Cite this as: Uleberg, E., Matsumoto, M., Pantos, G.A. and Bonelli, L. 2023 Toward Standardised Vocabularies for Norwegian Archaeology, Internet Archaeology 64. https://doi.org/10.11141/ia.64.7
The Museum of Cultural History (MCH) at the University of Oslo, Norway, has undertaken a series of infrastructure projects with the aim of improving the standardisation of archaeological data and increasing data integration at both a national and international level. This builds on decades of earlier work and includes a revision of shared National database systems (unimus), integration of previously disparate data types and spatial data (ADED), and more recently the development of a 3D publishing platform (BItFROST). These projects feed into broader aims of large-scale data integration as part of the European-wide ARIADNE Research Infrastructure. This article provides an overview of the history and development of these systems in Norway and takes a look at some of the roads still ahead.
Corresponding author: Espen Uleberg
espen.uleberg@khm.uio.no
Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway
Mieko Matsumoto
Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway
George Alexis Pantos
Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway
Letizia Bonelli
Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway
Figure 1: The five archaeological museum districts in Norway. The south-east region served by the MCH includes the area with the largest population density and conurbation and consequently the majority of development-led archaeology in the country
Figure 2: The welcome page of the current online unimus resources
Figure 3a: Screenshots of the ADED platform
Figure 3b: Screenshots of the BItFROST platform
Figure 4: Screenshot of the MCH resources in the ARIADNE portal
Figure 5: The Humanistic Information System as conceptualised at the time. The image depicts the different stakeholders and degree of subject overlap and interaction with the intended centralised approach to terminology definition
Figure 6: Example of the not-quite common vocabulary used in Norwegian archaeological data. Variation in terms comes both from regionally distinct archaeology but also variations in orthography, spelling and research tradition
Figure 7: Example of an annotated depiction of a tækkekrog — roof hook — in Nomina Rerum Mediaevalium, illustrating the challenge of mismatching terminologies and concepts between regions and language groups
British Museum 1999 The British Museums Object Names Thesaurus [dataset] https://terminology.collectionstrust.org.uk/British-Museum-objects/ [Last accessed: 20 March 2023]
Ekengren, F., Callieri, M., Dininno, D., Berggren, Å., Macheridis, S. and Dell'Unto, N. 2021 'Dynamic collections: a 3D web infrastructure for artifact engagement', Open Archaeology 7(1), 337–52. https://doi.org/10.1515/opar-2020-0139
Helskog, K., Indrelid, S. and Mikkelsen, E. 1976 'Morfologisk klassifisering av slåtte steinartefakter', Universitetets Oldsaksamling Årbok 1972-1974, 9-40.
Holmen, J. and Uleberg, E. 1996 'The National Documentation Project of Norway - the archaeological sub-project' in H. Kamermans and K. Fennema (eds) Interfacing the Past. Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology, CAA95, Leiden: Institute of Prehistory, University of Leiden. 43-6.
Huggett, J. 2022 'Data legacies, epistemic anxieties, and digital imaginaries in archaeology', Digital 2(2), 267-95. https://doi.org/10.3390/digital2020016
KHM n.d. Amundsen's Gjoa Haven Collection 1903-1905. https://www.khm.uio.no/english/collections/gjoahaven [Last accessed: 10 March 2023]
KHM 2012 Kulturhistorisk museum: Historikk. https://www.khm.uio.no/om/tall-og-fakta/historie/ [Last accessed: 10 March 2023]
KHM 2021 BItFROST: Bridging Research Across Heritage Studies. https://www.khm.uio.no/english/research/projects/bitfrost/ [Last accessed: 20 March 2023]
Matsumoto, M. and Uleberg, E. 2015 'Digitizing archaeology in Norway' in K. Piotrowska and P. Konieczny (eds) CONDITION 2015 Conservation and Digitalization, Gdańsk: National Maritime Museum. 159-64.
Matsumoto, M. and Uleberg, E. 2019 'Using an archaeological infrastructure in Norway', Cost-Action https://arkwork.eu/using-an-archaeological-infrastructure-in-norway/ [Last accessed: 20 March 2023]
Matsumoto, M. and Uleberg, E. 2021 'Curation of digital archaeological data in Norway', Internet Archaeology 58. https://doi.org/10.11141/ia.58.29 [Last accessed: 15 March 2023]
Ministry of Climate and Environment 1979 Act concerning the cultural heritage. https://lovdata.no/dokument/NLE/lov/1978-06-09-50 [Last accessed: 29 March 2023]
Munoz, A., Lopes Martins, D., Lana, C., Conrado Martins, L. and Siqueira, J. 2022 Decolonising ethnographic databases: a pilot project of data migration from the Swedish National Museum of World Culture's Carlotta to the open-source software Tainacan, version 1.0, Europeana PRO. https://pro.europeana.eu/page/europeana-research-collaborations-the-national-museum-of-world-culture-sweden [Last accessed: 29 March 2023]
Nicol, A., Jun H., Dhariwal P., Mishkin, P. and Chen, M. 2022 'Point-E: a system for generating 3D point clouds from complex prompts', Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition [preprint] https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2212.08751
Ore, C.E. and Rangsæter, O. 2007 Final Report for the Museum Project 1998-2006. https://www.muspro.uio.no/final%20report%20museum%20project.pdf [Last accessed: 20 March 2023]
Ore, C.E.S. and Uleberg, E. 2019 'The ADED project - a Norwegian infrastructure for excavation data' in J. Richards and F. Niccolucci (eds) The ARIADNE Impact, Budapest: Archeolingua. 123-134. https://zenodo.org/record/4319058
Peterson, J. 1919 De norske vikingesverd: en typologisk-kronologisk studie over vikingetidens vaaben, Kristiania: Jacob Dybwad. https://bibsys-k.userservices.exlibrisgroup.com/view/delivery/47BIBSYS_UBO/12215299080002204 [Last accessed: 15 March 2023]
Potenziani, M., Callieri, M., Dellepiane, M. and Corsini, M. 2015 '3DHOP: 3D Heritage Online Presenter', Computer & Graphics 52. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cag.2015.07.001
Rygh, O. 1888 Norske Oldsager: Afbildninger og Oversigter, Oslo: Cammermeyer.
Shetelig, H. 1906 The Cruciform Brooches of Norway, Bergen: Bergens Museum. https://www.nb.no/items/c58ec51753f04f760dad93a77bfd7fb1?page=0&searchText=oaiid:%22oai:nb.bibsys.no:999518991124702202%22 [Last accessed: 20 January 2023]
Uleberg, E. and Matsumoto, M. 2019 'Georeferencing museum collections' in M. Doerr, Ø. Eide, O. Grønvik and B. Kjelsvik (eds) Humanists and the Digital Toolbox, Novus Forlag. 111-34.
Østmo, E. 1998 'Register over trykte tilvekster av norske oldsaker', Universitetets Oldsaksamling Årbok 1997/1998, 177-90.
Internet Archaeology is an open access journal based in the Department of Archaeology, University of York. Except where otherwise noted, content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 (CC BY) Unported licence, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that attribution to the author(s), the title of the work, the Internet Archaeology journal and the relevant URL/DOI are given.
Terms and Conditions | Legal Statements | Privacy Policy | Cookies Policy | Citing Internet Archaeology
Internet Archaeology content is preserved for the long term with the Archaeology Data Service. Help sustain and support open access publication by donating to our Open Access Archaeology Fund.
Home
