Source acquisition

A Wheel of Heaven Translation is only as good as its source. This page lists the canonical openly-licensed source editions per tradition, the access pattern for each, and the file format the project stores them in.

The non-negotiable: the source must be either Public Domain, CC0, or a project-cleared licence. A WoH Translation cannot rest on a copyrighted critical edition; the project’s audit trail requires that any reader can re-fetch the source themselves and verify the pointed/transliterated text the translation is built from.

Hebrew Bible#

Canonical source#

Tanach with Ta’amei Hamikra (Westminster Leningrad Codex with vowel points and cantillation marks).

• Edition. The Westminster Leningrad Codex is the standard modern critical edition of the Hebrew Bible. The “Tanach with Ta’amei Hamikra” variant adds the cantillation marks (the te’amim), which the project preserves in source files because they affect translation choices (athnach, pasuq, zaqef, etc. mark major syntactic divisions that English punctuation should reflect).
• License. Public Domain.
• Authoritative URL. http://www.tanach.us/Tanach.xml
• Practical access. The Sefaria public API at sefaria.org/api/v3/texts/{Book}.{Chapter} returns clean JSON with the pointed Hebrew and verse divisions. The Sefaria text edition "Tanach with Ta'amei Hamikra" should be specified to get the cantillated form.
• Refid convention. {BOOK-CODE}-{chapter}:{verse}, e.g. GEN-1:1. Book codes follow the SBL Handbook abbreviations (GEN, EXO, LEV, NUM, DEU, JOS, JDG, RUT, 1SA, 2SA, 1KI, 2KI, 1CH, 2CH, EZR, NEH, EST, JOB, PSA, PRO, ECC, SNG, ISA, JER, LAM, EZK, DAN, HOS, JOL, AMO, OBA, JON, MIC, NAM, HAB, ZEP, HAG, ZEC, MAL).

Reference PD translations#

For the Translator’s fallback (where the glossary is silent):

• American Standard Version (ASV) 1901. The current WoH-project reference for Hebrew Bible Translator-default. Public Domain. Available via Sefaria, BibleGateway, and many others. Closest 20th-century formal-equivalence translation free of copyright.
• Optional second reference: the JPS 1917 Tanakh (Public Domain) for Jewish-tradition readings, especially the primaeval-history section where it diverges from Christian translations.

Lexical reference (Editor and Reviewer use)#

• BDB — Brown-Driver-Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament. Public Domain.
• HALOT — Koehler-Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament. Copyrighted; project access via scholarly references only.
• NIDOTTE — VanGemeren (ed.), New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology and Exegesis. Copyrighted.
• TDOT — Botterweck-Ringgren, Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament. Copyrighted.

Greek New Testament#

Canonical source#

Tregelles Greek New Testament (1857–1879).

• Edition. Samuel Prideaux Tregelles’ critical edition; the oldest Public Domain critical edition of the Greek NT. Available in transcription via the Tyndale House STEP project.
• License. Public Domain.
• Authoritative URL. Tyndale House STEP Bible project (https://stepbible.org/).
• Practical access. STEP Bible API; also OpenText resources.

Alternative source#

SBLGNT — SBL Greek New Testament (2010).

• Edition. Society of Biblical Literature edition, Michael W. Holmes (ed.).
• License. Free for non-commercial scholarly use; commercial redistribution requires SBL permission. The WoH project is CC0 and would need SBL clearance for direct redistribution of the text body.
• Status. Use as scholarly reference but not as the source text the project ships.

Reference PD translations#

• King James Version (KJV) 1611/1769. Public Domain.
• American Standard Version (ASV) 1901. Public Domain.
• Tregelles’ own English New Testament, where it exists. Public Domain.

Lexical reference#

• BDAG — Bauer-Danker-Arndt-Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament. Copyrighted.
• LSJ — Liddell-Scott-Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon. Public Domain (older editions). The 9th edition supplements are copyrighted.
• Louw-Nida — Greek-English Lexicon Based on Semantic Domains. Copyrighted.
• Thayer’s — Joseph Thayer, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament. Public Domain. Older and weaker than BDAG but citable.

Refid convention#

{BOOK-CODE}-{chapter}:{verse}, e.g. MAT-13:3, JOH-1:1, REV-4:1. SBL Handbook book codes (MAT, MRK, LUK, JOH, ACT, ROM, 1CO, 2CO, GAL, EPH, PHP, COL, 1TH, 2TH, 1TI, 2TI, TIT, PHM, HEB, JAS, 1PE, 2PE, 1JN, 2JN, 3JN, JUD, REV).

