Ars Inquirendi

Ars Inquirendi 2025 · Oxford, 4–7 December

Conference Recordings

The first Ars Inquirendi ran online and in Oxford, 4–7 December 2025 — convening pre-modernists, archaeologists, digital humanists, and AI researchers to test, rather than merely celebrate, what large multimodal models can do for pre-print-era evidence. A selection of talks was released publicly; they are gathered here.

Released talks

Published on YouTube — click to watch. The full programme follows below.

Video thumbnail: The Graphom Project: A Preliminary Atlas of Pre-Modern Written Sources

Day 1 · Creating Research Machines with LMMs

The Graphom Project: A Preliminary Atlas of Pre-Modern Written Sources

Stephen Pink

Plus Ultra Collective
Video thumbnail: When Players Rewrite History: Gameworlds, LMMs, and Alternative Medieval Scenarios

Day 3 · Emergent Properties

When Players Rewrite History: Gameworlds, LMMs, and Alternative Medieval Scenarios

Roger Martínez-Dávila

University of Colorado · Keynote
Video thumbnail: Agentic AI and Homoiconic Coding

Day 3 · Emergent Properties

Agentic AI and Homoiconic Coding

Damon Wischik

University of Cambridge
Video thumbnail: Unpacking Large Language Models: Design, Limitations, and Solutions for Humanities Research

Day 4 · Workshops

Unpacking Large Language Models: Design, Limitations, and Solutions for Humanities Research

Ben Kiessling

Université Paris Sciences et Lettres · Workshop

Full programme

Four days, online and in Oxford. Talks marked Watch were released publicly.

Day 1 A New Age of Pre-Modern Inquiry Thursday 4 December 2025

Opening keynote

Rethinking the Past: An AI Perspective in Archaeology

Maurizio Forte · Duke University

Panel: Creating Research Machines with LMMs

Evaluating LLM Performance on NLP Tasks for Old English

Mark Faulkner & Elisabetta Magnanti · Trinity College Dublin / Vienna

Panel: Creating Research Machines with LMMs

The Graphom Project: A Preliminary Atlas of Pre-Modern Written Sources

Stephen Pink · Plus Ultra Collective

Watch ↗

Panel

Panel discussion: building research machines from large multimodal models

Henrike Lähnemann, Anthony J. Lappin, Laura Morreale, Achim Rabus

Day 2 LMMs and/as the Archive Friday 5 December 2025

Presentation

(Re-)Structuring the Catalogue: Limitations and Design Strategy for Applying LLMs to Medieval Manuscript Catalogues

Madeline Rose · Trinity College Dublin

Presentation

Visual Language Models and Traditional HTR for Multilingual Handwritten Text

Achim Rabus · University of Freiburg

Presentation

Birchbark Letters: Complex Fragmented Texts Calling for LLM Reconstruction

Dmitri Sitchinava · University of Potsdam

Roundtable

Roundtable: LMMs as Archive

Peter B. Kaufman, Laura Morreale, Elaine Treharne, and panel · MIT / Harvard / Stanford

Day 3 Emergent Properties Saturday 6 December 2025

Workshop

Introduction to Computational Map Studies with MapReader

Peter Broadwell, Simon Wiles, Katherine McDonough · Stanford / Lancaster

Keynote

When Players Rewrite History: Gameworlds, LMMs, and Alternative Medieval Scenarios

Roger Martínez-Dávila · University of Colorado

Watch ↗

Presentation

Using Generative AI for Medieval Studies Research (I)

Anthony Harris · University of Cambridge

Presentation

AI Models for Transcription and Exploration of Historical Maps and Other Troublesome Materials

Peter Broadwell, Simon Wiles, Katherine McDonough · Stanford / Lancaster

Presentation

Agentic AI and Homoiconic Coding

Damon Wischik · University of Cambridge

Watch ↗

Roundtable

Roundtable: The Future of Pre-Modern Inference Studies

Sarah Bowen Savant, Peter B. Kaufman, Tom Revell, Daniele Nardi, Pablo Acosta-García

Day 4 Workshops Sunday 7 December 2025

Hands-on workshop

Using Generative AI for Medieval Studies Research (II)

Anthony Harris · University of Cambridge

Workshop

Unpacking Large Language Models: Design, Limitations, and Solutions for Humanities Research

Ben Kiessling · Université Paris Sciences et Lettres

Watch ↗

This programme is reproduced from the first Ars Inquirendi, originally published on the Oxford Medieval Studies site. Synthetic proceedings are gathered at the Plus Ultra Collective.