OpenAI and Microsoft have teamed up with Harvard University’s library to feed their AI models texts that stretch back over 600 years. By digitizing medieval manuscripts, early printed books and rare volumes, they hope the models will learn historical language patterns and subtle context—imagine an AI that not only answers questions but understands why a 16th-century scholar chose certain words.
Harvard’s Libraries: A Wealth of Hidden Gems
With more than 20 million volumes ranging from vellum-bound medieval codices to pioneering scientific treatises, Harvard offers a treasure trove for model training. This archive can help AI grasp archaic vocabulary and see how ideas evolved, refining everything from chatbots to academic research assistants with a deeper sense of our intellectual heritage.
Fueling New Research Frontiers
This collaboration reflects a growing trend of universities partnering with tech firms to unlock special collections. Harvard expands global access to its rare materials, and AI teams gain exclusive training data. The upshot? Historians tracing the spread of Renaissance thought, linguists mapping centuries of language change and legal scholars exploring the birth of modern jurisprudence could all get much smarter digital tools.
Preserving the Past, Respecting Rights
Working with fragile, centuries-old artifacts raises tough questions. Pages must be handled gently and digitized with precision, and some works still carry reproduction restrictions despite their age. Balancing open access with preservation ethics will be essential to ensure researchers can study these items without endangering the originals.
Deep Partnerships, Deeper AI
Ultimately, this project shows that the next leap in artificial intelligence isn’t just about faster hardware or bigger datasets—it’s about weaving our shared past into the models we build. By bringing historical texts into the mix, we give machines a richer compass for understanding human thought, one manuscript at a time.