The Texts
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WWP
The Texts
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It is possible to search the WWP texts and contextual material in a variety of ways. We provide you with pre-defined search forms (for example, to search for personal names, or to perform boolean queries) where you only need to enter appropriate values. You may perform searches based on text attributes, such as their author, place of publication, size or current location. You can also construct your own search queries; we provide examples to help you. In most instances, search forms offer a faster, more convenient way of searching than writing your own query. All you have to enter is a value for the program to search for. You can enter the value in upper or lower case--it doesn't matter--and then click the "Search" box or press the Return key. The following list describes the search forms we provide for each item in the textbase and how to use them. For a step by step introduction to the more difficult aspects of searching, you should read through the Search Tutorial. Please remember that the WWP texts cover a long period of writing in English, and that spelling varied greatly in the years between 1500 and 1800. Just because you don't find a word doesn't mean that it doesn't appear in the WWP texts. It's possible that it was spelled differently, or that different typography was used. For example, ... [Jacque or Julia supplement here]. If you see that a word you are looking for doesn't appear, or doesn't appear in the earlier part of the textbase, try using wild cards, or look it up in the OED in order to see how it might have been spelled. It is also important to remember that meaning and usages of words have also changed over time. For example, ...[Jacque or Julia supplement here]. Try looking for different words... |
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The simplest form of search is just to type a word in the Simple Search
Box. You may use wildcards, as described at the top of the Search Page. Use
a ? to indicate a single unknown character, and an asterisk to indicate any
number of unknown characters. For example, If you know how to use the Dynaweb query language to formulate your own queries, you can type them into the Simple Query Box. For more information on formulating your own queries using the Dynaweb query language, see the last section on this page. |
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There are three parts to the complex search. Searching for words in proximity to one another, searching for words in the context of a particular element, and peforming boolean searches together with element context. In each case, you type the words you want to search for in the box or boxes and specify any further search criteria by typing them into the boxes or selecting it from a menu. You peform the search by clicking the Search button of the particular search you want to perform. |
Finding Two Words in Proximity to One Another:
If you want to look limit a search for a particular word by looking for it only when it appears in the vicinity of another word, use the first part of the complex search form. Type your two words into the boxes. Type a number to indicate how close or far apart the two words may be. Click the Search Button. This search only looks for proximity. The words can be in either order.
For example, you can find all the occasions where the word
obedience occurs within 20 words of the word God.
Searching for a Word in an Element Context:
The WWP texts contain SGML markup to indicate genre, to disambiguate names and places from other words that might be synonymous with common nouns, to indicate citations and other quoted text, annotations, and the individual parts of a text such as its introduction or conclusion. It is possible to restrict your search to words that are only found within these SGML elements. From the drop-down menu, choose the context in which you wish to search (e.g. only in personal names or only in prose). This searches the appropriate SGML elements for your search string. To perform your search, press the Search button.
Note on personal names: The WWP encodes all personal names of human and human-like creatures. We think of creatures as being human if their anatomy is largely or significantly human, or if they are ever or have ever been incarnated as humans. Thus, for example, Niobe, Anubis, Chiron, and the Minotaur all qualify for a personal name.
Sarah, enter sarah or
SARAH or sAraH (remember, case doesn't
matter)Judas Iscariot enter judas
iscariotElisa or
Eliza), use a question mark in place of that letter:
eli?aLancaster or
Lancashire), use an asterisk in place of those letters:
lancas*a,
enter a*Boolean Searches using Element Context:
You can make the element context search more powerful by combining it with
a boolean search. You can specify two words (or the same words twice) in
two contexts (or the same context twice) and their relationship to one
another. The three boolean operators are OR, AND
and AND NOT. A search for two words and context using the AND
operator will produce results only when both words are found in their
contexts, within one work. A search for two words and context using the
AND NOT operator will find the the first word only when the second
word does not appear within its context in that work. An OR search
will produce results when either of the words appears in their context.
Text attribute searches will retrieve texts based on their attributes, such as author, publisher, date, size etc. These are not searches for words, but for whole texts. For more information on Text Attribute searches, see the Help Page.
If you find that the search forms do not provide the search that you want, and you are willing to learn the Dynaweb query language, you can make up your own queries. Type them into the Simple Search Box.
Below, we provide a few examples that you can use to build your own queries. If you want to learn more, you should read the Dynaweb query documentation. You should also observe the query that is printed above the KWIC view that is on the left, when you are browsing search results. The system prints the query it has performed, and you can copy these queries and modify them for your own use.
To do this kind of search, you need to know the tags used in
encoding the text. For example, to find all the occurrences of the word
epistle in headings only, you first need to know that the
relevant tag is <head>. Then enter:
epistle inside <head>
To do this kind of search, you need to know the tags used in
encoding the text. For example, to find all headings which contain the
word epistle, you need to know that the
relevant tag is <head>. Then enter:
<head> contains epistle
Note about "containment" searches: An example of a "containment" search is: "<quote> contains God". This might not be as thorough (and the display might not look as good) as an "inside" search (e.g."God inside <quote>"). We recommend you use the latter type of search for most kinds of searches. There are some searches for which"containment" actually works better, e.g."(<quote> cont (Woman and not Man and not husband)".
For large "containment" searches such as <quote> or <div>, we display the first line of the containing element, rather than the text near the word(s) (e.g. Woman or Husband) in your search.
Links to the Dynaweb Query Language documentation:
Basic Overview of Dynaweb Searching
Advanced Dynaweb Searches
The Nuances of the Dynaweb Search Language
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