About Scholia
Scholia is a reading and annotation library for philosophical and literary texts, designed for careful study of classical texts. Every work is structured down to the sentence, linked across translations, and open for quotation, notes, and citation in your own writing in the article builder.
Etch your thoughts, map the spirit's mental landscape, engage in dialogue with the ancients and give voice to your insights among the echoes of eternity.
The name
The word scholia (singular: scholion) refers to the marginal notes that ancient and medieval scholars wrote alongside classical texts — glosses, commentaries, cross-references, and explanations of difficult passages. Generations of readers added their own layer to a single manuscript, and over time the margins became a record of how a text was read, argued with, and passed on. This site takes that name as its model: the work of reading carefully, the great works and the comments of others and of leaving something useful behind for the next reader, thus forming layers upon layers of evolving thought.
What you can do here
- Read primary texts in their original language and in translation, side by side.
- Annotate at the sentence level — highlight, take notes, save quotations.
- Cite what you've read in your own writing through the article editor, with bibliographic references generated automatically.
How the library is organized
Books are grouped by author. Multiple translations of the same work appear as versions of a single entry — the Critique of Pure Reason and the Kritik der reinen Vernunft are one work, not two.
A work in progress
Scholia is being built openly. The library starts small and grows with each text added, each translation aligned, and each annotation contributed by its readers.