CIDOC Conceptual Reference Model Special Interest Group
About the CIDOC CRM Special Interest Group (SIG)
The CIDOC CRM SIG is a volunteer community of international experts dedicated to advancing the CIDOC Conceptual Reference Model — an extensible, ISO‑standard ontology (ISO 21127:2023) widely used in cultural heritage, museum, library, and archival information integration. The CIDOC CRM works under the aegis of ICOM Documentation as a working group of that committee.
Our continuous motivation is to evolve and steward a robust, extensible, and internationally recognized ontology that enables seamless integration, sharing, and interpretation of cultural heritage information — bridging institutions and disciplines with shared semantics and practical tools.
A Brief History
The CIDOC CRM originated in the 1990s within the CIDOC (International Committee for Documentation) of ICOM (now ICOM Documentation), as an initiative to improve the interoperability of museum documentation standards. In response to growing digital transformation, the CIDOC CRM Special Interest Group was formally established to guide the development of the model as a formal ontology. Over the years, it has evolved into a widely recognized standard, officially published as ISO 21127, and has expanded its reach to support libraries, archives, archaeology, digital humanities, research infrastructures, and beyond.
Purpose and Focus
1. Maintain the standard
Serve as the official working group of ICOM Documentation and expert body for ISO, reviewing proposed updates and ensuring the ontology stays accurate, relevant, and aligned with community needs.
2. Develop extensions
Collaborate with related communities (e.g., bibliographic standards, TEI) to build formal model extensions that seamlessly integrate with the base CRM ontology.
3. Support interoperability
Facilitate discussions on mapping other schemas to the standard and enabling the adaption of CRM for diverse knowledge domains (such as natural history, ethnography, etc.).
4. Educate and promote
Create training resources, documentation, and usage guides to help institutions and practitioners implement the ontology and its extensions.
Why It Matters
The CIDOC CRM provides a shared semantic framework — a “semantic glue” — for converting heterogeneous, local data into coherent, interoperable datasets. It supports both high-level querying and detailed data mapping, enabling museums, libraries, archives, and research centers to publish and link rich cultural heritage information. The CIDOC CRM SIG works to promote this vision of an interoperable reliable, expert based web of semantic knowledge by building and maintaining this foundational element of this approach.
How the SIG Works
- Voluntary and inclusive: Open to institutional members from libraries, museums, archives, and research organizations worldwide. See our membership list.
- Practical collaboration: Hosts regular hybrid working meetings (usually two per year) to solve real-world modeling challenges and coordinate updates. See our upcoming meetings.
- Transparent: all issues are managed through a mailing list and then registered in a publicly searchable issue tracking system.
- Outcome-oriented: The community produces rigorously documented ontologies according to a well defined specification document, multiple implementable serializations of the specification for different systems, as well as guidelines and training materials to support the diverse community of projects and adopters. See the specification.
Documentation
The core resources developed by the CIDOC CRM SIG are ontology specifications for the structuring, representation and integration of cultural heritage and historical data. The base ontology is called the CIDOC Conceptual Reference model. The group, moreover, maintains and updates a series of harmonized ontologies, which extend and make more specific the base ontology.
Contact Us
If you’re interested in the CIDOC CRM, want to participate in SIG activities, or need guidance on implementation or use, we’d love to hear from you.
🌐 Website: https://www.cidoc-crm.org
📧 Email: cidoc-crm@ics.forth.gr
📧 Chair: Martin Doerr
We welcome collaboration from professionals and institutions across cultural heritage, digital humanities, data science, and beyond.