Distant Reader - subject-dialing-freebo

Introduction

This is a Distant Reader "study carrel", a set of structured data intended to help the student, researcher, or scholar use & understand a corpus.

This study carrel was created on 2021-05-24 by Eric Morgan <emorgan@nd.edu>. The carrel was created using the Distant Reader zip2carrel process, and the input was a Zip file locally cached with the name input-file.zip. Documents in the Zip file have been saved in a cache, and each of them have been transformed & saved as a set of plain text files. All of the analysis -- "reading" -- has been done against these plain text files. For example, a short narrative report has been created. This Web page is a more verbose version of that report.

All study carrels are self-contained -- no Internet connection is necessary to use them. Download this carrel for offline reading. The carrel is made up of many subdirectories and data files. The manifest describes each one in greater detail.

Size

There are 15 item(s) in this carrel, and this carrel is 470,236 words long. Each item in your study carrel is, on average, 31,349 words long. If you dig deeper, then you might want to save yourself some time by reading a shorter item. On the other hand, if your desire is for more detail, then you might consider reading a longer item. The following charts illustrate the overall size of the carrel.

Readability

On a scale from 0 to 100, where 0 is very difficult and 100 is very easy, the documents have an average readability score of 95. Consequently, if you want to read something more simplistic, then consider a document with a higher score. If you want something more specialized, then consider something with a lower score. The following charts illustrate the overall readability of the carrel.

Word Frequencies

By merely counting & tabulating the frequency of individual words or phrases, you can begin to get an understanding of the carrel's "aboutness". Excluding "stop words", some of the more frequent words include:

line, sine, one, point, declination, shall, altitude, will, distance, may, latitude, two, side, hour, angle, find, meridian, first, lines, tangent, degrees, suns, center, foot, radius, right, sines, plain, draw, quadrant, set, take, given, sun, difference, circle, south, also, azimuth, north, equal, place, found, half, make, thread, hours, must, required, way

Using the three most frequent words, the three files containing all of those words the most are The sector on a quadrant, or A treatise containing the description and use of four several quadrants two small ones and two great ones, each rendred many wayes, both general and particular. Each of them accomodated for dyalling; for the resolving of all proportions instrumentally; and for the ready finding the hour and azimuth universally in the equal limbe. Of great use to seamen and practitioners in the mathematicks. Written by John Collins accountant philomath. Also An appendix touching reflected dyalling from a glass placed at any reclination., The description and use of the trianguler quadrant being a particular and general instrument, useful at land or sea, both for observation and operation : more universally useful, portable and convenient, than any other yet discovered, with its uses in arithmetick, geometry, superficial and solid, astronomy, dyalling, three wayes, gaging, navigation, in a method not before used / by John Brown, philomath., and Horologiographia, or, The art of dyalling being the second book of the use of the trianguler-quadrant : shewing the natural, artificial, and instrumental way, of making of sun-dials, on any flat superficies, with plain and easie directions, to discover their nature and affections, by the horizontal projection : with the way of drawing the usual ornaments on any plain : also, a familiar easie way to draw those lines on the ceiling of a room, by the trianguler quadrant : also, the use of the same instrument in navigation, both for observation, and operation : performing the use of several sea-instruments still in use / by John Brown, philomath..

The most frequent two-word phrases (bigrams) include:

nearest distance, versed sine, shall reach, suns declination, suns altitude, one foot, versed sines, meridian line, equal parts, one point, set one, meridian altitude, stiles height, angle sought, two points, straight line, suns azimuth, shall find, substilar line, right ascention, side sought, given angle, shall shew, right angles, right ascension, right line, given side, english books, right angled, one side, early english, half sum, right edge, lower figure, stars hour, foot long, setting one, plains perpendicular, two sides, north declination, opposite side, horizontal line, suns distance, suns right, new latitude, natural sines, first term, two lines, axeltree rod, angle opposite

And the three file that use all of the three most frequent phrases are Horlogiographia optica. Dialling universall and particular: speculative and practicall. In a threefold præcognita, viz. geometricall, philosophicall, and astronomicall: and a threefold practise, viz. arithmeticall, geometricall, and instrumentall. With diverse propositions of the use and benefit of shadows, serving to prick down the signes, declination, and azimuths, on sun-dials, and diverse other benefits. Illustrated by diverse opticall conceits, taken out of Augilonius, Kercherius, Clavius, and others. Lastly, topothesia, or, a feigned description of the court of art. Full of benefit for the making of dials, use of the globes, difference of meridians, and most propositions of astronomie. Together with many usefull instruments and dials in brasse, made by Walter Hayes, at the Crosse Daggers in More Fields. / Written by Silvanus Morgan. Speculum nauticum A looking-glasse for sea-men. Wherein they may behold, how by a small instrument, called the plain-scale, all nautical questions, and astronomical propositions, are very easily and demonstratively performed. First set down by John Aspley, student in physick, and practitioner of the mathematicks in London. The sixth edition. Whereunto are added, many new propositions in navigation and astronomy, and also a third book, shewing a new way of dialling. By H.P. and W.L., and A nevv quadrant, of more naturall, easie, and manifold performance, than any other heretofore extant framed according to the horizontall projection of the sphere, with the uses thereof. By C.B. maker of mathematic instruments in metall..

