A first dataset, step by step¶

This walkthrough builds a small dataset from one source: a London customs account of 1480 to 1485 that mentions Bristol and Deptford Strand. It uses seven of the ten sheets. The finished tables are the customs example, which you can download as CSV files and open beside this page.

Start from the temPlato workbook. Only the columns you fill in are shown below; leave the others empty.

1. List your places¶

One row per place, with an identifier you make up and a label to list it under. The label is only for display: the names the place has in your sources go in the names sheet.

`place_id`	`label`	`country_codes`
bristol	Bristol	GB
deptford-strand	Deptford Strand	GB

2. List your sources¶

One row per source. The date is when the source itself was made, as the catalogue gives it; from and to are the years it spans.

`source_id`	`title`	`citation`	`uri`	`date`	`from`	`to`	`licence`
tna-e122-19-10	TNA E 122/19/10	The National Archives, Exchequer: King’s Remembrancer, E 122/19/10	https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C5846832	1480-1485	1480	1485
geonames	GeoNames	GeoNames geographical database	https://www.geonames.org/	undated			https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

The second source, GeoNames, is there because the coordinates in step 4 come from it, not from the customs account. Every row says which source it comes from, so a location taken from a modern database is never mistaken for one found in a fifteenth-century document.

3. Record the names¶

One row for each name a source gives, spelt exactly as the source spells it. place_id and source_id point at the rows you made in steps 1 and 2.

`place_id`	`name`	`language`	`script`	`name_type`	`date`	`from`	`to`	`source_id`	`certainty`	`notes`
bristol	Bristowe	enm	Latn		1480-1485	1480	1485	tna-e122-19-10	0.95	Clear manuscript hand.
deptford-strand	Deptford Strand	en	Latn	toponym;odonym	1481	1481	1481	tna-e122-19-10	0.7	Manuscript partially damaged; reading probable but not certain.

The first row says: the customs account, for 1480 to 1485, calls Bristol “Bristowe”. The second says how sure the compiler is of a damaged reading (certainty 0.7) and why (notes). Deptford Strand names both a place and a street, hence two name types.

4. Record locations¶

Latitude and longitude in decimal degrees, as most web maps give them. The geometry_role says what the point marks: here a point standing in for the whole town, rather than its outline or one particular building.

`place_id`	`latitude`	`longitude`	`geometry_role`	`date`	`source_id`
bristol	51.45523	-2.59665	RepresentativePoint	undated	geonames

GeoNames does not date its coordinates, so the date is undated.

5. Record what kind of place it is¶

The account treats Bristol as a port. The type can be written in your own words, with the matching concept from a published vocabulary (here the Getty Art & Architecture Thesaurus) if you know it.

`place_id`	`type_label`	`type_uri`	`date`	`from`	`to`	`source_id`
bristol	port	http://vocab.getty.edu/aat/300000745	1480-1485	1480	1485	tna-e122-19-10

6. Say which records elsewhere are the same place¶

If you know that one of your places is already in GeoNames, Wikidata or the World Historical Gazetteer, say so in identities. This is what lets your evidence join everyone else’s.

`place_id`	`same_as`	`match_type`	`certainty`	`basis`
bristol	https://www.geonames.org/2654675/	exactMatch	0.95	Same name and position; the only plausible match.

7. Say what the dataset is¶

The about sheet has one row, describing the dataset as a whole: its title, who made it, its licence, what it covers, and the base of its web addresses. It is what lets other people find your dataset, cite it and know what they may do with it. Only the title is required, and the licence too once you mark the dataset published, but fill in as much as you can.

`title`	`description`	`creator`	`licence`	`status`	`keywords`	`spatial`	`temporal_from`	`temporal_to`	`dataset_uri`	`base_uri`
London Customs Accounts 1480–1485	Ports and places named in an Exchequer customs account (TNA E 122/19/10): a worked example of PLATO spreadsheet tables.	Stephen Gadd <https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3060-0181>	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/	draft	customs accounts;ports	http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q21	1480	1485	https://whgazetteer.org/example/customs/	https://whgazetteer.org/example/customs/

creator names the authors to cite. Write each one as a name followed by a web address in angle brackets, as here: Stephen Gadd <https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3060-0181>. The address is best an ORCID, which identifies a researcher whatever their name is written as. An author with no address can be given by name alone, and an address can be given alone too. Separate several authors with ;. Older tables may have a creator_name column for names without addresses: it still works, but it is deprecated and will be withdrawn in a later release, so put those names in creator instead.

base_uri is the most important column to get right before you publish. Every place’s permanent web address is made from it and the place’s place_id: the base, then place/, then the place_id. Here, Bristol’s is https://whgazetteer.org/example/customs/place/bristol. Every source’s is made the same way with source/: the customs account’s is https://whgazetteer.org/example/customs/source/tna-e122-19-10. Choose a base you control and will keep, such as your project’s own w3id address, so that the addresses still work in twenty years, and do not change a place_id or source_id once the dataset is published, since that would change its address. Keep to letters, digits and the characters - . _ ~ in these identifiers: any other character, a space included, is written in the address as a code such as %20. dataset_uri is the address of the dataset itself; if you leave it empty, the dataset takes the base as its address, ending in /.

What happens to your rows¶

Each row of names, locations and types becomes one attestation: a statement that this source, for this date, gives this name, location or type for this place. Your four evidence rows become four attestations about two places, each keeping its source, its date and your certainty. Nothing you entered is merged or overwritten, and a user of the combined data can always see who said what, and when.

For a richer example, with manuscripts copied later, “ibid.” references and editorial headwords, see the place-name survey example. Every column is described in the sheet reference.