Pelagios aims to interlink ancient world research data through linked open data methods, focusing on place references in various formats. The initiative encourages contributors to annotate place references using the Pleiades gazetteer instead of unifying models. Key challenges include automatic matching issues, vague references, and creating functional annotations to enhance data connectivity.

1. PELAGIOS
Interlinking Ancient World Research Resources
Through Place
Elton Barker
The Open University
Leif Isaksen
University of Southampton
Rainer Simon
Austrian Institute of Technology
February 2, 2012 | Berlin, Germany

2. What? | Aims of Pelagios
 Interlinking data about the Ancient World using Linked Open Data (LOD)
methods
 Focus on place references (in maps, texts,
images, database tables)
 Establishing simple “Pelagios Principles” to
support contributors in preparing
their data
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3. Who? | The Pelagios Collective
 The Open University  Open Context
 University of Southampton  Perseus Digital Library
 Austrian Institute of Technology  Ptolemy Machine
 Pleiades  SPQR
 Arachne  Ure Museum
 Claros
 Fasti Online
 Google Ancient Places
 nomisma.org
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4. How? | Don’t Unify the Model – Annotate!
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5. How? | Don’t Unify the Model – Annotate!
The Pelagios Principles
I. Annotate your place references with appropriate entries in the
Pleiades Gazetteer
II. Publish annotations in the Open Annotation (OAC) RDF vocabulary
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6. Why? | Piecing the Puzzle Together
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7. Why? | Example: The Graph Explorer
Exploring Relations between Exploring Relations between
Places through Data Data through Place
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8. Challenges | Some Issues Identified So Far
 Issues with automatic matching (data or in-house Gazetter)
 Name-based matching based on Pleiades or Pleiades+ [1] toponyms
 Followed by coordinate matching for verification/disambiguation
 Granularity & vague references (South Italy, Greek Islands)
 Location-based adjectives (Corinthian vs. Corinth)
 Typing of place references
 Find spot vs. origin, “depicts”, etc.
 Uncertain references (probably made in…, from the vicinity of…)
[1] Pleiades+ toponym extension to Pleiades based on Geonames
http://googleancientplaces.wordpress.com/pleiades/ 8

9. Discussion | Annotation vs. Unified Model
 The goal of Pelagios is to
 create links rather than to aggregate and enrich
 provide a toolkit & an API rather than a “single point of access”
 Pelagios requests that partners map
 data to a vocabulary rather than their metadata schema to another
 The fact that Pelagios is limited in scope helps!
 Restriction to Place
 Very limited set of “primitives” – Dataset, (typed?) Annotation, Place
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10. Thank you for your attention
http://pelagios-project.blogspot.com
Questions!
Cliparts by www.psdgraphics.com
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