Divinity Atlas
Things this atlas does not know. Each entry is a question that specialists
have posed and not settled, recorded with what would actually resolve it and which
expertise the answer needs.
These are kept deliberately, rather than quietly omitted. An atlas that shows
only what it is sure of implies a confidence it has not earned, and the gaps are often where
the interesting work is. Several sit exactly where two fields fail to meet: identifying the
hyssop of the Hebrew Bible needs a botanist and a philologist of Biblical Hebrew, and neither
one settles it alone.
You can send evidence on some of these. A pilot is open on 55 questions in one field, Palaeography. Each says what would resolve it; send something that meets that bar, with a source anybody can check, and an editor will weigh it. Sending evidence does not guarantee the question will be resolved, and it does not have to be your field to read what is being asked. See what is open.
Grouped by the field an answer needs. A question sitting between two disciplines appears under both, which is why the group counts add up to more than the number of questions.
Filter By Specialty 99 fields
Showing 761 to 780 of 781 open questions, page 39 of 40.
Not Yet Classified 508
Ash (Nion)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of ash at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Ash (Nion)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Alder (Fearn)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of alder at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Alder (Fearn)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Willow (Saille)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of willow at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Willow (Saille)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Hawthorn (Uath)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of hawthorn at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Hawthorn (Uath)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Oak (Duir)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of oak at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Oak (Duir)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Holly (Tinne)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of holly at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Holly (Tinne)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Hazel (Coll)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of hazel at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Hazel (Coll)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Vine (Muin)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of the vine at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Vine (Muin)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Ivy (Gort)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of ivy at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Ivy (Gort)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Reed (Ngetal)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of reed at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Reed (Ngetal)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Elder (Ruis)
Do Robert Graves's tree pairings in the thirteen sign Celtic tree calendar, and the placing of elder at this position, correspond to anything beyond his own argument in The White Goddess?
Open Elder (Ruis)
Why It Is Open Graves built the thirteen sign sequence in The White Goddess, 1948, by pairing his own reading of the Beth-Luis-Nion tree names to a thirteen month lunar calendar he reconstructed himself. That the wider tree calendar is his modern invention rather than an attested ancient system is not in dispute, and the tree names match because he took them from Ogham. What nobody has examined is the step after that: whether placing a given tree at a given calendar position reflects anything in the surviving Ogham material, or only his argument. No Celtic studies scholar has tested his month by month assignments either way, which is why this is an unfilled gap rather than a disagreement between camps. One question covers all thirteen signs, because the pairing is one act rather than thirteen.
What Would Settle It A philological comparison of Graves's month-by-month tree assignments against the Ogham letter-name glosses preserved in the Auraicept na nEces and the Briatharogam tracts, by a scholar of medieval Irish, to establish whether any assignment beyond the shared name is supportable.
Expertise Needed Celtic studies, medieval Irish philology
Question posed in
A Guide to Ogam, Damian McManus.
Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem
Where are the Mar Saba leaves now, and does the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem still hold them?
Open Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem
Why It Is Open The two and a half leaves carrying the letter ascribed to Clement of Alexandria were removed from their host volume in the patriarchate library, reportedly for separate conservation, and have not been publicly produced since. Searches reported in the 2000s did not locate them, and no statement of their whereabouts has been published by the library or by anyone else.
What Would Settle It A statement from the patriarchate library, or a catalogue entry recording the leaves as a separate item with a shelfmark, would settle whether they are still held. Producing them for ink and paper analysis would additionally settle the authenticity question that currently depends entirely on photographs.
Expertise Needed Manuscript librarianship and codicology, with analytical conservation science if the leaves are produced
Question posed in
Mark's Other Gospel: Rethinking Morton Smith's Controversial Discovery, Scott G. Brown.
Ligure
Which stone does the Hebrew leshem, rendered ligure in the King James Version, actually name?
Open Ligure
Why It Is Open No securely dated ancient Hebrew source uses leshem outside the Exodus breastplate list in a context that fixes what stone it names, so every proposed identification, jacinth, amber, tourmaline or opal, rests on inference rather than direct attestation. The Septuagint, the Vulgate and the later translation tradition do not agree on a referent for this ninth breastplate stone either, which is the visible symptom of the unsettled identification.
What Would Settle It An independently attested, securely dated use of leshem in a non-biblical ancient Hebrew or closely related Northwest Semitic inscription or document, ideally alongside a described or surviving physical object, would let philologists cross-check the word against a known referent. A securely provenanced, labeled exemplar from a Second Temple period priestly context would serve the same purpose.
Expertise Needed Northwest Semitic philology, biblical archaeology and historical mineralogy
Question posed in
The Holy Bible, Anonymous (multiple authors).
Florence Campbell
What were Florence Campbell's birth date and full biographical details?
Open Florence Campbell
Why It Is Open No source checked for this entry gives a birth year or biographical detail beyond her authorship of Your Days Are Numbered (1931) and a reported death in late 1964; her public identity survives almost entirely through the one book.
