Re: bibliography with certain canonical reference

Thanks JP. Option 1 (righttext) is clearly the solution I was looking for.
But from where I am writing this (other side of the world) it is night time
and I will need to wait till tomorrow to test it out.
Grateful for your timely, prompt and detailed response. I'll be in touch.
Julian


On Sun, 16 Aug 2026, 5:42 pm Jean-Pierre Delange via ntg-context, <
[email protected]> wrote:

> Hi Julian,
>
> I think there are actually two possible approaches here, depending on
> whether you want to keep this entirely within your present APA setup, or
> whether Augustine is part of a larger body of patristic/classical material
> for which a canonical-reference model would be useful.
>
> 1. Keep APA and add the canonical locator only to the citation occurrence
>
> If all your other references are author–year, I would probably keep your
> present APA setup unchanged.
>
> ConTeXt citations can take a righttext parameter. With APA this is
> particularly convenient because righttext is added as supplementary
> material inside the parenthetical citation.
>
> So instead of:
>
> \cite[authoryear][main::augustine1991confessions]
>
> you can use:
>
> \cite
>   [alternative=authoryear,
>    righttext={X.33.50}]
>   [main::augustine1991confessions]
>
> which should give:
>
> (Augustine, 1991, X.33.50)
>
> while all your ordinary citations can remain:
>
> \cite[authoryear][main::someotherwork]
>
> and continue to produce the normal:
>
> (Author, 2020)
>
> If you want the work title to be explicit as well, you could equally write:
>
> \cite
>   [alternative=authoryear,
>    righttext={{\em Confessions} X.33.50}]
>   [main::augustine1991confessions]
>
> The useful distinction here is that X.33.50 belongs to this particular *citation
> occurrence*, not to the bibliographic identity of the 1991 edition. So
> there is no need to add it permanently to the .bib record, nor to create
> a special rendering just for Augustine.
>
> 2. Use SBL modelling if Augustine is part of a larger patristic/classical
> corpus
>
> If, however, the book contains many references to Augustine or other
> ancient/patristic texts with canonical locators, then the module
> context-sbl may be worth considering.
>
> The SBL implementation provides a @classictext category specifically for
> classical texts and ancient works by Church Fathers. In that model, the
> ancient work itself can be kept distinct from the modern edition or
> translation being used.
>
> Schematically:
>
> @classictext{augustine-confessions,
>   author     = {Augustine},
>   title      = {Confessions},
>   shorttitle = {Conf.},
>   crossref   = {augustine1991confessions},
> }
> @book{augustine1991confessions,
>   ...
> }
>
> The canonical locator then belongs to the citation of the ancient work,
> while the 1991 translation remains the bibliographic edition behind it.
>
> This is a more structural solution than righttext, and is useful when
> canonical references are not merely occasional exceptions but a recurring
> feature of the document.
>
> So, roughly:
>
> APA + righttext
>     -> simplest solution for a few isolated canonical locators
> SBL + @classictext
>     -> structural solution for a corpus of ancient or patristic texts
>
> I would not switch an otherwise APA-based document to SBL merely to solve
> one Augustine citation. For your present example, righttext is probably
> the simplest and most appropriate answer.
>
> Incidentally, your question is very useful feedback for the new
> bibliography material on the ConTeXt Garden. This particular case — keeping
> an author–year style while adding a canonical or work-specific locator only
> to selected citation occurrences — deserves a small explicit example there.
>
> I should also mention that ANSS-CE is expected to receive, this autumn, a
> set of additional chapters devoted specifically to bibliography and
> citation management in ConTeXt. Those chapters are currently being written
> and are intended to provide a more systematic treatment of datasets,
> renderings, local and cumulative bibliographies, citation occurrences and
> locators, specialised styles such as SBL, and multilingual or multiscript
> bibliography.
>
> That does not make the Garden material redundant. On the contrary, the
> Garden remains the natural place for concise, task-oriented examples and
> for cases that emerge from actual user questions — like this one.
>
> Best,
>
> JP
>
>
> Le 16/08/2026 à 01:54, jbf a écrit :
>
> It is possible that the answer to my question already lies somewhere in
> the extensive (new) bibliography material in contextgarden, but if so I
> have missed it. And indeed it may be a very simple solution, but I can't
> work it out at the moment.
>
> I am typesetting an academic work by an author who wants local (end of
> chapter) bibliographies as well as, obviously, a final complete
> bibliography. No problem. I can do that and in fact have done so
> successfully. My problem lies with one particular set of citations from
> Augustine's* Confessions*, where the canonical references are something
> like Augustine, 1991, *Confessions* X.33.50.  All I can manage to produce
> at the moment is the usual author-year APA inline format (Augustine, 1991)
> [Obviously we are referring to a modern 1991 translation, but that is
> immaterial here].
>
> My current set up is:
>
> \usebtxdataset
>
>   [main]
>
> [references.bib]
>
> \usebtxdefinitions
>
>   [apa]
>
>  \definebtxrendering
>
>   [chapterlist]
>
>   [apa]
>
>   [dataset=main,
>
>    sorttype=authoryear]
>
> \definebtxrendering
>
>   [finallist]
>
>   [apa]
>
>   [dataset=main,
>
>    sorttype=authoryear]
>
> And where I need to reference Augustine inline I write, e.g.
> \cite[authoryear][main::augustine1991confessions] which gives me
> (Augustine, 1991). Is there is a way I can also include X.33.50 in this
> inline reference, but only for the Augustine citations? All other citations
> are strictly author-year.
>
> Julian
>
>
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