Akkadian (Mesopotamian)#

Canonical sources#

CDLI (Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative).

• Resource. Comprehensive transliterations of cuneiform texts with metadata. Lookups via CDLI numbers (P-numbers).
• License. CC-BY-NC-SA for the texts; attribution required. Project status: can be used as reference; for shipping in the Library a project-cleared agreement may be needed for some specific texts.
• URL. https://cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/

ETCSL (Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature) — also includes some Akkadian.

• Resource. Oxford’s comprehensive Sumerian text corpus with English translations.
• License. Open for scholarly use; project use compatible.
• URL. https://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/

Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus (ORACC).

• Resource. Critical-edition-style transliterations of Akkadian and Sumerian texts with lemma-level annotation.
• License. Project-by-project; most are open access. Verify per text.
• URL. http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/

Reference scholarly editions#

• Andrew George, The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic (2003). The standard critical edition of Gilgamesh. Copyrighted (Oxford University Press). Use as scholarly reference; do not ship.
• Benjamin Foster, Before the Muses (3rd ed., 2005). The standard English anthology of Akkadian literature. Copyrighted. Reference only.
• Stephanie Dalley, Myths from Mesopotamia (1989, rev. 2008). Standard mid-academic English translation of Akkadian myths including Atrahasis, Enuma Elish, Gilgamesh. Copyrighted.

Lexical reference#

• CAD — Chicago Assyrian Dictionary. Open access: https://isac.uchicago.edu/research/publications/chicago-assyrian-dictionary. Comprehensive lexicon; PDF volumes downloadable.
• AHw — Akkadisches Handwörterbuch (von Soden). Copyrighted print only.

Refid convention#

For Gilgamesh: GILG-{tablet-roman}:{line}, e.g. GILG-XI:14 for Tablet XI line 14. Tablets are Roman numerals (I–XII); the late Tablet XII is the appendix.

For other texts, use the project’s source code (e.g. ATRA for Atrahasis, ENUM for Enuma Elish) + standardised line numbering per the critical edition.

Sumerian#

Canonical source#

ETCSL (Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature).

• Resource. Oxford-based corpus with line-by-line transliterations and English translations.
• License. Open for scholarly use.
• URL. https://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/
• Refid convention. {ETCSL-id}-{line}, e.g. ETCSL-1.7.4-15 for line 15 of The Eridu Genesis (ETCSL 1.7.4). Or use the project’s own slug code (ERID for Eridu Genesis, ATRA for Atrahasis Sumerian fragments).

Lexical reference#

• ePSD2 — Electronic Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary. Open access at http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/epsd2/.

Egyptian (Pyramid Texts, Memphite Theology, etc.)#

Canonical source#

Open critical editions where available; specific PD older editions for canonical Pyramid Text and Coffin Text material.

• Sethe, Die altägyptischen Pyramidentexte (1908–1922). Public Domain.
• Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (1969). English translation; copyrighted.
• Allen, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (2005). Modern English translation; copyrighted.

Lexical reference#

• Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian (1962). Standard for working purposes; copyrighted.
• Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar (3rd ed., 1957). Standard grammar; copyrighted.

Refid convention#

{TEXT-CODE}-{spell-id}:{line}, e.g. PT-228:1 for Pyramid Text Utterance 228 line 1.

Qur’an (Arabic)#

Canonical source#

Tanzil.net.

• Resource. Free, open Arabic Qur’an in multiple recensions (the standard Hafs from Asim, Warsh from Nafi, etc.). The default is the Uthmanic/Hafs text.
• License. Open for scholarly use; attribution required.
• URL. https://tanzil.net/
• Refid convention. QUR-{sura}:{ayah}, e.g. QUR-21:1, QUR-54:1, QUR-56:15.

Reference PD translations#

• George Sale, The Koran (1734). Oldest English translation of academic seriousness. Public Domain.
• John Medows Rodwell, The Koran (1861). Public Domain.
• E. H. Palmer, The Qur’an (1880). Public Domain.
• Marmaduke Pickthall, The Meaning of the Glorious Koran (1930). Public Domain in most jurisdictions.
• Abdullah Yusuf Ali, The Holy Qur’an (1934). Public Domain.