What Would Settle It A period publisher archive, obituary or genealogical record establishing her birth date and life outside her published work.
Expertise Needed Archival research, history of American occultism
Question posed in
Florence Campbell (publisher biographical note), Newcastle Publishing editorial staff.
Upsilon ⲩ
What is the Coptic name of the letter taken from Greek upsilon?
Open Upsilon ⲩ
Why It Is Open Coptic renamed several of the Greek letters, and this atlas uses the Coptic names where they are settled: ei for epsilon, laula for lambda, ou for omicron, semma for sigma. For upsilon the authorities disagree. Scholarly grammars of the Sahidic dialect record one Coptic form, alphabet charts in ordinary Coptic Orthodox use commonly print another, and the run that seeded these rows could not establish which had the better claim without asserting something it had not checked. The Greek name is used in the meantime as a neutral label.
What Would Settle It A survey of the letter names given in the principal Coptic grammars alongside the names taught in Coptic Orthodox church schools in Egypt and the diaspora, distinguishing the scholarly Sahidic tradition from living Bohairic practice, and saying which name belongs to which tradition rather than choosing one for both.
Expertise Needed Coptology; Coptic Orthodox liturgical practice
Question posed in
Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.
The Kotel Pilgrimage
What are the current arrangements for prayer at the Western Wall plaza, and who decides them?
Open The Kotel Pilgrimage
Why It Is Open The atlas holds no catalogued source establishing the present division of the plaza, which forms of prayer are conducted where, or where authority over those decisions rests. The arrangements have changed more than once and are the subject of continuing public and legal argument in Israel, so a description taken from a general history would very likely be out of date and would risk asserting one party's position as settled.
What Would Settle It Cataloguing the governing Israeli instruments and any current court decisions, together with the published positions of the parties to the dispute, so that the entry can describe the arrangement and the disagreement about it from documents rather than from report.
Expertise Needed Israeli religious law and public administration, and contemporary Jewish religious sociology
Question posed in
Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.
Jainism
Does Jainism have a therapeutic practice of its own, distinct from charitable medical giving?
Open Jainism
Why It Is Open The facet detector reports Jainism as carrying no Practice of kind Therapeutic while its Dharmic peers do. Jain fasting is ascetic rather than curative, and bhaishajya dana, the giving of medicine, is one of the four danas and so is charitable. Triage on 2026-07-29 could not name a Jain practice whose purpose is healing.
What Would Settle It A survey of the Shvetambara and Digambara prescriptive literature and of modern Jain institutional practice for a named healing observance, together with a ruling on whether Jain animal hospitals and the pinjrapole count as a therapeutic practice or as charity.
Expertise Needed Jain studies, South Asian religious history
Question posed in
Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.
Sikhism
Does Sikhism have a therapeutic practice distinct from seva, its ethic of service?
Open Sikhism
Why It Is Open The facet detector reports Sikhism as carrying no Practice of kind Therapeutic. Sikh medical service, from Bhai Kanhaiya tending the wounded of both sides to gurdwara dispensaries and hospitals, is real and well attested, but it is the ethic of seva applied to medicine rather than a separate named practice. Triage on 2026-07-29 could not decide whether the atlas should record it twice.
What Would Settle It A ruling on the atlas facet boundary between Charitable and Therapeutic, plus evidence from the Rehat Maryada and Sikh institutional history for a named healing observance.
Expertise Needed Sikh studies, history of South Asian medicine
Question posed in
Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.
Norse Paganism
Does the Old Norse corpus contain composite creatures that the atlas Hybrids facet is meant to capture?
Open Norse Paganism
Why It Is Open The facet detector reports Norse Paganism as carrying no MythicalCreature of kind Hybrids while all three Polytheistic peers do. The Norse bestiary the atlas holds is built from outsized single species beasts, serpents, sea monsters and spirits. Whether Sleipnir, Hraesvelgr, the swan maidens and the merfolk are composite creatures or shapeshifters and beasts in another guise is a question about the facet definition as much as about the sources, and triage on 2026-07-29 could not settle it.
What Would Settle It A definition of the Hybrids facet precise enough to sort cases, applied to a full inventory of creatures in the Poetic Edda, the Prose Edda and the fornaldarsogur.
Expertise Needed Old Norse philology, comparative mythology
Question posed in
Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.
Senet
How was senet actually played, and how did its rules carry the funerary meaning the New Kingdom sources give it?
Open Senet
Why It Is Open No complete ancient rule text survives. Play is reconstructed from board layouts, marked squares and the partial instructions in late funerary compositions, and competing reconstructions disagree on movement and on how the marked squares functioned.
What Would Settle It A papyrus or ostracon setting out the rules of play in full, from a securely dated context, or a securely dated board with an inscribed sequence complete enough to fix movement independently of the later funerary texts.
Expertise Needed Egyptology; the archaeology of games
Question posed in
In Search of the Meaning of Senet, in Archaeology 33, Peter A. Piccione.