DIAMM (the Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music) is a world-leading resource for the study of medieval manuscripts. Its website presents information on thousands of manuscripts, as well as nearly 15,000 images and associated metadata. DIAMM also provides a home for scholarly resources and editions, undertakes digital restoration of damaged manuscripts and documents, publishes high-quality facsimiles, and offers its expertise through consultancy.
For more information about DIAMM, its activities, research projects, consultancy and collaborations, please click here
With a growing online collection freely available to view on the internet, the project seeks both to conserve and make widely available high-quality digital images of European music manuscripts from the 13th to the 16th centuries. Scholars and students can make public and private annotations to images as well as create saved custom collections of sources to aid in their research, and the database will soon provide a searchable piece-by-piece inventory of the more than 2600 manuscripts indexed by the project.
Founded by Dr Margaret Bent and Professor Andrew Wathey in 1998, the project is managed by Dr Julia Craig-McFeely (Research Fellow in the Faculty of Music), who is also one of the project’s directors, along with with Professor Thomas Schmidt (University of Manchester) and Professor Elizabeth Eva Leach (Faculty of Music and St. Hugh’s College, Oxford). Leading scholars in the field, and those intimately involved with manuscript study and conservation in the major research libraries in the UK and abroad also contribute generously to the project in their capacity as members of the board.
In addition to the manuscripts, the online resource provides access to images of the two major manuscript catalogues dealing with sources from this period – RISM and the Census Catalogue – with searchable electronic versions of their content for all the manuscripts they list. Since the publication of these catalogues, numerous new sources have come to light, and DIAMM is currently the most comprehensive access point for information and listings of all known manuscripts. The content is updated regularly, and scholarly contributions are acknowledged.
DIAMM’s activities have extended beyond the development of the online resource to encompass the production of printed facsimiles of music sources. Two such publications have won the American Musicological Society’s annual award for best edition (2009, 2011). Other early music resources, including editions, an archive of doctoral theses, a VLE (virtual learning environment) for the study of fourteenth-century notation, and other teaching and learning materials.
DIAMM Publications
DIAMM Publications are available to buy on the University’s online store here . Booksellers need to complete an order form available here and email to finance@music.ox.ac.uk
The Project Manager acts as a consultant for a wide variety of digitization initiatives worldwide, including the National Library of Ireland digitization programme, the Israel Antiquities Authority Dead Sea Scrolls digitization initiative, and various projects in which the highest quality of digital imaging and image management is required.
