Using linked open data to enhance the discoverability, functionality and impact of Emblematica Online
| Published date | 20 March 2017 |
| Date | 20 March 2017 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/LHT-11-2016-0126 |
| Pages | 159-178 |
| Author | Timothy W. Cole,Myung-Ja K. Han,Maria Janina Sarol,Monika Biel,David Maus |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Librarianship/library management,Library technology,Information behaviour & retrieval,Information user studies,Metadata,Information & knowledge management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
Using linked open data
to enhance the discoverability,
functionality and impact of
Emblematica Online
Timothy W. Cole and Myung-Ja K. Han
Mathematics Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, USA
Maria Janina Sarol
Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, USA, and
Monika Biel and David Maus
Herzog August Library, Wolfenbuttel, Germany
Abstract
Purpose –Early Modernemblem books are primary sourcesfor scholars studying theEuropean Renaissance.
Linked Open Data (LOD) is an approach for organizing and modeling information in a data-centric manner
compatible with the emerging Semantic Web. The purpose of this paper is to examine ways in which LOD
methodscan be applied to facilitate emblemresource discovery, betterreveal the structure and connectednessof
digitized emblemresources, and enhance scholar interactions with digitized emblem resources.
Design/methodology/approach –This research encompasses an analysis of the existing XML-based
Spine (emblem-specific) metadata schema; the design of a new, domain-specific, Resource Description
Framework compatible ontology; the mapping and transformation of metadata from Spine to both the new
ontology and (separately) to the pre-existing Schema.org ontology; and the (experimental) modification of the
Emblematica Online portal as a proof of concept to illustrate enhancements supported by LOD.
Findings –LOD is viable as an approach for facilitating discovery and enhancing the value to scholars of
digitized emblem books; however, metadata must first be enriched with additional uniform resource
identifiers and the workflow upgrades required to normalize and transform existing emblem metadata are
substantial and still to be fully worked out.
Practical implications –The research described demonstrates the feasibility of transforming existing,
special collections metadata to LOD. Although considerable work and further study will be required,
preliminary findings suggest potential benefits of LOD for both users and libraries.
Originality/value –This research is unique in the context of emblem studies and adds to the emerging body
of work examining the application of LOD best practices to library special collections.
Keywords Semantic Web, Linked data, Resource Description Framework, Special collections, Emblems,
Metadata transformations
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
The early modern emblem book was a popular literary genre in Europe from the mid-
sixteenth through mid-eighteenth century. As illustrated in Figure 1, the form of an emblem
is compound, integrating text and graphics. The exact structure of emblems varies, but
most include an image element (the pictura), a short motto textual element (the inscriptio),
and a longer verse textual element (the subscriptio). An additional prose or verse textual
component (the commentario) was sometimes included. Vernacular languages as well as
Latin were used for textual elements. Textual elements might be repeated in multiple
Library Hi Tech
Vol. 35 No. 1, 2017
pp. 159-178
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0737-8831
DOI 10.1108/LHT-11-2016-0126
Received 7 November 2016
Accepted 29 November 2016
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0737-8831.htm
This research was supported in part by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities
(USA) and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (the German Research Foundation). The
conclusions, opinions, and findings expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not
necessarily reflect the opinions of the sponsors of this research.
159
Emblematica
Online
languages. Emblems were contextual, often influenced by cotemporaneous events such
as the Reformation or the Thirty Years’War. Emblem creators drew inspiration from
diverse sources, e.g., the Bible, classical antiquity, fables, mythology, science, and medicine.
Today, as objects of research, emblems straddle multiple scholarly domains, including art
and cultural history, literature, semiotics, religious studies, and political science.
According to Daly (2002, pp. 5-6) “there were probably as many as 6,500 printings of
emblematic books, with or without pictures,”with the exact size of the surviving corpus
depending in part on what counts as an emblem book. Today this tangible corpus is widely
dispersed with the largest concentrated collections of emblem books distributed among a small
number of rare books academic and special libraries scattered across Europe and North
America. Historically, this geographic scarcity has been an impediment to emblem research.
This challenge has been compounded by the fact that relatively few indexes to individual
emblems were ever created (prior to the project described here), and often the indexes that were
created focused on co-located emblems, making it difficult for scholars to discover individual
emblems relevant to their research held elsewhere. (A single emblem book may contain tens,
hundreds or even more than a thousand individual emblems.) Fifty years ago intheir landmark
volume Emblemata, Henkel and Schöne demonstrated the value for research of moving from a
strictly volume-level bibliographic perspective to a more granular, emblem-level view of the
corpus (Henkel and Schöne, 1967/1998). By indexing 47 volumes (albeit in some cases only
partially), Henkel and Schöne’s work enabled scholars to recognize new connections among
individual emblems. Scholars benefitted from this enhanced access to information, and
Emblemata became the standard reference work in the field of emblem studies. With the advent
of high quality, relatively low-cost digitization technologies, it has become possible to extend
and go beyond the Henkel and Schöne model. Since the mid-1990s, librarians have been working
with emblem scholars to digitize volumes from local collections and to make digital emblem
book surrogates available worldwide. Collaboration has been a hallmark of these projects, both
intra- and inter-institution. By one count there are now more than 1,200 unique emblem book
editions (more than 1,900 digital copies in all) that have been made available on the web[1].
Concurrent with the growing availability of emblem book surrogates on the web (albeit
unrelated), Tim Berners-Lee introduced the Semantic Web, the Resource Description Framework
(RDF) (Berners-Lee et al., 2001/2009), and guidelines for Linked Open Data (LOD). In recent years
new use cases (such as ours), a growing understanding of and appreciation for RDF, the
development and increasing availability of LOD-compatible content and ontologies, and the
advent of new tools for working with RDF, have accelerated the growth of the Semantic Web.
The Semantic Web can be thought of as a next generation enhancement of the World Wide Web
Motto
Pictura
Subscriptio
Figure 1.
Illustrating the
typical structure
of an emblem
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LHT
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