Lexical reference#

• Lane, An Arabic-English Lexicon (1863–1893). Public Domain. Comprehensive classical Arabic lexicon; available at http://www.tyndalearchive.com/tabs/lane/.
• Hava, Arabic-English Dictionary (1899). Public Domain.
• Wehr-Cowan, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic. Modern reference; copyrighted.

Special notes#

The Qur’an translation work requires extra care for tradition- respect:

• The project’s Translation track is technically possible (working from Arabic with a transliteration map) but the Edition track (working from a PD English translation, applying the WoH glossary) is more commonly the right approach because the Arabic text is liturgical and the project does not benefit from a fresh Arabic-to-English rendering.
• Carve-outs for divine names (Allah, ar-Rahman, ar-Rahim) and the Throne (al-`Arsh) should be made explicit and conservative.
• The project should consult Muslim scholarship before shipping any speculative readings of Qur’anic verses.

Pseudepigrapha (Book of Enoch, Jubilees, etc.)#

Canonical sources#

1 Enoch (Ethiopic):

• Charles, The Book of Enoch (1912). Public Domain. The standard English translation through the 20th century; superseded scholarly by Nickelsburg/VanderKam but still cited.
• Knibb, The Ethiopic Book of Enoch (1978). Copyrighted. Scholarly reference only.
• Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch 1: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 1–36; 81–108 (2001). Hermeneia. Copyrighted. Scholarly reference only.

Jubilees:

• Charles, The Book of Jubilees (1902). Public Domain.
• VanderKam, The Book of Jubilees (1989). Copyrighted.

Refid convention#

ENO-{chapter}:{verse} for 1 Enoch. JUB-{chapter}:{verse} for Jubilees.

Ugaritic (Levantine)#

Canonical source#

Copenhagen Ugaritic Corpus (CUC) — Text-Fabric dataset.

• Resource. Consonantal Latin transliteration of 278 tablets with line / column / side annotation, including the complete Baal Cycle (KTU 1.1–1.7), Aqhat, Kirta, Rephaim, and Shachar & Shalim.
• Licence. CC BY-NC 4.0. Working base for in-house translation only; do not republish the transliteration verbatim under CC0. A book whose source-uga-N.json was built from CUC declares a licensing block on _meta.json recording the upstream NC term.
• URL. https://github.com/DT-UCPH/cuc (Zenodo DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.10695308).
• Refid convention. KTU-anchored: {CODE}-{tablet}:{column}:{line}, e.g. BAAL-1.3.i:5 or the simplified AQHT-17:1. The baal-cycle-woh book is the established precedent.

Reference scholarly editions#

• KTU³ (Dietrich-Loretz-Sanmartín 2013) — the standard edition; copyrighted, reference only.
• Smith & Pitard, The Ugaritic Baal Cycle, vol. 2 (Brill 2009) — definitive for KTU 1.3–1.4. Copyrighted.
• Pardee, The Baʿlu Myth in COS vol. 1 (Brill 2003) — copyrighted.
• Virolleaud, Syria 12+ (1931 onwards) — editiones principes; enter US PD on a rolling 95-year schedule, Syria 12 in Jan 2027. Worth waiting for the start of an Ugaritic PD shelf.
• Gibson, Canaanite Myths and Legends (Edinburgh 1978) — copyrighted but heavily relied upon.

Lexical reference#

• del Olmo Lete & Sanmartín, A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition (DULAT) — Brill, copyrighted.
• Sivan, A Grammar of the Ugaritic Language — copyrighted.

Hittite and Hurrian (Anatolian)#

Canonical source#

Hethitologie-Portal Mainz (HPM) / Mythen der Hethiter editions.

• Resource. E. Rieken et al. line-by-line edition (partitura with German translation) of the Hittite mythological corpus — Kumarbi cycle (CTH 344, 345, 348, 364), Illuyanka (321), Telipinu (324), Elkunirša and Ašertu (342). Open access via the HPM portal.
• Licence. No Creative Commons licence stated. Treat as FREE with open-access posture — citation expected, redistribution permission requested explicitly per the acquisition-program licence policy.
• URL. https://hethport.net/txhet_myth/textindex.php (the old hethport.uni-wuerzburg.de URLs redirect here).
• Refid convention. {CODE}-{tablet}:{line} with the CTH number recorded in _meta.json.composition, e.g. EMRG-1:18 (CTH 344 Song of Emergence).

