Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) is predominantly known as the celebrated German natural scientist credited with the creation of modern geography. However, characterizing him solely as a natural scientist neglects the diversity of Humboldt’s research interests. During his lifetime, he not only advanced fundamental research in today’s disciplines such as geography, geology, geophysics and biology, but also made essential contributions to the fields of national economics and ethnology. Throughout his life he undertook several expeditions to the then unexplored parts of the world, such as Latin America and Siberia, and returned with diverse and meticulously recorded data and travel journals. Because of this field research, Humboldt was not only held in high esteem by the contemporary scientific community, but also received public attention for making foreign countries and cultures tangible for a broader audience. Hence, from today’s perspective, Alexander von Humboldt is considered a cosmopolitan and transdisciplinary, educated scholar.

The complexity of Alexander von Humboldt’s work is quite remarkable but complicates its scientific reappraisal. Firstly, todays self-evident differentiation among scientific disciplines forms an institutional barrier to a holistic approach to Humboldt’s scientific heritage. Moreover, the vast extent of Humboldt’s written output and the complexity of his notes are further hurdles. Taking this into account, the Academy Project ‘Travelling Humboldt – Science on the Move’ at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities is the first editorial project that attempts the enormous task of editing Humboldt’s scientific estate from a holistic and interdisciplinary perspective by investigating his manuscripts related to the topic of travel at the intersection of natural and cultural science.

Conceived as a long-term project with a duration of 18 years and funded by the federal state of Brandenburg and the German Federal Republic, ‘Travelling Humboldt’ can rely on a solid financial base and currently belongs to one of the bigger editorial projects in the German-speaking world. With Ottmar Ette, a Professor of Romance Languages and Comparative Literature, acting as the scholarly director and Tobias Kraft as the editorial director, the project is led by proficient Humboldt specialists, who have been involved in earlier Humboldt projects. They are supported by the mathematician and scientific historian Eberhard Knobloch, who is familiar with Humboldt’s work due to his previous position as the Director of the erstwhile Alexander von Humboldt research center and has proven experience in the field of editing scientific historical sources. All things considered, ‘Traveling Humboldt’ brings together a well-chosen team consisting of scholars from diverse research backgrounds such as history, philology, romance studies, mathematics and digital humanities, and thus fulfills its self-imposed interdisciplinary approach. https://web.archive.org/web/20190604152900/https://edition-humboldt.de/about/index.xql?id=H0002928&l=en.

Notwithstanding the project’s solid financial and scholarly resources, editorial focus still must be set. Thus, the project focusses on the thematic complex of travel which is considered an integral element of Humboldt’s work. The primary objective is to make those parts of Humboldt’s personal papers that are relevant to his travels accessible in their entirety in the form of the edition humboldt. In practice, this goal is achieved in three ways: The main focus of the project lies on the publication of Humboldt’s famous travel journals, primarily, those pertaining to his American and Russian-Siberian voyages, which have been purchased by the ‘Berlin State Library – Prussian Cultural Heritage’ in 2015. Secondly, the manuscripts are enhanced by a selection of personal papers that document his travels, such as memoirs, publications, map collections and notes. In this section, the sources come from the ‘Berlin State Library’ and the ‘Jagiellonian Library’ in Krakow and some of them have been previously edited. Considering this fact, the project draws partly on the contents of existing, printed scholarly editions but rearranges them by subtopics, such as ‘scientific travels’ or ‘earth science’. The project’s third thematic focus lies on the correspondence Humboldt maintained with other researchers. Just as Humboldt’s personal papers, the source materials originate from different memory institutions and often have already been edited. Hence, the edition includes unedited material as well as information from preceding and third-party edition projects. However, even though borrowed transcriptions or information are always declared as such, a systematic list of all utilized external resources is missing. https://web.archive.org/web/20200815164557/https://www.bbaw.de/forschung/alexander-von-humboldt-auf-reisen-wissenschaft-aus-der-bewegung.

