Documentation for Semantic Domains, Louw & Nida, SDBG

[jonathanrobie]

We need to document semantic domains in our data. They appear in the @domain and @ln attributes, e.g.:

               <w ref="LUK 1:1!1"
                  class="conj"
                  xml:id="n42001001001"
                  lemma="ἐπειδήπερ"
                  normalized="Ἐπειδήπερ"
                  strong="1895"
                  gloss="Inasmuch as"
                  domain="089007"
                  ln="89.32"

The Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Greek is our source for these domains, it extends Louw & Nida, and @ln is the number of the entry in Louw & Nida. In this case, the corresponding entry looks like this:

LN 89.32 ἐπεί; ἐπειδήa; ἐπειδήπερ: markers of cause or reason, often with the implication of a relevant temporal element—‘because, since, for, inasmuch as.’

Johannes P. Louw and Eugene Albert Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains (New York: United Bible Societies, 1996), 780–95.

Note that an entry may contain multiple words that all convey the same sense.

Both Louw & Nida and the Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Greek have levels of domains, and the top level is the same. Hence, 89 means the same thing in both, "Relations". In L&N, the subdomain for this entry is "Cause and/or Reason":

SDBG uses numbers rather than alphabetic characters. Thus, this domain:

                  domain="089007"

is equivalent to 89G in L&N (A=1, B=2, C=3, D=4, E=5, F=6, G=7 ...).

Note that in either scheme, there is no direct relationship between the number or letter of a subdomain and the right-hand part of the entry number. 89.32 is within 089007 in SDBG and within 89G in L&N, each subdomain contains a set of entries, the numbering does not tell you which entries are contained in a given subdomain.