# PASS 1 transcription and editorial specification

The operational prompt in `prompts/transcribe-page.md` is suitable for direct use
with a multimodal model. This document records the human-facing policy behind it.

## Evidence hierarchy

1. The current scanned page image is authoritative.
2. Conventional OCR is a non-authoritative reading hypothesis.
3. A model draft is a candidate transcription.
4. Agent review is a diagnostic correction layer.
5. Owner approval is the only approval state supported by this phase.

No downstream layer may silently replace the visible source. Scan artifacts,
binder holes, and shadows are not source text.

## Faithful transcription

Preserve visible spelling, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, terminology,
factual mistakes, and incorrect dates. Do not modernize, sanitize, complete, or
quietly correct the source. A source typo remains ordinary faithful text; an
editorial note may identify it without replacing it.

When a reading is uncertain, record the best defensible reading and real
alternatives using qualitative confidence. When nothing defensible can be read,
record an explicit illegible extent. Never force a guess.

Visibly added, deleted, overtyped, or replaced text must remain explicit. Record
whether the intervention is handwritten, typewritten, mixed, or unknown and its
visible placement or cancellation method.

An unreadable intervention still retains its visible structure. If deletion or
addition is evident but its text cannot be read, keep that intervention type with
a null reading and `unreadable` confidence instead of flattening it to generic
illegibility or guessing a word.

## Structure and lineation

Logical entries, letters, lists, tables, and other document blocks are primary.
Physical source lines sit inside those structures. This keeps later TEI, HTML,
search, and index generation semantic while retaining a diplomatic view and
precise line-break hyphen behavior.

Tables are used only when the source visibly establishes column relationships.
Irregular sequences remain lists. Amounts, dates, and arithmetic in accounts or
orders are not normalized in PASS 1.

Non-textual handwritten or printed drawings, diagrams, doodles, and symbols use
the small `graphical_feature` block added in schema 1.2. The block records an
observational description, medium, placement, an optional source-image region,
and visible relationships to nearby text blocks. Reading text excludes the mark;
the diplomatic renderer emits a bracketed observational marker. Readable labels
remain textual annotations. No historical meaning is inferred.

## Dates

The literal date heading is always preserved. A separate ISO date may be:

- mechanically `normalized`;
- editorially `inferred`, with reason and confidence;
- `ambiguous`;
- visibly `invalid`; or
- left `not_normalized`.

Page 181 demonstrates why owner comparison against the scan is essential: the
agent diagnostic misread the final digit, while the image visibly says “Monday
July 11 - 1898.” The owner-approved edition preserves 1898 literally and records
`1898-07-11` as ordinary mechanical normalization, with no source-error note.

Gap-range endpoints follow exactly the same date model. `start_date` and
`end_date` may each be null if unavailable; a present endpoint retains source
text, normalized date, status, qualitative confidence, and reason. Page 110's
literal `Nov. 28.` therefore remains literal while the year-bearing normalization
is explicitly `inferred`, never silently treated as mechanical normalization.

## Stabilized regression rules

- Keep a visibly incorrect year in both source line and `date_source`; put a
  chronology-based correction only in an `inferred` normalized date.
- Preserve intentional internal hyphens such as `nice-pleasant`.
- Incomplete-looking material does not continue merely because it lacks a formal
  close. If the next surviving page is unrelated, do not invent a link.
- Ambiguous handwriting keeps low confidence and plausible alternatives instead
  of a fluent, confident guess.
- A cancellation mark spanning pages does not by itself make the underlying
  logical diary entry continue across the boundary.
- Ditto marks, fractions, ticks, dashes, and other small meaningful source marks
  remain literal; they are not expanded, decimalized, or omitted.

## Page boundaries and missing material

Only text physically present on the current page belongs to that page. A block
may declare that it begins before or continues after the page. Reciprocal block
links are added only by deterministic reconciliation after both pages have been
processed.

Explicit source gaps are first-class. Page 110's skipped-book notice must not be
filled with inferred diary text. A final page ending without a closing is marked
as ending mid-block; the pipeline does not invent the missing ending.

## PASS 2 boundary

PASS 1 may preserve literal names and mark obvious local structural roles. It does
not decide that aliases refer to one person, resolve historical place identities,
build journeys or relationships, or attach external historical facts.

## Owner-review authority

Agent-reviewed diagnostics are comparison aids, not ground truth. The owner
reviews each evaluation page against the image, with OCR, model candidate,
diagnostic, reading/diplomatic renderings, diffs, notes, and uncertainties kept
visible. Only an explicit approve-as-is or approve-corrected action creates
`owner_approved` plus `owner_approved_edition`. A needs-work action remains
unapproved. Approved output is derived into a separate directory, preserving the
candidate, diagnostic, and any submitted owner correction as distinct lineage
artifacts.