PD transliterations#

• E. Forrer, Die Boghazköi-Texte in Umschrift (1922/1926). Public Domain; on Archive.org. Covers Old-Hittite-era tablets only — fine for Illuyanka and Telipinu fragments, not for the Kumarbi cycle (first published 1946+).
• KUB / KBo cuneiform autographs pre-1931. Public Domain.

Reference scholarly editions#

• Güterbock, Kumarbi (1946) + JCS Ullikummi edition (1951–52). Copyrighted; URAA-restored.
• Hoffner, Hittite Myths (2nd ed., 1998). Copyrighted.

Known gap: CTH 789 (Song of Release). The only open edition is E. Neu, StBoT 32 (1996) — copyrighted. No alternative identified; the text is BLOCKED until either an open edition appears or hethport.net adds it.

Lexical reference#

• HW² — Hethitisches Wörterbuch (Friedrich-Kammenhuber). Copyrighted; partial.
• CHD — Chicago Hittite Dictionary. Partial fascicles; copyrighted.

Avestan and Pahlavi (Persian / Zoroastrian)#

Canonical sources#

Geldner, Avesta, the Sacred Books of the Parsis (1886–96).

• Edition. The standard critical edition of the Avestan scriptures (Yasna including the Gathas, Vendidad, Yashts). Three volumes.
• Licence. Public Domain everywhere.
• Practical access. avesta.org (Joseph H. Peterson) presents Geldner-based romanized Avestan in HTML; the site apparatus carries Peterson’s copyright, but a faithful transcription of the PD Geldner text is itself PD. For clean provenance, key from the Geldner volumes on Archive.org and treat avesta.org as a collation aid.
• TITUS Avestan corpus is closed (“no parts… may be republished without prior permission”) — reference only.

PD English translations#

• Darmesteter, The Zend-Avesta, SBE 4 (1880) and SBE 23 (1883). Public Domain.
• Mills, The Zend-Avesta, Part III: the Yasna, Visparad, Âfrînagân, Gâhs, and Miscellaneous Fragments, SBE 31 (1887). Public Domain. The standard PD Gathas translation.
• West, Pahlavi Texts, SBE 5 (1880) + SBE 18, 24, 37, 47. Public Domain. Indian recension of the Bundahishn and other Pahlavi texts.

Pahlavi gaps#

The Greater (Iranian) Bundahishn and Selections of Zadspram have no openly-licensed machine-readable original. The PD basis is T. D. Anklesaria’s facsimile of MS TD2 (1908). B. T. Anklesaria’s 1956 transcription and 1964 Zadspram edition are copyrighted. Treat these texts as Pahlavi-pilot work pending direct transcription from the TD2 facsimile, or wait for an open edition.

Refid convention#

VID-{fargard}:{verse} for Vendidad (e.g. VID-2:21). YAS-{chapter}:{stanza} for Yasna, e.g. YAS-30:3 (Gatha Ahunavaiti); YT-{number}:{stanza} for Yashts (e.g. YT-19:35 Zamyad). BUND-{chapter}:{section} for Bundahishn.

Greek (classical)#

For the Greek New Testament see the dedicated section above. For classical Greek mythography, philosophy, and historiography:

Canonical sources#

Perseus canonical-greekLit + Open Greek and Latin / First1KGreek.

• Resource. TEI XML editions of the major Greek authors at https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-greekLit and https://github.com/OpenGreekAndLatin/First1KGreek. Direct file paths use TLG identifiers, e.g. data/tlg0020/tlg001/tlg0020.tlg001.perseus-grc2.xml for Hesiod’s Theogony.
• Licence. CC BY-SA 4.0 (older files CC BY-SA 3.0).
• Practical access. Both the Scaife reader (https://scaife.perseus.org/) and direct raw-XML fetches from GitHub. The TEI <l> elements carry the canonical line numbering.
• Refid convention. Line numbers for poetry (THEO-116, ERGA-109); Stephanus pagination for Plato (TIM-22b, CRI-113c); book.chapter.section for prose (Diodorus DIOD-1.10.1).

PD print bases#

• Rzach, Hesiodi Carmina (Teubner 1902) for Hesiod.
• Burnet, Platonis Opera (OCT 1900–1907) for Plato — the same text Perseus serves.
• Allen, Homeri Opera vol. V (OCT 1912) for the Homeric Hymns.
• Vogel, Diodori Bibliotheca Historica (Teubner 1888).
• Wagner, Apollodori Bibliotheca (Teubner 1894).

