About
About Bibliothecarius Modernus - The Modern Librarian
Bibliothecarius Modernus uses AI technology to translate Latin Patristic texts, hopefully making them accessible to audiences that extend beyond niche Latin scholarship. These translations are not intended as authoritative scholarly editions, and the quality will vary based on the AI processing, particularly when handling theologically nuanced concepts. Despite these limitations, the project operates on the principle that accessibility outweighs perfection.
Many works featured here have fallen into relative obscurity, either lacking English translations entirely or having only dated versions available. In some rare cases, more popular authors (like Tertullian or Ambrose) are included for personal reasons or upon request. The translation is prompted for maximal clarity while preserving the original meaning, with the goal of making these historical texts more approachable and potentially inspiring deeper scholarly study. Rather than replacing authoritative editions, this project should help translators identify works that still resonate with modern audiences or deserve further scholarly attention.
To ensure accuracy, the translation process incorporates several safeguards against AI errors (including hallucinations). The videos display the original Latin alongside the English translation, and interlinear (English-Latin) versions are available on the GitHub repository for many texts. This transparency allows viewers to verify translations and identify any potential inaccuracies.
Translation Methodology
Translations are produced using AI assistance (currently Claude 4.5 Sonnet, previously ChatGPT-4o for earlier works) with human direction and review. The process involves text selection, prompting strategy, quality review, and editorial oversight by Ryan Wolfslayer. Contextual research and analysis sections are produced using additional AI research tools (OpenAI o3) with human synthesis and verification.
This approach treats AI as a sophisticated tool requiring disclosure rather than a co-author. The human contributor remains responsible for text selection, curatorial decisions, translation direction, quality review, and all editorial decisions. The original Latin is always displayed alongside English to enable verification.
Resources
- Latin Patristic Texts Repository - Access the growing collection of translated texts.
- Project White Paper (PDF) - The project's philosophy, technical architecture, and methodology.
- Project Video Overview - A video introduction to the project.
For any translators who are interested in making their own translations or authoritative editions: Everything associated with my project is under Creative Commons license, so it's yours to use as a jumping off point - no need to ask. If you want to credit my work or just let me know this was helpful, that's always appreciated but not required.
About Me
Hi, I'm Ryan Wolfslayer, the person behind Bibliothecarius Modernus. For those who are interested, I am a trained librarian with an MSLIS from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I've been working in digital librarianship for close to ten years and am an avid Python programmer. In my free time I read entirely too much theology, which is what directly inspired this project.
Connect & Contribute
Community engagement is the best part of the process, and I look forward to many discussions, corrections, and new theological or historical insights. If you know of existing scholarly translations, please share this information.
Contact: bibliothecarius.modernus@gmail.com
Professional: LinkedIn