PROMETHEUS — Promoting Universal Values through Digital Epigraphy and Cultural Heritage is a small-scale cooperation project co-funded by the European Union Program Creative Europe, Culture strand. It is also co-funded by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the Republic of North Macedonia, the Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia, the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Bulgaria, and the project's partners. The duration of the project is 2 years (2024-2025). The project consortium comprises 5 institutions from 3 countries: North Macedonia, Bulgaria, and Serbia. The project coordinator is The Archaeological Museum of the Republic of North Macedonia in Skopje, and the other partners are The Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Belgrade, The Institute for Balkan Studies of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, The St. Kliment Ohridski University of Sofia, and Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje. The activities of the project are divided into 5 Work Packages (WPs): 1) Project Management, Administration and Coordination; 2) Capacity building; 3) Networking and knowledge sharing; 4) Digitisation of epigraphic monuments; 5) Communication and dissemination.
Epigraphic monuments are an important part of cultural heritage and a valuable source of information about the past. They testify to all aspects of human civilisation and give valuable insights into everyday life, social institutions, politics, and culture. Inscriptions, more than any other written historical source, are personal records. They document love, loss, sadness, hope, faith, well-being, honour, pride, respect, success, power and authority, freedom, peace, war. Therefore, they are a helpful tool for the recognition and promotion of universal human values. Southeastern European and Balkan countries have a significant epigraphic heritage from the Greek and Roman periods, which testifies to the life, culture and history of the local tribes and their relations with the civilisations of Ancient Greece and Rome. These inscriptions speak in their specific way about inclusion and diversity and can help us better understand these issues in the context of universal values. The ongoing war in Ukraine and its consequences on Europe and the rest of the world once again remind us that fostering humanity is an obligation of all generations. Epigraphic heritage has the potential to teach the audience, especially the younger generation, about the importance of this obligation.
In the last decades, epigraphy has significantly evolved as a digital field of research. Various digital corpora of inscriptions have been created following the highest scholarly standards. Different initiatives have also been launched that promote the use of digital technology to bring the content of epigraphic monuments closer to a wider audience, enhance the learning of Greek and Latin, and promote knowledge of history and culture.
Nevertheless, the existing digital models for the representation of museum collections and archaeological sites still hesitate to take full advantage of the written content of the inscriptions to actively engage the audience. The digital publication of inscriptions in Southeastern European and Balkan countries is still underdeveloped, and museums are generally in need of models for audience development and engagement of the audience in the reception and experience of cultural heritage based on the use of digital epigraphy. The transnational cooperation between the cultural institutions in these countries needs to be improved.
The aim of the cooperation between the Archaeological Museum of the Republic of North Macedonia, the University “St. Kliment Ohridski” (Faculty of Classical and Modern Philology), Sofia, Republic of Bulgaria, the Institute for Balkan Studies SASA, Belgrade, Republic of Serbia, the University of Belgrade –Faculty of Philosophy, Republic of Serbia and the University “Ss. Cyril and Methodius” (Faculty of Philosophy), Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia, is to bring together the existing successful practices of digital edition of inscriptions, as well as of the use of epigraphy as an educational tool to design and develop resources and models for active engagement of diverse audiences and epigraphic heritage dissemination based on the promotion of universal values.
This project strengthens transnational creation and circulation and enhances cultural institutions' ability to innovate and prosper. Its activities are primarily focused on increasing access to and participation in the culture of diverse categories of audiences, as well as on audience engagement and development, both physically and digitally. They are also focused on capacity building, training, professional development, and digitisation.
To achieve these objectives, the cooperation between the partners from the Southeastern European and Balkan countries and other European countries is focused on the creation of a digital collection of Ancient Greek and Latin epigraphic monuments from the regions of the Republic of North Macedonia, the Republic of Serbia and the Republic of Bulgaria accompanied with the relevant digital resources for its exploitation and use both by expert and non-expert audience. This cooperation enabled the free exchange of experience, good practices and knowledge in the area of digital epigraphy and epigraphic heritage representation and dissemination among institutions involved in various aspects of cultural heritage care and management. It built up the capacities of museums, archaeological sites and educational facilities to digitise and document epigraphic monuments and develop and create their digital corpora of inscriptions, but, more importantly, to explore the possibilities for implementation of the existing and the development and creation of new models for encoding and digital publication of inscriptions that will engage the wider audience in a way in which everyone will be able to recognize the human values as a link between the past, the present and future and as a link that connects people regardless of sex, race, religion, language, nationality. It also built up the capacities of these institutions to present the local epigraphic monuments and the cultural heritage from classical antiquity in a way in which everyone will be able to recognise it as part of the common European cultural space.
Finally, this project strengthens the capacities of cultural institutions to cooperate closer with schools and universities and to organize events and activities in which students will have the opportunity to use their digital skills, appreciate cultural heritage and at the same time learn Greek and Latin, learn epigraphy, learn about the past, learn about the Greek and Roman roots of European civilisation and modern culture and develop their ability to analyse issues related to diversity, inclusion, gender equality and environment from a diachronic perspective and the perspective of universal human values.
The project's results are digital and open-access, available for free use by cultural, educational, and research institutions and diverse audiences worldwide.