Difference between revisions of "Users Guide to SOLM-2024 database"

Revision as of 13:21, April 9, 2024

This is the start of the Users Guide to the SOLM-2024 database

Overview of the database

- Technology: Excel Workbook
- Size: 22 MB
- Dimensions: 23,715 rows; 320 columns
- Sheets: One
- Conceptual structure: Flat semi-structured database
- Author: Colin Greenstreet
- Date started: 2017
- Latest version: SOLM-2024 Ver.13.2 08/04/2024

Conceptual structure

- Primary dimension is formed by the personal depositions of people

- Secondary dimension is formed by the named ships with which most of the personal depositions of people are associated

- Each of the primary dimensions is characterized in multiple ways, which can be grouped into sub-categores

e.g. The dimension of people has the following sub-dimensions, some of which are textual and some of which are numerical

People

PEOPLE: BASIC
-- Name [Forname; Surname] [TEXT]
-- Age [Years; Estimated birth year] [NUMBER]
-- Gender [Male/Female] [TAB]
-- Marital status [Bachelor; Spinster; Married; Widowed] [TAB; TEXT]
-- Relationships with other people [Father/Son/Daughter; Husband/Wife; Uncle/Nephew; Cousins] [TEXT]
-- Age married [NUMBER]
-- Religion [TEXT]

PEOPLE: GEOGRAPHY
-- Current residence [Street/Hamlet; Parish; Town; County/Province] [TEXT]
-- Current state [e.g. England; e,g. France] [TEXT]

PEOPLE: GEOGRAPHY ADVANCED
-- Place of birth [Parish; County; Province; State] [TEXT]
-- Length of time in current residence [NUMBER; TEXT]
-- Approximate age when moved to current residential area [YEARS]

PEOPLE: OCCUPATION
-- Main self-described occupation [TEXT]
-- Further more detailed self-described occupations [TEXT]
-- Additional work related activities described in text [TEXT]
-- Years in occupation [NUMBER]
-- Age started occupation [NUMBER]

PEOPLE: OCCUPATION: APPRENTICES AND SERVANTS
-- Apprenticeship/Servant status [TAB]
-- Age became apprentice [number]
-- Years as apprentice [NUMBER]
-- Age became servant [NUMBER]
-- Years as servant [NUMBER]

PEOPLE: OCCUPATION: MARITIME
-- Years at sea [NUMBER]
-- Approximate age first went to sea [Years] [NUMBER]
-- Approximate years at sea before made master [NUMBER]
-- Approximate years master of ships [NUMBER]
-- Approximate age first master of ships [NUMBER]
-- Months master of most recent ship [NUMBER]
-- Months in company of most recent ship [NUMBER]
-- Length of most recent voyage in which deponent present [NUMBER]
-- Number of known voyages by deponent in named ship

PEOPLE: FINANCE: WAGES
-- Wages (£) [per day] [CURRENCY]
-- Wages (£) per week [CURRENCY]
-- Wages (£) [per month] [CURRENCY]
-- Wages (£) per voyage [CURRENCY]
-- Wages (£) per year [CURRENCY]
-- Wages and/or Profits [TEXT]

PEOPLE: FINANCE: TAXES
-- Subsidy assessment (£) [CURRENCY]
-- Subsidy assessment [TEXT]

PEOPLE: FINANCE: INVESTMENT
-- Private adventures + clothes, instruments and other personal items [£] [CURRENCY]
-- Private adventures + money + clothes, instruments and other personal items [TEXT]
-- Small loans and debts between mariners and mariners and passengers [TEXT]
-- Worth (debts paid) (£) [CURRENCY]
-- Worth (debts paid) [TEXT]

Ships

SHIPS: BASIC
-- Name of ship [TEXT]
-- Place of affiliation of ship [e.g. the Seaventure of Yarmouth] [TEXT]
-- Name of master of ship [TEXT]

SHIPS: VOYAGES
-- Extent of voyage knowledge [None; Partal; Full] [TAB]
-- Voyage nodeal points [Named nodes in route order, if known] [TEXT]

