Information dynamics in Low Countries' chronicles (1500-1860): a computational approach

Abstract

This dissertation is about the reception of information by non-experts in the early modern period. It studies the changing reputation of the various sources that were available between 1500 and 1860, and how people dealt with the constantly growing supply of information. It does so by assessing the impact of the burgeoning flow of information on the content of a corpus of over 200 early modern local chronicles from the Low Countries, using both quantitative and qualitative text analysis methods.

The main historical question answered in this dissertation is: How do changes in the information landscapes of chroniclers from the Low Countries affect the content of chronicles? The two aspects of the chronicles that are studied in more detail are the sources chroniclers used and the topics they described. The other central question answered in this dissertation is a methodological one: To what extent are methods of computational text analysis helpful in getting a better understanding of the information landscapes of early modern chroniclers from the Low Countries?