Homeric and Homeopathic Archival Collection

Overview

The Homeric and Homeopathic Archival Collection is a digital assemblage that unites two distinct thematic groups: (1) the first four books of Homer’s Odyssey—the “Telemachy,” presented as plain‑text transcriptions (book01.txt – book04.txt); and (2) a set of German‑language scanned documents from a 1900 homoeopathic academy archive, supplied as high‑resolution JPEG images with OCR transcriptions. Both groups are catalogued in the PINAX repository and are accessible via a single collection record (ID 01KCJ7MV09G4P5K51WW4GR5SM9).

Background

The Odyssey texts derive from a public‑domain translation of the ancient Greek epic (c. 800–700 BCE) and are accompanied by a PINAX metadata record that identifies Homer as creator and supplies bibliographic details (language, subjects, geographic references). The homoeopathic materials originate from the “Telemachy Scan Collection” (1900), created by C. Hering and associated with an unnamed academy devoted to homoeopathic medicine. These documents reflect early‑20th‑century efforts to systematize clinical case reports, procedural guidelines, and distribution plans for a professional correspondence journal.

Contents

• Odyssey Books I–IV: Four plain‑text files covering Telemachus’s assembly, his voyages to Pylos and Sparta, and the suitors’ conspiracies; metadata lists subjects such as Tele­machus, Penelope, and Greek mythological locations.
• Homeopathic Archive Scans: A series of JPEG scans (e.g., scan_telemachy1.jpg) with OCR text that includes theoretical rationales for materia‑medica organization, case summaries (e.g., Silicea Xo treatments), administrative proposals for an “Archivzettel” system, a distribution plan for the Correspondenzblatt periodical, financial terms, and a meeting announcement for the Northampton Society (27 April 1900).

Scope

The collection spans two disparate domains: literary scholarship of early Greek epic poetry (c. 800 BCE) and historical medical documentation of German‑language homoeopathic practice (1900). Geographic coverage includes the Mediterranean world of the Odyssey (Ithaca, Pylos, Sparta, etc.) and German locales such as Altenau and Northampton. Temporal coverage is limited to the ancient narrative period for the Odyssey texts and the spring of 1900 for the homoeopathic documents. The collection provides researchers with primary literary material and a snapshot of early modern medical archival practices, but does not contain the full journals or later books of the Odyssey.