The Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative: A Primer

Published by Shiyanthi Thavapalan on

Dear Mar Shiprim readers,

This month we thank Rune Rattenborg & Émilie Pagé-Perron for creating an introductory primer for using the CDLI to browse, search, edit and cite artifacts uploaded to the platform by a team of volunteers going back to three generations of scholars. We hope this primer will be useful to students and scholars new to the platform as well as to seasoned users who may be interested in contributing to CDLI. Rune and Émilie also share some of the platform’s aspirations for the future.

Look out for more primers in the future – are there topics or tools within Assyriology and related fields you’d like us to cover? Get in touch at .

With warm wishes,
Pavla Rosenstein
Mar Shiprim Editor

 

1 Introduction

Welcome to the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (CDLI) primer! This guide will give you an introduction to the history of the CDLI and a basic overview of the CDLI research platform and data collections. It will enable you to conduct simple and advanced searches of the hundreds of thousands of artifacts in the database, filter and download your search results, register a user account with CDLI in order to edit and contribute data through our crowdsourcing system, understand how you can get the most out of our copious bibliography, and how to cite and reference the CDLI in your work. Finally, we provide some directions on current and future projects of the CDLI.

Figure 1.1: The co-directors of the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (www.cdli.earth). From left to right: Émilie Pagé-Perron, Jacob L. Dahl, Bertrand Lafont, and Jürgen Renn

The data collections of the CDLI hold records on ca. 390,000 artifacts inscribed with cuneiform, including hundreds of thousands of photos, line drawings, and transliterations. Linked to the artifacts are records on ca. 700 archaeological proveniences, ca. 1,200 public and private collections, and a bibliography of ca. 16,000 secondary publications (all figures as of April 2025). The artifact index also includes a steadily growing collection of external resource links, currently counting more than 400,000 links between artifacts in the CDLI and their corresponding record in other databases, making the CDLI as much a main gateway to the wider digital ecosystem of cuneiform studies as an essential database in its own right.

Next to these data collections, the CDLI also houses a series of scholarly journals and papers managed by the editors and the wider CDLI community. All are published in a digital format (.html and, for CDLJ and CDLB, also in .pdf), are entirely free of charge, and fully open access. If you are interested in publishing with us, do get in touch with CDLI editors at cdli@ames.ox.ac.uk. You can take a closer look at the journals and guidelines for submission here:

2 Community

The CDLI is managed by four co-directors (see Figure 1.1) overseeing strategic priorities and daily operations. As of 2025, the directorship of the CDLI consists of Dr Émilie Pagé-Perron (University of York), Professor Jacob L. Dahl (University of Oxford), Professor Bertrand Lafont (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique), and Professor Jürgen Renn (Max-Planck-Instiut für Geoanthropologie). Together, they represent three generations of scholars who have devoted considerable parts of their professional career to the building of the CDLI.

The directors are supported by a larger group of associates and collaborators. Associates are domain experts in Assyriology, archaeology, and computational linguistics advising on aspects of the CDLI data model and platform. Some of them also act as editors of the data collections, reviewing and approving contributions from the user community. Collaborators contribute with expert knowledge on particular bodies of cuneiform inscriptions, for example collections housed in specific museums, or relating to other research databases. They also count seasoned experts in a range of other areas, including digital imaging and modeling, research engineering, data management, and programming. Together with our global community of contributors, these all help to augment and further develop the data collections held by the CDLI.

The CDLI is and always will be entirely non-profit. We rely on public funding, private donations, and scholars, programmers, and translators volunteering their time and expert skills to keep the platform running. If you are interested in contributing to the CDLI community, you are always welcome to contact the editorial team at cdli@ames.ox.ac.uk. Our user community contributes to the platform in a wide number of ways, including not only the preparation of imagery, transliterations, and translations of cuneiform artifacts, but also cleaning and checking of metadata, curating our extensive bibliography, and building extensive related data collections on museum collections and archaeological proveniences, among many other things. Regardless of your level of experience, your skills can certainly be put to use at the CDLI!

