CALL FOR PAPER - Reading the Past with AI: Computational Approaches to Historical Artifacts
Date
8 Jul 2026
==== CALL FOR PAPER ===
Title: Reading the Past with AI: Computational Approaches to Historical Artifacts
In recent years, the use of methods derived from artificial intelligence has brought new insights to several disciplines focused on the study of ancient artifacts, such as paleography, codicology, and sigillography. This new dynamic, linked to recent advances in machine learning—particularly through the development of large language models and multimodal models—as well as to efforts in the digitization and transcription of primary sources, opens up new methodological and interpretative perspectives.
The conference 'Reading the Past with AI: Computational Approaches to Historical Artifacts', will be held on the 29th-30th of April at Sorbonne Université (Paris), aims to present an overview of various research projects concerning the application of AI to ancient artifacts, encompassing a wide variety of materials (manuscripts, inscriptions, papyri, seals…), disciplines (codicology, paleography, sigillography, numismatics…), languages, and methods (computer vision, image processing, language models…).
We welcome contributions on the following themes, but not exhaustively:
1. HTR/OCR and computational paleography (automatic handwritten text recognition, hand identification, dating, and localization of artifacts…)
2. Computational codicology (automatic analysis of the material features of manuscripts, such as layout, ruling, quire structure, decoration, and illumination)
3. Restoration through computational methods (reconstruction of textual or material lacunae in mutilated manuscripts, fragmentary papyri, or effaced inscriptions, including via generative models)
4. Analysis of pigments, inks, and material supports (multispectral or hyperspectral image processing)
5. Sigillography and the analysis of non-textual objects (recognition of iconographic motifs and classification of seals, coins, or ceramics through computer vision approaches)
6. Automatic alignment and collation of witnesses (methods for comparing manuscript versions, computational stemmatics, and variant detection)
7. Knowledge representation and reasoning about ancient artifacts (ontological modeling, knowledge graphs, and automatic extraction of entities and relations from epigraphic, papyrological, or codicological corpora)
Submissions concerning digitization projects or digital editions are considered outside the conference's thematic scope. Paper proposals should be submitted as an abstract of 500 words maximum, accompanied by a brief biographical note, to <[email protected]> and <[email protected]>. The deadline for submitting paper proposals is on the 1st of October 2026.
Organizers: Sophie Robert-Hayek and Victoria Eyharabide
**Date**: 29th- 30th of April 2027
**Location**: Paris (exact address will be announced later)