Since the beginning of the project, the QUANTA teams have worked with two major tasks – conceptual clarification and the building, completion, and/or consolidation of our major databases. A range of sub-projects involving data analysis and preparation of empirical studies is also underway. (i) The work on conceptual clarification has included defining key concepts, establishing terminological consistency for in-group communication across disciplines, and elaboration on theoretical issues in the philosophy of numbers. (ii) Our major databases are Numeralbank: the verbal systems of number words used in different languages; BodyBase, for body-based representations of number, including those used in sign languages; and one on material artifacts from prehistoric times. Two of these databases have had to be built from scratch, which required a broad variety of sources to be identified, obtained, and screened; the systems described in these sources to be classified and coded in terms of their cognitive properties; and the relevant information to be extracted and entered into the database. Moreover, protocols for data collection, flow, curation, and integration had to be developed and adjusted; and a joint coding grid for aligning the different types of data across representational formats had to be designed and fine-tuned. (iii) The analytical subprojects involve investigations of how various cultural domains (such as games, calendars, or weaving and knot tying) and counting practices influence one another; which role the names of body parts play for the generation of number words; or which cultural factors may have driven changes in counting systems. As much of this work depends on the comprehensiveness of the databases, these downstream projects are work in progress. (iv) Finally, impeded by covid-19 restrictions, the empirical studies to be conducted with indigenous groups in remote areas had to be postponed, but suitable field sites in the Peruvian Amazon have been scouted and secured, and experimental protocols are being developed. (v) Prehistoric artefacts relevant for the project goals were analysed or are in the process of being analysed with novel methodologies. First results of these studies were published or are in press.