If you have the means or the desire to do so, you can also support the CDLI financially through Open Collective, a crowdfounding platform that allows individuals and institutions to donate money to projects through an online platform. It also provides full transparency with regards to contributions and expenses. Anyone can access information on how donations to the CDLI are being spent and on which projects, as you can see from the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (CDLI) Open Collective portal.

3 Getting started

To start you off, let’s go to the main home page (at cdli.earth, see Figure 3.1) and take a look at the menus. This is the default entry point of most visitors to the CDLI, so it will be good for you to know where you can go from here.

Figure 3.1: The top part of the main page of the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (www.cdli.earth), including navigation bars (① and ②), the simple search tool (③), and various shortcuts (④).

To ease access to the search engine, the simple search tool is placed centrally on the main page. This feature also includes a shortcut to the advanced search tool. Below are given shortcuts to the Bibliography, the Browse menu, and the Documentation pages. We will get back to all of these shortly.

In the top of the main home page, you have two sets of navigation bars. The lower one, to the right of the logo, provides you with some essential shortcuts. These include the Browse menu, giving an overview of the different indices, Contribute, which provides instructions to registered users on how to contribute to the data collections, About, for those who want to learn more about the background and history of the CDLI, and Search, which contains a drop-down list leading to the various search features. This navigation bar is available on any page of the CDLI.

In the extreme top right, you find the user navigation bar, which includes features mainly for registered users and administrators. This navigation bar is also available on any page of the CDLI. It includes shortcuts to Publications, namely the various journals published by the CDLI, and Resources, which provides a full overview of the various reference lists, tools, and user manuals related to the CDLI data collections. Finally – if not logged in – you have the Login button where registered users can log into the CDLI, and Register, where you can sign up to be a user with the CDLI if you do not already have an account – or you need to create a new one.

4 Identifiers and indices

A lot of specialist terms and references will appear in the following, so before we dive into the details of searching the artifacts, we will briefly go over the meaning of the most important concepts. For further information on any aspect of the CDLI database, we would always advise you to search the Documentation pages. If you still cannot find what you are looking for, remember that you can always contact CDLI staff at cdli@ames.ox.ac.uk.

First, let us take a look at artifact identifiers, composite numbers, and seal numbers. These are the primary keys for identifying and linking individual artifacts inscribed with cuneiform with unique textual compositions, and with unique seal impressions. Once you understand how these identifiers relate to each other, finding things will be a lot easier. Second, we will look at the many other indices, or data tables, that are linked to the main artifact index. Here you will get an idea of all the different types of data that are connected to individual artifact records in the CDLI, what they mean, and how they can be used to search for the information you need.

4.1 Identifiers

The core of the CDLI data collections is theartifactsindex, which takes the cuneiform artifact as its primary entity. A cuneiform artifact is the physical object upon which a cuneiform inscription is placed. The artifact is recognised by itsartifact identifier. In addition, a unique textual composition can be identified by itscomposite number. A seal, or the impression of a seal on an artifact, can also be identified by itsseal number(see Figure4.1for an example).

Figure 4.1: An inscribed brick of Sennacherib, king of Assyria, giving the artifact identifier P428341 (①) and the composite number Q003563 (②). The tag ‘witness’ (③) indicates that this artifact identifier designates an inscribed artifact related to a composite number (from (https://cdli.earth/P428341).

4.1.1 Artifact identifier

The artifact identifier, or the so-called P-number, is a unique primary key for every individual cuneiform artifact contained in the artifact index of the CDLI. An artifact is any one physical object, or multiple fragments of the same object, inscribed with cuneiform, as well as seals, which may or may not carry an inscription. Artifact identifiers are generated by the CDLI, and consist of a six-digit number. Once assigned to an artifact, artifact identifiers are never reused or reassigned. They provide a permanent and stable digital identifier for all artifacts included in the CDLI and, by extension, for the vast majority of cuneiform inscriptions known around the world. Artifact identifiers can be searched through the artifact index. The stable URI of a CDLI artifact will always include the artifact identifier in the end, so for example https://cdli.earth/P123456.

