This presentation gives an overview about the motivation for manuscript databases. To build manuscript databases we used the database management tool Heurist which was specifically developed for the Humanities. Heurist allows you to design, populate, explore, and publish data without the need to be a programmer. To insert a large dataset in the database automatically, we developed the databasing on demand (DBoD) approach. The DBoD approach is illustrated in this presentation.

The more databases you have, the more likely you are to find additional data that enriches the existing local information. For this, we need federated searches and a federated database system (FDBS). A FDBS is created by merging databases. Before we implemented a FDBS, we developed a simulation environment to test the communication architecture of the FDBS. But how? You will find the answer at the end of this presentation.

The research for this contribution was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany's Excellence Strategy - EXC 2176 'Understanding Written Artefacts: Material, Interaction and Transmission in Manuscript Cultures', project no. 390893796.