About the ARTFL Project's Encyclopédie Plate Search interface

This search form allows users to search for plate images contained within Volumes 18 through 28 of the Encyclopédie of Diderot and d'Alembert. Users can execute searches using either a plate group name or keywords drawn from plate description text. Boolean OR operators will expand queries in both search fields. Search results can be sorted by plate order or, for keyword searches, by ranked relevancy of the query term. Searches yield 24 results maximum per page.

Search results come with links to view and interact with individual images or entire plate groups in a IIIF (International Image Interoperability Framework) viewer. The viewing platform displays images by drawing upon a IIIF manifest, a JSON file that contains metadata about the images and technical instructions to the server regarding image delivery. ARTFL's Encyclopédie manifests are publicly available so that users can work with the plate images across platforms and alongside digital objects from other IIIF collections.

The viewing platform allows users to examine images in extremely close detail; read the figure description and image metadata in a sidebar on the left; compare several images at a time side by side or in a grid; and import and export workspaces, collections of IIIF manifests that the user has assembled. We hope to have image annotation enabled soon.

This resource is ARTFL's first foray into the world of IIIF manifests and viewing platforms. Please do not hesitate to contact us with comments or questions.