Note that, contrary to most museum catalogues, an artifact record in the CDLI can include any number of fragments, indicated for example by multiple associated museum or excavation numbers, as long as these have been joined to form a complete or partially complete original artifact. This means that the number of records returned from a search on a particular body of cuneiform artifacts in the CDLI and, say, the catalogue of the British Museum, may not always be the same, since museum catalogues will often count fragments as separate entities.

4.1.2 Composite number

The composite number, also referred to as the Q-number, is a unique primary key for text compositions. A text composition is the unique inscription itself, not the artifact upon which it is inscribed. To take an example, multiple artifacts may bear the same display inscription of Ur-Nammu, so the composite number is a unique identifier of that specific inscription. The composite number consists of a ‘Q’ prefix followed by a six-digit number. composite numbers for cuneiform inscriptions are maintained by the Q Catalogue of the Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus (ORACC). A composite number can be applied to a cuneiform artifact when the text inscribed on that artifact constitutes a witness, that is, a rendition, of the specific text composition. composite numbers can be searched through the artifact index. The stable URI of a composite number found in the CDLI will give the composite number at the end: https://cdli.earth/Q000001.

A composite number has its own dedicated artifact record, and therefore its own dedicated artifact identifier, in the artifacts index of the CDLI. As you may have guessed, composite numbers are managed by an ORACC project because many subprojects at ORACC are ordered according to unique compositions, not unique artifacts. A composite number can be linked to several different artifacts bearing the same textual composition. At CDLI, we call the linked artifact a ‘witness’ to the composite, and the composition record itself the ‘composite’. This will appear immediate below the header on the individual artifact record (see Figure 4.1), and can also be selected in the filters. A composite number also allows for the creation of scores, namely the comparative arrangement of renditions of the same composition from different artifacts. You can search scores in the Composite Texts section of the Resources page.

4.1.3 Seal number

The seal number is a unique primary key for a specific seal, including the iconographic element as well as any cuneiform inscription it may have. Note that the CDLI includes seals both with and without cuneiform inscriptions. The seal number consists of a ‘S’ prefix followed by a six-digit number. A seal number can be linked to a cuneiform artifact when said artifact is either the cylinder or stamp seal identified with the seal number, or when said artifact carries an impression from said seal. Seal numbers can be searched through the artifact index. The stable URI of a seal number found in the CDLI will give the seal number at the end: https://cdli.earth/S000001.

A seal number also has its own dedicated artifact record, and therefore its own dedicated artifact identifier, in the artifacts index of the CDLI. Like composite numbers, a seal number can be linked to several different artifacts, provided that each artifact carries part or all of an impression of the same physical seal. The seal number itself will then designate the physical seal used to make the impression. A seal in the CDLI artifact index can then be labelled ‘physical’ if the seal itself has actually been found, or ‘composite’ if it has only been inferred from an impression. This will appear immediate below the header on the individual artifact record, and can also be selected in the filters. Just like with composite numbers, seal numbers allow us to integrate information about seals across a wide range of artifacts. You can find out more about our seals data in the Seal Portal section of the Resources page.

4.2 Indices

Okay, so the main index of the CDLI contains artifact records, identified by artifact identifiers. Some of these artifact records are linked together by composite numbers and seal numbers, which indicate relationships relating either to the particular textual composition inscribed on an artifact or the seal impressed upon an artifact. These are the three essential dimensions of the artifacts index at CDLI. Now, let us try to expand a bit on all the other things that the artifacts index ties together.

Most of the basic information, or metadata, associated with an artifact found in the CDLI is drawn from separate indices, or data tables. The home page of the CDLI will lead you to the artifacts index, but it is important to know the existence of at least some of the related indices.

You can find an alphabetically ordered list of all publicly available indices of the CDLI on the Browse page. This overview can be reached from any other location on the CDLI by using ‘Browse’ in the navigation bar on the top right. You can reach any index of the CDLI directly through the URL of that index – see the list below for some of them.