PD English translations#

• Evelyn-White, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and Homerica (Loeb 1914). Public Domain.
• Jowett, The Dialogues of Plato (1892). Public Domain.
• Smyth, Aeschylus (Loeb 1926). Public Domain.
• Frazer, Apollodorus (Loeb 1921). Public Domain.
• Oldfather, Diodorus Siculus (Loeb vols, 1933+) — copyright not renewed → PD-US; full text hosted on Bill Thayer’s LacusCurtius.

Hellenistic witnesses#

• Berossus, Babyloniaca (fragments via Syncellus, Eusebius, Müller FHG II). All carriers PD. PD English: Cory, Ancient Fragments (1832). Modern editions (Burstein 1978, Verbrugghe-Wickersham 1996) copyrighted.
• Philo of Byblos / Sanchuniathon (via Eusebius PE I.9–10). PD Greek: Gifford 1903 (full PE) on Archive.org; First1KGreek tlg2018 (CC BY-SA). PD English: Gifford 1903; Cory 1832.

Lexical reference#

• LSJ — Liddell-Scott-Jones, older editions PD; 9th edition supplements copyrighted.
• LSI — Liddell-Scott Intermediate (1889). Public Domain.

Coptic (Gnostic / Nag Hammadi)#

Canonical sources#

Coptic Scriptorium corpora.

• Resource. TEI / ANNIS / CoNLL-U annotated Coptic texts; CC BY (variable per corpus). Verified usable corpora for the Library: thomas-gospel (NHC II,2 Gospel of Thomas — Dilley edition) and pistis-sophia (Askew Codex).
• Licence. CC BY 4.0 for the documents named above (the corpora README lists the per-document licence).
• URL. https://github.com/CopticScriptorium/corpora.
• Refid convention. Logion number for Thomas (THOM-77); Schmidt chapter for Pistis Sophia (PIST-1:7); codex page.line for other tractates (AJOH-11:18).

PD Coptic editions#

• Schwartze & Petermann, Pistis Sophia (1851) — Coptic with Latin translation. Public Domain.
• C. Schmidt, Pistis Sophia Coptic edition (1925 Coptica II). PD-US.

PD English#

• G. R. S. Mead, Pistis Sophia (1921, 2nd ed.). Public Domain.
• Horner, Coptic NT and Pistis Sophia partial translations (1911–1924). Public Domain.

Tractates with no open Coptic edition#

For NHC tractates beyond Thomas and Pistis Sophia (Apocryphon of John, Hypostasis of the Archons, On the Origin of the World, Eugnostos / Sophia of Jesus Christ), no openly-licensed Coptic transcription exists. The standard print editions (Krause-Labib 1962; Till-Schenke 1972; Waldstein-Wisse 1995; Layton 1974; Bullard 1970) are all copyrighted. The Marcion project (https://marcion.sourceforge.net/, GPL v2) collates from these prints — usable as a working aid but the transcriptions of reconstructed passages carry residual edition rights. Translator posture: transcribe from the facsimile codex images, treat Marcion as collation.

Lexical reference#

• Crum, A Coptic Dictionary (Oxford 1939). PD-US; the standard for Sahidic.

Old Church Slavonic (Slavic apocrypha)#

2 Enoch, the Apocalypse of Abraham, and related material.

• Sokolov, Slavonic Book of Enoch / Книга тайн Еноха (Moscow 1910, posthumous edited by Speranskij). Public Domain; scans via Archive.org and national libraries.
• Popov 1880 (earlier Slavonic edition). Public Domain.
• Sreznevsky / Tikhonravov Slavonic editions of the Apocalypse of Abraham. Public Domain (verification per scan pending).
• Charles & Morfill, The Book of the Secrets of Enoch (1896) and Forbes-Charles, APOT vol. II (1913). Public Domain English.
• Box, The Apocalypse of Abraham (SPCK 1918). Public Domain.

Refid convention: 2EN-{chapter}:{verse} (declare long vs. short recension per verse), APAB-{chapter}:{verse}.

Persian and Arabic (Bahá’í)#

Canonical sources#

The Bahá’í scriptural corpus — Bahá’u’lláh (d. 1892), the Báb (d. 1850), ’Abdu’l-Bahá (d. 1921) — is fully PD by author-death calculation. The Bahá’í World Centre’s authorised English translations are copyrighted; the Persian and Arabic originals are not.

