Metadata thesaurus

Metadata thesaurus contains terms and expressions required in describing materials.

Service links

Service description

Metadata thesaurus contains terms and expressions required in describing materials. The thesaurus is also suitable for selecting headings displayed in user interfaces. It also enhances automatic processing of metadata (machine-readability, automatic translation, linkability).

The thesaurus is organized according to the entity-relationship structure of the RDA text and the LRM conceptual model. Each term and phrase has its own permanent identifier (URI).

Use of the terms in the thesaurus standardises the vocabulary of descriptive metadata, and simultaneously harmonises description, thus enhancing information searching.The aim of the thesaurus is also to make it easier to produce metadata, by collecting vocabulary and expressions needed in description, and clarifying concepts related to them.

The thesaurus includes terms complying with the RDA description rules. The selected terms are consistent with other thesauri and ontologies (YSO, KOKO, etc.) and with terms in the ONIX format, and the RDA Registry.

The thesaurus does not contain vocabulary describing the subject matter of the work, such as index terms.

Background information

Development of the Metadata thesaurus was included in the KILDA project (library metadata into linked data) between 2014 and 2016.

The thesaurus is maintained by the National Library. Development of the the thesaurus is done in cooperation with national description groups: Expert group for bibliographic metadata, Expert group for subject cataloging, Expert group for music metadata, Expert network for agent metadata, and the Cataloguing standard committee. The Metadata thesaurus is also used by many other memory organisations (archives, museums), in part.

The Metadata thesaurus was published in the Finto service as linked open data in 2015.

Swedish translation of the thesaurus 2015–