These indices are controlled vocabularies, meaning that they contain a list of carefully curated unique values that are the same throughout the database. Both simple search and advanced search of the artifact index can use these indices as filters. They can only be edited or expanded by registered users, and most of them only by CDLI editors. In the next section of this primer, we will demonstrate how you filter by categories in artifact search to further refine your results. But first, let us look at the indices. The following indices are linked to the artifacts index:

  • Materials – the material of the inscribed artifact
  • Material aspects – the aspect of the artifact material
  • Material colors – the colour of the artifact material
  • Artifact types – the type of artifact inscribed
  • Genres – the genre of the inscription
  • Languages – the language(s) of the inscription
  • Periods – the historical period of the artifact
  • Dates – the date of the artifact as given in or derived from the inscription
  • Archives – the archive that the artifact belongs to
  • Proveniences – the provenience of the artifact
  • Regions – the region where the provenience of the artifact is located
  • Collections – the current collection that holds the artifact
  • Bibliography – scholarly publications relating to the artifact
  • Authors – authors relating to publications relating to the artifact
  • External resources – external resource links for the artifact

Take some time, either now or later, to explore the various indices and get an idea of what they contain. And remember that these indices are not just oriented towards the artifacts, but also form the link between artifact metadata in the CDLI and resources from elsewhere in digital space (see Figure 5.1 for an example). A value included in the material index can, for example, be matched to corresponding values in the Art & Architecture Thesaurus of the Getty Research Institute, meaning that the index integrates with more general vocabularies for the study of cultural heritage. A record in the provenience index can include links to the corresponding record of an archaeological site at Pleiades, Geonames, or Wikidata. An artifact linking to a provenience in CDLI is then not only linked to Assyriological data collections, but also many external databases used by other research domains.

5.1 Simple search

Now for the simple search tool. The simple search tool is available on the main page of the CDLI (https://cdli.earth/), being one of the first things you see when entering the site (Figure 3.1 and Figure 5.2). From any other location on the CDLI, the search page can be reached using ‘Search’ in the navigation bar on the top right. Going to the search page (https://cdli.earth/search) will land you on a full search of the artifacts index, from which you can proceed to apply filter by categories.

Figure 5.2: The simple search tool of the CDLI as it appears on the main page (https://cdli.earth/) and the artifact search page (https://cdli.earth/search). The tool includes links to search settings (①) and the advanced search tool (②). Note also the link to the search guide documentation on the top left (③) and the drop-down list to specify the domain to be searched (④).

5.3 URL ID query

If you already know exactly which records you want to find, you can search for the pertinent identifiers using an expanded URL. This works for standard CDLI identifiers, namely artifact identifier, composite number, and seal number, and will return a complete list of all artifact records where the given identifier appears.

All you need to do is to build the URL for the search, using the same format as we use for the stable URL of an artifact identifier, composite number, or seal number. This consists of the base domain address, ‘https://cdli.earth/’, followed by the individual identifiers that you want to include separated by commas, with no spaces. Try out the URL ID query given below in your own browser:

https://cdli.earth/P123456,S000001,P000001

The search results from this query gives you only the records of these specific identifiers. This can be useful if you want to provide a single list of results from the artifacts index for a specific selection of artifacts, compositions, or seals – for example if you want to send a search link to someone or put a link to a selection of artifacts in a printed text.

5.4 Filter by categories

Results fromsimpleandadvanced searchqueries, as well as results from aURL ID query, can be filtered according to values from controlledindicesusing the filters on the left-hand side of the search results. This is another way of narrowing your search as you go, but also extremely helpful when you want to explore search results or get an idea of how results are distributed across different categories – especially if you have a great many records to look through!

Figure 5.3: The upper part of the filter menu of the CDLI search results (detail from https://cdli.earth/search), located on the left-hand side of the search results. The period filter (①) has been expanded and the period ‘Neo-Assyrian (ca. 911-612 BC)’ checked (②). If pressing ‘Apply’ now (③), the search results will be filtered to include only the 36,314 records from this period.

 

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