• H-Bahai (Michigan State University, H-Net) hosts scans of 19th-/early-20th-century lithographs and the INBA (Iran National Bahá’í Archives) facsimile series. https://www.h-net.org/~bahai/
• Afnan Library hosts the digitised INBA series. https://afnanlibrary.org/inba/
• Ocean of Lights hosts machine-readable originals alongside provisional translations. https://oceanoflights.org/
• bahai-library.com hosts originals and the multilinear Aqdas project.
• The Bahá’í Reference Library (bahai.org/library) carries PDF downloads of the BWC’s typeset Arabic and Persian editions, but the BWC asserts copyright over its typesetting / compilation — practical posture: transcribe from PD lithographs / INBA facsimiles, treat the BWC e-texts as collation aid only.

Licence posture#

The underlying words are PD by author-death calculation. The BWC’s copyright claim attaches to its editions, not to the underlying text. The acquisition program’s practical rule: prefer the lithograph-derived transcriptions for clean CC0 provenance.

Sensitivity#

The Bahá’í community is textually meticulous and the BWC’s authorised translations are considered authoritative within the faith. WoH translations are unofficial, independent of the authorised renderings, and stated as such in the methodology note of every Bahá’í book.

Refid convention#

Aphoristic works number serially: HWA-{n} for the Arabic Hidden Words, HWP-{n} for the Persian Hidden Words. Treatises use paragraph numbering: IQAN-1:13.

Vietnamese (Caodai)#

Đạo Cao Đài canonical texts.

• Resource. The diaspora archive daotam.info hosts machine-readable Vietnamese HTML of Thánh Ngôn Hiệp Tuyển (both volumes), Pháp Chánh Truyền, Tân Luật, Kinh Thiên Đạo và Thế Đạo, and Con Đường Thiêng Liêng Hằng Sống.
• Licence. Vietnam: life+50. Vol. 1 (1928) and the constitutional texts (1926–27) are PD in Vietnam since at least 2010. Vol. 2 (1963) and post-1948 Phạm Công Tắc material carry more complex status (anonymous-works rule, US URAA considerations) — flagged per book. No formal licence statement on daotam.info — treat as religious commons; courtesy contact with the archive accompanies use of the source layer.
• URL. https://www.daotam.info/
• Refid convention. TNHT-{vol}:{n} for Thánh Ngôn Hiệp Tuyển, where n numbers the paragraph of the message and the date appears in source.messages metadata. The first opened book is the established precedent.

Japanese (Oomoto)#

Oomoto Shin’yu (大本神諭) and Reikai Monogatari (霊界物語).

• Resource. reikaimonogatari.net — the de-facto open corpus, maintained by researcher Iizuka Hiroaki. Full text of the Oomoto Shin’yu (index obc=os) and all 81 volumes of the Reikai Monogatari, with bulk downloads.
• Licence. Japan: life+50 for authors who died before 1968. Deguchi Nao (d. 1918) and Deguchi Onisaburō (d. 1948) are both fully PD in Japan. US URAA caveat: Reikai Monogatari volumes published 1929–34 do not enter the US PD until ~2025–2030 on a rolling 95-year schedule; sequence US-hosted publication accordingly.
• URL. https://reikaimonogatari.net/ / https://reikaimonogatari.net/dl.php (bulk).
• Refid convention. OSHIN-{year}:{n} for dated Shin’yu oracles, RM-{volume}:{chapter}:{n} for Reikai Monogatari.

Sanskrit (Vedic / Indic)#

• VedaWeb (Universität zu Köln) — TEI dataset of the Rig Veda with per-version CC licences declared in the teiHeader. https://vedaweb.uni-koeln.de/; data on Zenodo DOI 4601264. Verify per-version licence before ingest.
• Aufrecht, Die Hymnen des Rigveda (2nd ed. 1877). Romanized Saṃhitā text; Public Domain everywhere.
• Griffith, The Hymns of the Ṛgveda (1889–92). Public Domain English (sacred-texts).
• Eggeling, The Śatapatha-Brāhmaṇa SBE 12, 26, 41, 43, 44 (1882–1900). Public Domain.
• Telang, The Bhagavadgītā SBE 8 (1882) and Arnold, The Song Celestial (1885). Public Domain.
• GRETIL (Göttingen) hosts many Sanskrit e-texts but has no uniform licence — verify per file. The Mahābhārata electronic text (Tokunaga / Smith) is “free for scholarly, non-commercial use” — not CC0-ingestable; the project’s Sanskrit work uses targeted Rig Veda + Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa selections only.

