Adam
The element for recording the coordinates or other boundary or point definition of a place is
Place: locationThe element definition is "A delimitation of the physical territory of a place".
As your example shows, there are different values that may be assigned to this element, reflecting the different methods of 'locating' a place. These methods include centre-point coordinates (there are several distinct methods for determining the centre of an irregular boundary) and boundary coordinates (including bounding box and irregular polygon) that are sets of point coordinates. As the LRM says "The level of precision used can vary according to the context".
Different authority files (vocabulary encoding schemes) for Place are unlikely to record all the possible values, so the element is unrefined. It is assumed that different communities will add, as required, refinements of the element, and if an international consensus emerges, presumably RSC would be receptive to a proposal for refining the element.
As you point out, NACO is interested in the names of places, which are not the same entities as places themselves.
The place depicted on a cartographic work may be labelled 'Edinburgh', but the map itself, if presented as a rectangular area, will contain places that are not called Edinburgh and are located outside of the city boundary. The place depicted is the rectangular area of the map, which contains the irregular polygon that is the 'boundary' of the city. Also, the city boundary itself is not fixed: the political boundary (administrative area) is not quite the same as the social boundary, the planning boundary, or the tourist boundary. And it changes through time.
RDA assumes that data processing can help to make sense of this. A machine can calculate if a point lies within an area, and an area within a larger area. A sheet map that includes a distinct place may not be labelled with the name of the place.
See the Wikipedia entry on the
Ordnance Survey National Grid. It includes an depiction of Grid square TF, with a caption: "The map shows The Wash and the North Sea, as well as places within the counties of Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk". The place actually depicted on the map is a rectangular area named 'TF' in the grid system, and it contains a place named 'Boston'. If 'TF' and 'Boston' are treated as distinct places, and their coordinates are recorded for each 'location' using the same coordinate system, then a search for 'a map of Boston' can hit the OS map as well a street map of the town if the retrieval system can compute 'inside' and 'outside' of a specific 'location'.
Or an agent who creates metadata could simply add relationships to all of the places that the cartographic work depicts/covers.
The IFLA Library Reference Model scopes the Place entity as:
"The entity place, as relevant in a bibliographic context, is a cultural construction, it is the human identification of a geographic area or extent of space. Places are usually identified through a physical object (a geographical feature or a man-made object), or due to their relevance with regards to a particular agent (geopolitical entities such as countries, cities), or as the location of an event. The place as an extent of space is distinct from any governing bodies that exercise jurisdiction in that territory. The government responsible for a territory is a collective agent. Places can be contemporary or historical, on Earth or extra-terrestrial. Imaginary, legendary or fictional places are not instances of the place entity.
A place can have fuzzy boundaries. The boundaries of a place can change over time (such as a city that absorbs adjacent suburbs) without changing the identity of the place for bibliographic purposes.
As it can be a moving frame of reference, the entity place is not necessarily identified by its geospatial coordinates alone."
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Gordon Dunsire
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Original Message:
Sent: Jul 28, 2021 11:48 AM
From: Adam Schiff
Subject: Geographic coordinates in place name authorities
In geographic place name authorities, NACO catalogers regularly record geographic coordinates of the place in field 034 of authority records. For example:
034 ## ǂd E0072651 ǂe E0072651 ǂf N0465653 ǂg N0465653 ǂ2 geonames
034 ## ǂd E0072700 ǂe E0072700 ǂf N0465700 ǂg N0465700 ǂ2 wikiped
151 ## ǂa Bern (Switzerland)
There does not seem to be an element in RDA that corresponds to coordinates for a place in a place description. All I see for the place entity are the following elements:
coordinates of cartographic content of: A work that is a cartographic work that has an area of coverage that is described using a mathematical system to identify its boundaries or location.
Domain: Place. Range: Work
longitude and latitude of: A work that is a cartographic work that has an area of coverage that is identified using longitude of the westernmost and easternmost boundaries and latitude of the northernmost and southernmost boundaries.
Domain: Place. Range: Work
strings of coordinate pairs of: A work that is a cartographic work that has an area of coverage that is identified by a polygon using coordinates for each vertex.
Domain: Place. Range: Work
The inverse relationships relate works to places:
coordinates of cartographic content: A place that is the area of coverage of a cartographic work that is described using a mathematical system to identify its boundaries or location.
Domain: Work. Range: Place
longitude and latitude: A place that is the area of coverage of a cartographic work that is identified using the longitude of the westernmost and easternmost boundaries and the latitude of the northernmost and southernmost boundaries.
Domain: Work. Range: Place
strings of coordinate pairs: A place that is the area of coverage of a cartographic work that is identified by a polygon using coordinates for each vertex.
Domain: Work. Range: Place
Am I missing something in RDA, or is there actually no element in RDA for recording the geographic coordinates of a place, rather than the coordinates of a place depicted on a cartographic work? Is what we do in NACO on geographic authority records simply outside the scope of RDA?
Adam Schiff
Adam L. Schiff
Principal Cataloger
University of Washington Libraries
(206) 543-8409
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Adam Schiff
Principal Cataloger
University of Washington Libraries
He/Him/His
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