subject-pollTax-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 18 item(s) in this carrel, and this carrel is 38,848 words long. Each item in your study carrel is, on average, 2,158 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.

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histogram of sizes
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box plot of sizes

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 82. 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.

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histogram of readability
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box plot of readability

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:

text, shall, tcp, money, english, pole, eebo, early, within, parliament, will, act, books, tax, tei, general, council, persons, make, commissioners, foresaid, may, collectors, texts, saids, encoded, pay, several, poll, scotland, shires, works, online, order, paris, first, characters, either, phase, xml, according, house, image, made, payment, partnership, privy, use, per, images

Using the three most frequent words, the three files containing all of those words the most are The French King''s declaration for settling the general poll-tax together with his edict ordering all communities both regular and secular, and all particular persons, (who have any water from rivers, brooks, springs and fountains, or otherwise, whether for the ornament of their houses, or the improving to their estates) to pay such sums as shall be impos''d upon them in council, in order to have the benefit of the said waters confirm''d to them for the future., Proposals humbly offer''d to the consideration of the honourable House of Commons, for laying a poll-tax on all horses, mares, geldings, &c. for one year and a poundage-tax on all horses, mares, geldings, &c. that shall be bought or sold in England. Also an annual imposition or duty on all weights and measures whatsoever; as likewise on all shopkeepers and tradesmen., and Proclamation for bringing in and paying the arrears due by the forces in this country.

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

english books, early english, books online, privy council, text creation, creation partnership, page images, early works, tcp schema, represented either, several shires, characters represented, image sets, excellent majesty, poll tax, severall counties, andrew anderson, shall pay, commercial purposes, encoded text, online text, without asking, markup reviewed, batch review, xml conversion, work described, bit group, financial support, tiff page, image set, pfs batch, creative commons, encoded edition, text transcribed, tcp assigned, images scanned, providing financial, asking permission, institutions providing, proquest page, iv tiff, poleable persons, make use, gap elements, spi global, foresaid act, advice foresaid, page image, john pas, eng poll

And the three file that use all of the three most frequent phrases are A proclamation, prorogating the dyets of giving in lists of poleable persons, and payment of their pole-money, and prescribing methods for the exactness and perfecting of the same. Proclamation for the more easie and effectual in-bringing of the pole-money., and A proclamation, for the better inbringing of the pole-money, imposed in anno 1695..

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

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unigrams
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bigrams

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:

tcp, pole, house, sheriffes, parliament, council, weights, text, tax, shire, paris, money, measures, majesty, lists, king, general, courts, commissioners, classis, cities, burghs

And now word clouds really begin to shine:

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keywords

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 text, and Die Jovis 9⁰ Septembr. 1641. Whereas it doth appear to this House by certain informations received from divers parts of this kingdom, that the pole-money doth generally come to a far lesse sum, then by the true intent of the act it both might and ought to do ... 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:

  1. text - A proclamation for collecting and in-bringing the pole-money, appointed to be payed at Martinmass, 1695. by an Act of the last session of Parliament.
  2. shall - The French King''s declaration for settling the general poll-tax together with his edict ordering all communities both regular and secular, and all particular persons, (who have any water from rivers, brooks, springs and fountains, or otherwise, whether for the ornament of their houses, or the improving to their estates) to pay such sums as shall be impos''d upon them in council, in order to have the benefit of the said waters confirm''d to them for the future.
  3. text - The true coppy of a letter sent by Mr Speaker to the sheriffes of severall counties. Namely: Worcester, Cambridge, Huntington, Lecester, North-hampton, Warwick, and Rutland. Which have not as yet paid in the poll-money. With the copy of an order sent from the Lords and Commons now assembled in Parliament to these severall counties before-named, for the speedy transportaion of that money to York for disbanding of his Majesties army. And they that are found faulty, shall incurre both the ill-opinion and severe punishment of both Houses of Parliament. August 24. 1641.

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:

  1. text, tcp, said - A proclamation for collecting and in-bringing the pole-money, appointed to be payed at Martinmass, 1695. by an Act of the last session of Parliament.
  2. shall, said, paris - The French King''s declaration for settling the general poll-tax together with his edict ordering all communities both regular and secular, and all particular persons, (who have any water from rivers, brooks, springs and fountains, or otherwise, whether for the ornament of their houses, or the improving to their estates) to pay such sums as shall be impos''d upon them in council, in order to have the benefit of the said waters confirm''d to them for the future.
  3. text, house, money - Die Jovis 9⁰ Septembr. 1641. Whereas it doth appear to this House by certain informations received from divers parts of this kingdom, that the pole-money doth generally come to a far lesse sum, then by the true intent of the act it both might and ought to do ...
  4. shall, money, sheriffes - The true coppy of a letter sent by Mr Speaker to the sheriffes of severall counties. Namely: Worcester, Cambridge, Huntington, Lecester, North-hampton, Warwick, and Rutland. Which have not as yet paid in the poll-money. With the copy of an order sent from the Lords and Commons now assembled in Parliament to these severall counties before-named, for the speedy transportaion of that money to York for disbanding of his Majesties army. And they that are found faulty, shall incurre both the ill-opinion and severe punishment of both Houses of Parliament. August 24. 1641.
  5. hath, truly, speedy - An order of the House of Parliament concerning the gathering in of the pole-moneys. die Veneris, May 6, 1642.

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

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topic model

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?":

text, money, texts, works, characters, xml, order, image, books, images, tax, payment, persons, page, saids, edition, work, keying, eebo, title, elements, time, use, project, encoding, data, day, users, purposes, markup, hands, review, part, others, terms, sum, sets, selection, schema, instances, guidelines, editions, changes, reason, pole, transcription, number, sums, effect, shires

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:

be, is, said, have, are, was, were, been, make, foresaid, encoded, pay, do, according, made, given, appointed, being, based, give, sent, paid, published, -, printed, represented, meet, marked, created, create, corrected, take, has, set, come, scanned, reviewed, providing, performed, owned, modified, mentioned, making, edited, distributed, did, described, copied, coded, co

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nouns
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verbs

Proper Nouns

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

tcp, pole, act, parliament, council, text, english, scotland, commissioners, paris, king, collectors, tei, eebo, house, general, privy, poll, oxford, edinburgh, shires, majesty, courts, commons, c., proquest, phase, partnership, creation, lords, kingdom, lists, royal, books, weights, transcribed, tax, burghs, persons, cities, rolls, online, supply, england, saids, estates, shire, sub, paroch, measures

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?"

their, our, they, them, we, it, his, us, he, i, you, themselves, your, him, himself, me, she, np, levy''d, its

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

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proper nouns
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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, such, early, several, first, english, available, respective, particular, due, general, own, textual, severall, illegible, true, great, second, present, lyable, usual, many, keyboarded, good, financial, commercial, speedy, possible, poleable, last, former, original, large, better, subject, more, greater, excellent, wide, whole, syntactic, structural, readable, quality, public, proofread, overall, monographic, lossless

not, so, in, as, also, therefore, up, thereof, then, online, above, early, more, now, hereby, most, whatsoever, even, out, likewise, well, very, over, only, never, usually, therein, there, sometimes, otherwise, next, variously, respectively, respectfully, notably, mainly, further, accurately, strictly, fully, far, down, yet, much, severally, conjunctly, specially, humbly, generally, by

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adjectives
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adverbs

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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