Refid convention: RV-{maṇḍala}.{sūkta}:{ṛc} (e.g. RV-10.129:4); BG-{chapter}:{śloka}; SB-{kāṇḍa}.{prapāṭhaka}.{brāhmaṇa}.{kaṇḍikā}.

Akkadian (extension)#

Beyond the canonical Akkadian sources already documented above (CDLI, ETCSL, ORACC), the electronic Babylonian Library (eBL) at LMU Munich provides full critical editions of every Akkadian epic on the project’s queue — Atrahasis (L.1.1), Enuma Elish (L.1.2), Erra and Ishum (L.1.5), Descent of Ishtar (L.1.8), Etana (L.1.9), Anzu (L.1.10).

• Licence. CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Working base for in-house translation; the resulting book inherits the NC term via the licensing block on _meta.json — the Atrahasis translation is the first such case in the corpus.
• URL. https://www.ebl.lmu.de/
• Companion: SEAL — Sources of Early Akkadian Literature (Hebrew University; https://seal.huji.ac.il/), CC BY-NC-ND; reference / collation only.

Refid convention follows the eBL line numbering, which itself matches the established Lambert-Millard (Atrahasis), Lambert (Anzu / Erra), Foster anthology line numbers per text. Tablet roman numerals + line: ATRA-I:1, ENUM-IV:18.

Egyptian (extension)#

Beyond the PD basis (Sethe, Naville, Budge) already documented:

• Thesaurus Linguae Aegyptiae (TLA). The site itself is partially restricted (no full sub-corpora reuse). But TLA publishes raw-data corpus dumps on HuggingFace under CC BY-SA 4.0 — thesaurus-linguae-aegyptiae/tla-Earlier_Egyptian_original-v18-premium and sibling datasets, with lemmatised transliteration and German translation. This is the open Egyptian pipeline.
• Coffin Texts. A. de Buck, OIP 34–87 (1935–1961) — free PDFs from ISAC (isac.uchicago.edu) but copyright Univ. of Chicago; treat as gratis reference only. TLA HF dump covers many CT spells under CC BY-SA.

Refid convention: PT-{utterance}:{line} for Pyramid Texts (PT-261:1); BD-{spell}:{line} for the Book of the Dead; CT-{spell}:{line} for the Coffin Texts; BHC-{line} for the Book of the Heavenly Cow (Naville’s line numbering).

Source file format#

All source files in data-library/{book-slug}/source-{lang}-{N}.json follow this schema:

{
  "schemaVersion": 2,
  "bookSlug": "<book slug>",
  "chapter": <number>,
  "source": {
    "type": "<masoretic-text | greek-critical | akkadian-transliteration | sumerian-etcsl | sumerian-composite | arabic-uthmanic | egyptian-hieroglyphic | ugaritic-alphabetic-cuneiform-best-effort-reconstruction | hittite-transliteration | avestan-transliteration | pahlavi-transcription | coptic-sahidic | persian-lithograph | arabic-lithograph | vietnamese-print | japanese-print | sanskrit-samhita | slavonic-edition | english-pd-edition | ...>",
    "versionTitle": "<canonical name of the edition>",
    "license": "<Public Domain | CC0 | CC-BY-SA | ...>",
    "versionSource": "<canonical URL of the edition>",
    "fetchedFrom": "<where the project actually pulled it from>",
    "fetchedAt": "<ISO date>"
  },
  "verses": [
    {
      "n": 1,
      "refId": "<CODE>-<chapter>:<verse>",
      "<lang>": "<source-language verbatim>"
    }
  ]
}

The source file is immutable once committed. If the underlying edition is updated (rare), a new source file is created with a new fetch date; the prior file is preserved.

{lang} in the verse object is the ISO 639-1 / -3 code:

Acquisition checklist (per new book)#

Before starting a new WoH Translation book:

• Identify the canonical Public Domain or project-cleared-licence edition.
• Verify the licence in writing; record it in the source file’s source.license field.
• Identify the reference PD English translation the Translator agent will fall back to.
• Confirm the refId convention with the project (book code, verse numbering).
• Pull the first chapter’s source text into data-library/{book-slug}/source-{lang}-1.json.
• Verify the source file round-trips: re-fetch from the canonical URL and confirm the text matches.
• Scaffold _meta.json with the book metadata.

Only then is the project ready to invoke the Translator agent.