While often deemed superficial or sophomoric, rudimentary frequencies and their associated "word clouds" can be quite insightful:

Keywords

Sets of keywords -- statistically significant words -- can be enumerated by comparing the relative frequency of words with the number of times the words appear in an entire corpus. Some of the most statistically significant keywords in the carrel include:

meridian, suns, line, declination, tcp, sun, south, latitude, horizon, circle, center, azimuth, angle, west, tangent, substile, radius, pole, plain, north, east, dyal, compasses, altitude, world, thread, thre, sunne, sine, scale, rule, quadrant, proportion, prop, probl, point, plains, plaine, numbers, hour, foot, extent, equator, diameter, diall, dial, content, complement, compassis, axeltree

And now word clouds really begin to shine:

Topic Modeling

Topic modeling is another popular approach to connoting the aboutness of a corpus. If the study carrel could be summed up in a single word, then that word might be line, and The description and use of a joynt-rule fitted with lines for the finding the hour of the day and azimuth of the sun, to any particular latitude, or, to apply the same generally to any latitude : together with all the uses of Gunters quadrant applyed thereunto ... / contriv''d & written by J. Brown, philomath. is most about that word.

If the study carrel could be summed up in three words ("topics") then those words and their significantly associated titles include:

If the study carrel could be summed up in five topics, and each topic were each denoted with three words, then those topics and their most significantly associated files would be:

Moreover, the totality of the study carrel's aboutness, can be visualized with the following pie chart:

Noun & Verbs

Through an analysis of your study carrel's parts-of-speech, you are able to answer question beyonds aboutness. For example, a list of the most frequent nouns helps you answer what questions; "What is discussed in this collection?":

line, distance, side, point, sine, degrees, declination, lines, hour, altitude, foot, angle, difference, way, hours, thread, place, example, parts, length, d, end, time, inches, points, day, figure, extent, tangent, part, latitude, sum, b, sides, -, compasses, center, shadow, deg, complement, height, use, proportion, sines, measure, number, p, viz, half, table

An enumeration of the verbs helps you learn what actions take place in a text or what the things in the text do. Very frequently, the most common lemmatized verbs are "be", "have", and "do"; the more interesting verbs usually occur further down the list of frequencies:

is, be, are, being, find, have, draw, given, take, set, found, make, required, said, lay, sought, having, drawn, made, was, let, according, note, finde, reach, laid, do, see, were, taken, counted, called, say, divided, shew, gives, fixed, enter, done, added, laying, come, divide, been, setting, cut, makes, work, prick, give

Proper Nouns

An extraction of proper nouns helps you determine the names of people and places in your study carrel.

sine, line, suns, latitude, radius, meridian, sun, azimuth, center, south, north, sines, quadrant, declination, plain, tangent, circle, altitude, ark, horizon, angle, east, pole, west, c, point, hour, scale, diameter, square, cosine, s, b, complement, thred, f, dial, arch, plains, substile, versed, rule, a, numbers, triangle, tangents, content, chap, m, dyal

An analysis of personal pronouns enables you to answer at least two questions: 1) "What, if any, is the overall gender of my study carrel?", and 2) "To what degree are the texts in my study carrel self-centered versus inclusive?"

it, you, i, your, his, them, their, they, we, its, my, he, our, me, her, she, us, him, themselves, thy, thee, one, l, ∷, whereof, himself, c, yours, o, y, wil, whee, wh, vvith, touchline, s, r, mine, hou, can''st

Below are words cloud of your study carrel's proper & personal pronouns.

Adjectives & Verbs

Learning about a corpus's adjectives and adverbs helps you answer how questions: "How are things described and how are things done?" An analysis of adjectives and adverbs also points to a corpus's overall sentiment. "In general, is my study carrel positive or negative?"

other, same, equal, first, right, greater, true, former, second, third, fourth, nearest, many, more, meridian, less, whole, lesser, such, parallel, versed, perpendicular, general, like, direct, last, small, much, opposite, plain, particular, upper, great, straight, half, several, horizontal, middle, new, common, natural, equinoctial, left, 4th, lower, greatest, next, substilar, square, proper

then, so, also, not, thus, first, as, before, out, again, off, therefore, thereof, only, here, more, just, down, now, together, very, right, well, much, there, else, up, above, lastly, that, is, twice, most, in, far, on, long, exactly, secondly, likewise, even, less, whatsoever, opposite, onely, easily, always, instead, otherwise, about

Next steps

There is much more to a study carrel than the things outlined above. Use this page's menubar to navigate and explore in more detail. There you will find additional features & functions including: ngrams, parts-of-speech, grammars, named entities, topic modeling, a simple search interface, etc.

Again, study carrels are self-contained. Download this carrel for offline viewing and use.

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