Due to its choice in source material, ‘Travelling Humboldt’ not only has to handle the genuine complexity of Humboldt’s work, but also the diversity of the chosen material. The project attempts to tackle these challenges by using the possibilities that are offered through new Digital Humanities technologies. In other words, it uses a digital first approach for its edition.

In practice, using a digital first approach means that the edition humboldt is developed as a text corpus based on TEI-XML. But why do they call it a ‘digital first approach’ and not simply ‘digital approach’?cf. Kraft 2018a 387. This slight distinction is due to the project’s form of publication: despite its digital methodology, it pursues a hybrid way of publishing. Hence, the XML-based text corpus serves as a basis for both, the edition humboldt digital, which is made available to the public on a homepage, as well as the edition humboldt print, which is published as a multivolume printed work.

Although the project ‘Travelling Humboldt’ focuses on the topic of travel, neither the edition humboldt in general, nor the edition humboldt digital, or the edition humboldt print have any obvious nominal relation to that theme. Instead, the use of the adjectives ‘digital’ and ‘print’ suggests that the editions define themselves by their chosen medium (see also the chapter “Digital – print – hybrid?”).

Apart from edited text, the edition also provides additional materials such as a bibliography, research contributions and commentaries on the manuscripts. Furthermore, it contains a chronology of Humboldt’s most important biographical data based on an out-of-stock book, which was first published in the 1960s and reprinted in the 1980s by the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities.cf. Humboldt, Alexander von. In the chronology, detected errors are corrected by the editors, because not only former researchers made some errors but also a genius like Alexander von Humboldt himself were not above the possibility of occasional confusions in his notes. https://web.archive.org/web/20190604152954/https://edition-humboldt.de/about/index.xql?id=H0000002&l=en.

The edition is completed with a presentation of high-resolution facsimiles (provided that the legal framework permits it). Thus, the edition humboldt digital enables its users to explore Humboldt’s work in three ways: source-, context-or content-based. Overall, leaving the limitations of print editions such as scale and layout behind, the edition serves as a multilayer information platform on Alexander von Humboldt and his research.

While the edition humboldt digital focuses on the detail, the edition humboldt print aims to serve the needs of a general audience by offering a compact reading version of Humboldt’s travel journals. Furthermore, it is designed to create an ‘ideal’ text by arranging omissions and erroneous leaps in chronology in order to recreate Humboldt’s original itineraries. However, beside this chronological function, the edition humboldt print only serves as a supplement to its digital counterpart.cf. Kraft 2018a 387.

Since the edition humboldt print is not available yet, this review only focusses on the manifestation of its digital counterpart, the edition humboldt digital.Meanwhile, since the date of the submission of this review, the first volume of the print edition has been published. A detailed description of the contents of all volumes can be accessed on ‘Alexander von Humboldt Informationen online’. However, as not only the digital but also the print edition is based on a digital paradigm, it is also worth having a look at the conceptual framework of the edition humboldt in general first, in order to discover its self-positioning within the field of digital scholarly editing.

There are several controversial issues about making a print edition based on a digital approach, whilst simultaneously publishing a digital edition. First, referring to Patrick Sahle, who states that a digital scholarly edition is characterized by its underlying digital paradigm, one might ask whether a print edition based on a digital paradigm is an antithesis in and of itself.cf. Sahle 2017. This argument is supported by the fact, that a conversion of a digital edition into a print edition necessarily results in a loss of information, such as function or metadata. Finally, considering practical issues, it is questionable whether a reproduction of Humboldt’s itineraries (as planned for the printed edition) could not have been realized – or are already partly prepared (e.g. through the chronology and the usage of authority files for place names) – in a digital way as well.

