diff --git a/aborist/qa/query.py b/aborist/qa/query.py
index c97d748..7e6858f 100644
--- a/aborist/qa/query.py
+++ b/aborist/qa/query.py
@@ -6,13 +6,17 @@ asks Hermes, caches the answer.
 The flow:
     1. FTS5 search across all shards (chunks_fts can't be UNION'd in views,
        so we query each shard's index independently and merge by score).
-    2. Pick top-K distinct documents within a character budget.
-    3. Compute `context_root` = Merkle root over the sorted source
+    2. Title-boost rerank: hits whose title contains query tokens get a
+       score bump. Title is a strong topical signal that BM25 alone misses
+       (BM25 favors short docs with rare body tokens — Tell_(poker) outranks
+       Back_to_the_Future without a title boost).
+    3. Pick top-K distinct documents within a character budget.
+    4. Compute `context_root` = Merkle root over the sorted source
        document_roots — that's the "source" dimension of v9.8's 8-dim
        cache_key for this multi-source answer.
-    4. Cache lookup; hit returns STRICT immediately.
-    5. Miss calls Hermes via the OpenAI-compatible client.
-    6. Persist record with merkle_proof = {context_root, sources: [...]}
+    5. Cache lookup; hit returns STRICT immediately.
+    6. Miss calls Hermes via the OpenAI-compatible client.
+    7. Persist record with merkle_proof = {context_root, sources: [...]}
        so a verifier can recompute context_root and check each source
        document_root against its shard.
 
@@ -24,6 +28,7 @@ chunk's proof on demand.
 from __future__ import annotations
 
 import json
+import re
 import time
 from dataclasses import dataclass
 from pathlib import Path
@@ -51,6 +56,42 @@ from aborist.store import (
 )
 
 
+_TITLE_TOKEN_RE = re.compile(r"[A-Za-z][A-Za-z0-9]*")
+_TITLE_STOPWORDS = frozenset(
+    """
+    the a an is are was were be been being of to in on at for with by from
+    as about into through during and or but not no nor so yet what who where
+    when why how which this that these those such i you he she it we they
+    me him her us them do does did have has had can could should would will
+    """.split()
+)
+
+
+def _title_query_tokens(s: str) -> set[str]:
+    return {
+        t.lower()
+        for t in _TITLE_TOKEN_RE.findall(s)
+        if t.lower() not in _TITLE_STOPWORDS and len(t) > 1
+    }
+
+
+def _rerank_by_title(hits: list, question: str, boost: float = 8.0) -> list:
+    """Boost hits whose title contains query tokens — title is high signal."""
+    qtokens = _title_query_tokens(question)
+    if not qtokens:
+        return hits
+    for h in hits:
+        if not h.title:
+            continue
+        # Replace _ with space: "Back_to_the_Future" -> ["back", "future"]
+        ttokens = _title_query_tokens(h.title.replace("_", " "))
+        overlap = len(qtokens & ttokens)
+        if overlap:
+            h.score += overlap * boost
+    hits.sort(key=lambda h: -h.score)
+    return hits
+
+
 DEFAULT_QUERY_POLICY = {
     "system_prompt": (
         "You are answering a question using ONLY the sources provided below. "
@@ -130,6 +171,11 @@ def _search_corpus(
     return out
 
 
+def _rerank(hits: list[_Hit], question: str) -> list[_Hit]:
+    """Public-private rerank: title-boost. Easy to extend with other signals."""
+    return _rerank_by_title(hits, question)
+
+
 def _load_doc_text(shard_path: str, document_root: str) -> str | None:
     """Concatenate all hot chunks of a document. Returns None if cold or missing."""
     conn = connect(shard_path)
@@ -183,6 +229,9 @@ def query(
     hits = _search_corpus(shards_dir, single_db, question, over_fetch)
     if not hits:
         return {"status": "no_sources", "msg": "FTS5 search returned no hits"}
+    # 1b. Rerank — title-boost gives topically-named docs priority over
+    # body-only matches like Tell_(poker) for "tell me about ...".
+    hits = _rerank(hits, question)
 
     # 2. Pull doc texts within budget.
     chosen: list[_Hit] = []
diff --git a/aborist/sources/wikipedia.py b/aborist/sources/wikipedia.py
index 876b025..b202fd0 100644
--- a/aborist/sources/wikipedia.py
+++ b/aborist/sources/wikipedia.py
@@ -244,6 +244,7 @@ class WikipediaSqlDump(Source):
         base_uri: str = "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/",
         shard: tuple[int, int] | None = None,
         start_id: int = 0,
+        encoding: str = "latin-1",
     ):
         if table not in ("cur", "old"):
             raise ValueError("table must be 'cur' or 'old'")
@@ -265,12 +266,17 @@ class WikipediaSqlDump(Source):
         # High-water mark observed during iteration. Caller reads this back
         # after each batch and persists it via store.set_meta().
         self.last_id: int = start_id
+        # 2003-era MediaWiki dumps mix Latin-1 raw bytes (e.g., 0xE9 for é)
+        # with HTML entities. Latin-1 decode is lossless on every byte and
+        # gives the right code point for the raw-byte cases. Modern dumps
+        # are UTF-8 — pass encoding="utf-8" for those.
+        self.encoding = encoding
 
     def iter_documents(self) -> Iterator[Document]:
         opener = bz2.open if str(self.path).endswith(".bz2") else open
         rank, total = (0, 1) if self.shard is None else self.shard
         idx = 0
-        with opener(self.path, "rt", encoding="utf-8", errors="replace") as f:
+        with opener(self.path, "rt", encoding=self.encoding, errors="replace") as f:
             for stmt in _iter_insert_statements(f):
                 head = stmt.lstrip()
                 if not head.upper().startswith("INSERT INTO"):