About this Project

The Online Leibniz Project is a searchable digital edition of the correspondence and writings of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716).

Sources

The texts are derived from the Akademie editions (Series II, Philosophischer Briefwechsel, and Series VI, Philosophische Schriften), and C. I. Gerhardt’s edited volumes of Leibniz’s philosophical writings. Source transcriptions are hand-tagged plain-text files that are transformed through a preprocessing pipeline into the pages you see here. The Akademie texts preserve the original page and line numbering used for scholarly citation, while the Gerhardt volumes only preserve pagination.

How to Cite

We welcome and encourage the use of this platform for scholarly research, teaching, and translation. To support the continuity of this open-access project and acknowledge our contributors, we ask that you cite both the foundational print editions and this digital platform.

Citation Guidelines

Prioritize the Print Editions

Because this platform provides direct access to high-resolution PDFs of the standard historical editions, scholars should always cite the physical volume and page numbers of the definitive print edition as their primary text authority.

• For texts from the Akademie-Ausgabe, cite by Series (Reihe), Volume (Band), and page.
• For texts from the Gerhardt edition, cite by Volume (Band) and page.

Acknowledge the Digital Platform

If your research, translation, or analysis was facilitated by our search engine, machine translation optimization prompts, or unique digital entries, please include a digital reference to this project.

Why acknowledge us? Documenting the impact of this platform is essential for securing future institutional funding, proving the utility of digital humanities tools to grant committees, and honoring the labor of the engineers and scholars who built it.

Citation Examples

Chicago Manual of Style (Notes and Bibliography)

Footnote / Endnote Example: Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, ed. Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1923–), Reihe II, Band 1, S. 45; accessed via LeibnizOnline: Texts and Tools (Harvard University), entry harvard_ii1_1, https://leibniz-search.digitalhumanities.fas.harvard.edu/.

Bibliography Example: Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm. Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe. Edited by the Akademie der Wissenschaften. Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1923–. Digital facsimile accessed via LeibnizOnline: Texts and Tools. Harvard University. https://leibniz-search.digitalhumanities.fas.harvard.edu/.

MLA Style (9th Edition)

Works Cited Example: Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm. Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe. Edited by Akademie der Wissenschaften, Reihe II, Bd. 1, Akademie Verlag, 1923-, p. 45. Leibniz Online: Texts and Tools, Harvard University, entry harvard_ii1_1, leibniz-search.digitalhumanities.fas.harvard.edu/entries/harvard_ii1_1/.

Acknowledging AI-Assisted Translations

If you used the machine translation protocols or custom prompts hosted on this site to draft vernacular translations for publication, we suggest the following format in your acknowledgments or footnotes: “The translation of this passage was drafted with the assistance of [AI Model Name], utilizing the Early Modern philosophy optimization metrics provided by Leibniz Online: Texts and Tools (Harvard University).

Contributing

Corrections and additions are welcome. This edition is a work in progress.