Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology
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Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology

Release: 21 Jan 2026

Modified on: 2026-01-21
Latest version:
https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#
Previous version:
http://ont.virtualtreasury.ie/ontology#
Revision:
v1.3
Issued on:
2026-01-21
Authors:
Lucy Mckenna (Trinity College Dublin)
Alex Randles (Trinity College Dublin)
Lynn Kilgallon (Trinity College Dublin)
Declan O'Sullivan (Trinity College Dublin)
Peter Crooks (Trinity College Dublin)
Christophe Debruyne (Trinity College Dublin)
Beyza Yaman (Trinity College Dublin)
Gary Munnelly (Trinity College Dublin)
Fabrizio Orlandi (Trinity College Dublin)
Imported Ontologies:
<http://erlangen-crm.org/current/>
core
Source:
https://virtualtreasury.ie
Funding:
https://www.gov.ie/en/organisation/department-of-tourism-culture-arts-gaeltacht-sport-and-media/
Download serialization:
JSON-LD RDF/XML N-Triples TTL
License:
http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
Visualization:
Visualize with WebVowl
Cite as:
Lucy Mckenna (Trinity College Dublin), Alex Randles (Trinity College Dublin), Lynn Kilgallon (Trinity College Dublin), Declan O'Sullivan (Trinity College Dublin), Peter Crooks (Trinity College Dublin), Christophe Debruyne (Trinity College Dublin), Beyza Yaman (Trinity College Dublin), Gary Munnelly (Trinity College Dublin), Fabrizio Orlandi (Trinity College Dublin). Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology. Revision: v1.3.
Ontology Specification Stable

Abstract

The Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) ontology provides a structured semantic framework for representing and describing historical people, places, organisations, and related concepts within the context of Irish history. It is designed to support the modelling of biographical, administrative, and contextual information drawn from historical sources and reference works. The ontology is grounded in the CIDOC CRM (Erlangen CRM) conceptual model and reuses its core classes and properties, particularly E55_Type, to define controlled types such as names, occupations, offices, ranks, places, and life events. It further incorporates SKOS to enable conceptual organisation, alignment, and interoperability with external vocabularies. Named individuals are used to represent authoritative types and reference concepts, including biographical sources (e.g. the Dictionary of Irish Biography), naming conventions, social roles, temporal descriptors, and place-related classifications. Object properties are provided to support the representation of relationships between entities, including biographical associations, marital relationships, hierarchical subjects, and type attribution. Overall, the VRTI ontology supports the consistent description, integration, and reuse of historical data across digital collections and knowledge graphs, enabling interoperability, provenance-aware modelling, and scholarly research within the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland and related initiatives.

Introduction back to ToC

This ontology is designed to represent knowledge about Irish historical events, artifacts, and their relationships. It follows the CIDOC CRM standard and extends it with additional classes and properties for specific use cases.

Namespace declarations

Table 1: Namespaces used in the document
bibo<http://purl.org/ontology/bibo/>
crm<http://erlangen-crm.org/current/>
dct<http://purl.org/dc/terms/>
foaf<http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/>
owl<http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#>
rdf<http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#>
rdfs<http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#>
schema<http://schema.org/>
skos<http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#>
vann<http://purl.org/vocab/vann/>
vrti:<https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#>
vrtivoc<https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/vocabulary#>
widoco<https://w3id.org/widoco/vocab#>
xml<http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace>
xsd<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#>

Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology: Overview back to ToC

This ontology has the following classes and properties.

Object Properties

Named Individuals

Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology: Description back to ToC

The Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology provides a structured framework for representing historical records and related entities. It supports modeling metadata, provenance, and relationships between historical figures, locations, and artifacts. The ontology facilitates the organization and retrieval of information related to Irish history by defining key classes, object properties, and data properties, making historical data interoperable and accessible for digital archives and research.

Cross-reference for Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology classes, object properties and data properties back to ToC

This section provides details for each class and property defined by Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) Ontology.

Object Properties

Era Typeop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#hasEraType

The era of an entity as taken from the VRTI Vocabulary
has super-properties
P2 has type op
has domain
E1 CRM Entity ni
has range
E55 Type ni

husbandop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#husband

Property created to provide information about the husband in a marriage joining.

objectop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#object

Generic property to indicate the object in a reified relationship

Place Typeop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#hasPlaceType

The specific type of place as taken from the VRTI Vocabulary
has super-properties
P2 has type op
has domain
E1 CRM Entity ni
has range
E55 Type ni

subjectop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#subject

Generic property to indicate the subject in a reified relationship

subjectsop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#subjects

Property created to provide information about the subject in a hierarchical relationship.

Wifeop back to ToC or Object Property ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#wife

Property created to provide information about the wife in a marriage joining.

Named Individuals

DIBni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#DIB

The Dictionary of Irish Biography. A biographical dictionary of notable Irish people and people who had notable careers in Ireland, containing approximately 9000 entries. It is published by Cambridge University Press in collaboration with the Royal Irish Academy, and is available both in print and online.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

DIB Area Of Interestni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#DIBAreaOfInterest

The Area of Interest (e.g. Politics, Social Sciences, etc.) of a Person in the Dictionary of Irish Biography (a biographical dictionary of notable Irish people and people who had notable careers in Ireland, containing approximately 9000 entries).
belongs to
E28 Conceptual Object c

Floruitni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Floruit

Term used to denote the period during which a person 'flourished'; the floruit is used where their dates or birth or death are unknown.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Forenameni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Forename

A person's first name, given at birth or baptism, and used before a family name.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Marriageni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Marriage

The legally or formally recognized union of two people as partners in a personal relationship; the condition of being married; the relation between two people married to each other, matrimony. Source: "marriage, n." OED Online, Oxford University Press, June 2020, www.oed.com/view/Entry/114320.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Nameni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Name

The word or phrase by which a person, place, or thing is known, addressed, or referred to.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Name variantni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#NameVariant

An alternative form or version of a name, often used to capture linguistic, historical, or cultural variations in nomenclature.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Occupationni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Occupation

A particular action or course of action in which a person is engaged, esp. habitually; a particular job or profession; a particular pursuit or activity. Source: "occupation, n." OED Online, Oxford University Press, June 2020, www.oed.com/view/Entry/130181.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Officeni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Office

A place where professional or clerical duties are performed, or a position of responsibility or authority.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Organisationni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Organisation

Represents a general organisation type, serving as a broader category for specific types of organisations.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Patronymics-Matronymicsni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#PatronymicsMatronymics

Naming conventions derived from the name of a father (patronymic) or mother (matronymic).
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Placeni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Place

A particular position, point, or location in space.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Placenameni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/vocabulary#Placename

The name of a geographical place
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Placename Variantni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/vocabulary#PlacenameVariant

A variant name of a geographical place
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Rankni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Rank

A position within a hierarchy, especially in terms of social or organizational status.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Soubriquet aliasni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#SoubriquetAlias

An alternative or additional name used to identify a person, often a nickname.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Surnameni back to ToC or Named Individual ToC

IRI: https://www.w3id.org/virtual-treasury/ontology#Surname

A family name passed down from generation to generation, used to identify members of a family.
belongs to
E55 Type ni

Legend back to ToC

op: Object Properties
ni: Named Individuals

References back to ToC

Changes from last version

Classes

Added classes

Object Properties

Added object properties
Deleted object properties

Acknowledgments back to ToC

The authors would like to acknowledge the support of the ADAPT Centre.