Semantics - Supportive Element for the Cooperative Evaluation of Geographical and Historical Information

Abstract : The emergence of the Semantic Web and its underlying knowledge technologies has brought changes in data han- dling. Transferring expert knowledge to machines through knowledge formalization provides us the required support in managing huge datasets like the information in the World Wide Web. In the field of geospatial technology semantic technologies not only entail the capability to achieve higher degree of data integration but also infer semantics to discover new and hidden knowledge. This is of particular interest in the field of archaeology, where complex interrelations among heterogeneous datasets exist. Although researches on seman- tics are active areas in geospatial communities, their initial use is mainly for spatial data integration. This article tries to go one step further and imply semantics for spatial knowl- edge discovery through spatial built-ins within SWRL and SPARQL. The work resembles the approach of the Open Geo- spatial Consortium (OGC) to define standards for GeoSPARQL.