpus-based approach. The envisioned database also has the potential to include diachronic data from additional genres and languages at a later stage.