Regarding this digital – print controversy, it must be pointed out that neither the decision to develop hybrid publishing, nor the design of the digital strategy or anything else within the project in general was done arbitrarily. In that respect, several strategic papers have been published since the launch of the project and accurately predefine and outline the editions mission and methods. In his article ‘Hybride Edition und analoges Erbe’ Tobias Kraft provides an extensive and thorough self-reflection on several controversial arguments for and against digital as well as print editions. Overall, Kraft – who is a media scholar– emphasizes several advantages supporting a print edition, such as better velocity and quality of reading capacity as well as digital preservation issues. However, the latter argument seems to be disputable. Due to the long-term duration and solid financing of the project, the edition humboldt is in a unique situation as it could keep up to technical innovations. In doing so, it could also make major contributions towards the research in the field of digital preservation of digital scholarly editions by assessing and evaluating its preservation strategy in the long run.

In any case, Kraft is also aware of the aforementioned dissent. Concerning technical matters, he argues that scholarly editions have reached a historical turning point where methodology, technology and media are still dynamic and future developments are not yet in sight. Therefore, he considers a hybrid approach to be the best strategy at the present time. However, this does not mean that the project’s hybrid approach is cast in stone until 2033, as he states: A project which works on a hybrid edition of historical manuscripts in 2017, needs to remain open to the question, which requirements and expectations will be demanded of such an edition in three, five, ten or fifteen years.cf. Kraft 2018a 386.

Despite the complexity of Humboldt’s scientific heritage, it has been made clear in this review that the edition humboldt digital is doing a brilliant job so far. Particularly its exceptional documentation, its user-friendly attitude and the implementation of established technical standards need to be emphasized once again. Referring to this, the edition can serve as a role model for further digital scholarly editions. Due to its long-term duration, it tends to be likely that the project might eventually shape further methodological developments in the field of digital scholarly editions and set new standards in the years ahead. In this respect, the development and presentation of a convincing concept for the long term preservation and accessibility of the digital edition could make a valuable contribution towards the research on digital scholarly editions in general.

Concerning issues of digital preservation, one might question whether a reconstruction of Humboldt’s original itineraries necessarily requires a print medium or could also be done in a digital way. Even though Tobias Kraft provides plausible arguments against a digital edition based on reading comprehension and long-term preservation, he does not give any justification for the benefit of an analogue reconstruction of the itineraries at any point. However, as the printed edition is not published yet, its advantages and disadvantages cannot be reviewed at this point. Notwithstanding this, it is already now debatable, whether itineraries that integrate spatial and temporal information can be better presented in the rather ‘static’ print medium than in the digital medium that can render such information in a dynamic and contextualizing manner. Especially the spatial dimension of Humboldt’s manuscripts could be reconstructed in a digital way. For instance, a visualization of Humboldt’s travel route in the form of a map would be an enrichment for the edition. Moreover, such an application would not only be consistent with the topic of travelling but also suits the project’s philosophy of making use of the various possibilities of digital technology.

When comparing the edition’s objectives and guidelines with its current condition, it can be concluded that it lives up to its promises. It performs superbly in its self-positioning at the intersection of science and humanities, while also enabling low-threshold access to Humboldt’s work by offering extensive annotations and cross-linking to further material. One might even consider the edition humboldt digital an information platform rather than ‘just’ a scholarly edition, as it not only includes edited primary data but also a plethora of secondary material referring to Alexander von Humboldt and his work in general. Consequently, it can also serve other questions of research besides the topic of travelling.

Perhaps, the edition humboldt digital could also pool scholarly resources by providing a platform for future editions of Humboldt’s work. The quite general naming of the edition itself might eventually lend itself to future re-interpretations or shifts in focus.

Finally, it can be concluded that even though some – mainly technical – deficiencies have been identified in this review one can be excited about future versions of the edition humboldt digital. As the edition is still in its early stage, further modifications and innovations by 2033 are very likely. Indeed, the remarkable feature of the plant index, as released in version four, is a promising indicator for that and gives rise to high expectations.