SHIPS: PHYSICAL
-- Ship burthen [Tons] [NUMBER]
-- Ship ordnance [Guns] [NUMBER]
-- Ship decks [NUMBER]
-- Ship age [YEARS; TEXT]
-- Ship length [NUMBER]
-- Ship breadth [NUMBER]
-- Ship depth [NUMBER]
-- Height between decks [NUMBER]
-- Where ship built [TEXT]
-- Where ship bought [TEXT]

SHIPS: PEOPLE
-- Name of master of ship [TEXT]
-- Ship company size [including master and boys] [NUMBER]

SHIP: OTHER CHARACTERISTICS
-- Ship details [burthen; manning; ordnance]; Furniture; Apparrell; Sails; Rigging; Hull; Anchors; Value of ship; Freight rates; Demurrage; Size of ship's company; Owners of ship [TEXT]
-- Repairs to ship; Ship building; Leakiness; Pumping of ship; Weighing of ship [TEXT]
-- Ships provisions [Food; Drink; Iron work; Ropes; Sails etc.] [TEXT]
-- Passengers [TEXT]
-- Weather [hurricanes; monsoons; tempests, gale; storms; frost; ice; tropical heat; wind; fog; tide]; Severity of weather [stress; distress; extremity; (very) foul; thick; contrary; bad; wet]; Impact of weather on ship [leakage; steering errors; casting away; running ashore; driven ashore]; Seasonality [TEXT]
-- Planned and/or actual voyage details and key voyage dates [TEXT]

Legal

LEGAL: BASIC

-- Event triggering legal case in High Court of Admiralty [TEXT]
-- Short form case description [TEXT]
-- Folio mark [TEXT]
-- Date of deposition [Modernized English calendar] [TEXT]

LEGAL: ADVANCED

-- Disputes in English law courts or arbitration; Commissions; Protests; Examinations on ships; Examinations on shore [TEXT]
-- Disputes in non-English law courts or arbitration outside England; Includes Inquisition, Embargos, Sequestration, Consuls; Commissions; Foreign Notaries; Protests [TEXT]

Sorting the database

- Use of filters

- Use of sort buttons

- Use of F5 function

[THIS SECTION IS UNDER DEVELOPMENT]

Exercises

1. Using the SOLM-2024 database to analyse trade flows

- Example: Brazilian/Portuguese/Mediterranean
- Example: Hamburg/Lisbon-Cadiz/Mediterranean
- Example: English East Mediterranean

2. Using the SOLM-2024 database to compare and contrast shipping size and types in different geographies

- Question: Size and character of English East Mediterranean English shipping versus English Atlantic shipping
- Question: Size and character of English Atlantic shipping on Newfoundland versus Virginia versus Barbados routes

3. Using the SOLM-2024 database to study the roles, duties, and tasks of different occupations

- Question: How did people in specific mariner sub-occupations self-describe their office, places, tasks?
- Question: How did people evaluate the performance of others in specific mariner sub-occupations?
- Question: What can be quantified in terms of skill levels and wage levels for different mariner sub-occupations?

4. Using the SOLM-2024 database to study predation by galleys in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic in the 1H C17th

- Question: Where do you find galleys and war ships geographically active in seizing commercial shipping in the 1H C17th [Turkish galleys; galleys of Argiers; galleys of Tunis; galleys of Sally; Spanish galleys; French galleys]

5. Using the SOLM-2024 database to look at the use by English mariners of international legal jurisdictions

- Question: How can we use the data within SOLM-2024 to identify legal cases in non-English legal jurisdictions invollving English commercial shipping?
- Question: How can we systematically examine the strategies used by mariners and factors to access legal systems and arbitration in non-English jurisdictions?
- Question: What was the role of Consuls and Consular assistance outside England and how did mariners interact with Consuls?

Providing feedback

- We encourage all our users to provide feedback and to make special requests to us

- The SOLM-2024 database can improve by being used as much as possible for a wide range of research tasks