Roger Pearse

Anything published before 1923 is out of copyright in the USA. Onthe EU, on the other hand, you would need to know Rostagno's date of death.

So Fuchs is a reprint? Or does the photo indicate "Leiden 1902". I.e. where does the 1902 come from.

zhugin

Fuchs is a reprint of Leiden 1902. Regarding the need to know Rostagno's death, there cannot be such need if the picture isn't protected as a "literary or artistic work". Rostagno made no "work" of his own. "It shall be a matter for legislation in the countries of the Union to determine the term of protection of photographic works and that of works of applied art in so far as they are protected as artistic works; however, this term shall last at least until the end of a period of twenty-five years from the making of such a work." (Berne Convention art 7. 4.)

Rostagno died in 1942.

Ben C Smith

Thank you very much for providing the photo. I have updated my Tacitus testimonium page with a link to it. (Clicking on the photo on that new page brings up another photo of the original size.)

Ben.

Roger Pearse

Out of interest, how did you find out the date of death?

Fuchs is reprinting the image from a photographic facsimile: Tacitus. Codex Laurentianus Mediceus 68 I. (II.) [comprising Bks. 1-5, and 11-16 of the Annals; and Bks. 1-5 of the Histories]; phototypice editus. Praefatus est Henricus Rostagno (Enrico Rostagno); in Du Bieu (W. N.) Codices Graeci et Latini phototypice editi, etc. tom. 7. Leiden, 1902.

I believe that libraries habitually claim that photographs of pages of manuscripts are protected works under copyright. I doubt that this claim has ever been tested in court, tho, and I would agree with your sentiments about whether it is actually what the Berne convention says. Manuscript libraries are obscurantist, negligent yet greedy bastards, as a rule. (Rostagno was, of course, the Keeper of the manuscripts at the Laurentian; such gentry rarely let anyone else publish 'their' stuff).

I've never heard of a 25 year copyright; I don't know but suspect (ignorantly) it gets the same rights as literary texts. If so, it might still be in copyright in the UK and EU (life + 70 years) until 2012 (!)

All the best,

Roger Pearse

zhugin

I am not a lawyer outside Sweden, but according to Swedish law a photograph (which is not an artistic work) is protected 50 years from the creation, which would be until 1952 in this case. A photograph of a page is thus protected, but not by the same right as the literary and artistic works. (The copyright of the literary work would have been Tacituses :-) ) There must be a difference between "works" and other creations. The Italian copyright law says "The exploitation rights in photographic works shall lapse at the end of the 70th year following the author's death." but also "The exclusive right in respect of photographs shall subsist for 20 years as from the making of the photograph." (i.e. 1922) The difference is indicated by "In particular, protection shall extend to [...] works of photographic art and works expressed with processes analogous to photography provided they are not simple photographs protected in accordance with the provisions of Chapter V of Part II" (the 20 year protection above). Anyway, the photography statute says: "This provision shall not apply to photographs of writings, documents, business papers, material objects, technical drawings and similar products."

Roger Pearse

I've been trying to find out what the UK position is.

(Depressingly, I wasn't able to find a single state-funded body concerned with anything but grabbing as much copyright for itself as possible; so much for the idea of open access. Museums in particular make money off reproductions, and are determined to do so; but there seems to be a lack of case law to back up their claims).

But I did find this:

The eurocrats play their customary evil role in copyright; but the good news is that no copyright in photos exists before 1945 in the UK so this photo must be out of copyright.

Roger Viklund

For those who have access to JSTOR, the entire article by Fuchs (in German), including the photo, can be read here:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1582692?seq=1

Kindly, Roger Viklund

Roger Pearse

I have no access to JSTOR. Would some kind person email it to me at roger_pearse@yahoo.co.uk?

Thanks,

Roger Pearse

Roger Viklund

Done that!

Richard Carrier

All correct, except I don't know what you mean by 3. Elsewhere on the page when the scribe writes /ri/ he uses a particular form of /i/ that looks entirely different from the one in Christianos, but instead uses there a form of /i/ that appears nearly everywhere else on the page (but not everywhere else, as there is a third form, a straight downstroke, which doesn't resemble either of the others).

No simple answer to that.

VC presumably owns the copyright, or the owner of the source of the photo does (e.g. the 1902 volume others discuss here, which I'll get a look at in a few weeks), but they might not anymore (as several have pointed out here, the copyright has probably expired, although this is still a grey area, especially if the source owned it and was a corporate entity like a university).

Even if they do still own it, what we're doing is arguably fair use and thus not subject to protection (although European law is more restrictive about that than U.S.). And even if not, they probably cannot reasonably claim damages and might not even care.

The matter will be more complex if someone buys a new photo from Italy. That will probably not be publishable online (they may even require the purchaser to sign an agreement to that effect), but it can be exchanged by email privately among scholars subjecting it to fair use.