From Inventory to Knowledge Graph: The Evolution of Object Documentation Over Time, as Illustrated by the Berlin Kunstkammer and Its Successor Institutions
At NFDI4Objects, the National Research Data Infrastructure for the material legacies of human and environmental history, the concept of object biography plays a central role in integrating and linking heterogeneous and distributed data on objects that are preserved today in collections and museums. At the FAU CDI, as a participant in NFDI4Objects, this concept is being developed in close collaboration with the Klassik Stiftung Weimar. It is important to understand how the documentation of such objects has evolved over the centuries, how practices and media have changed in function and structure within a shifting disciplinary context, and what conclusions can be drawn from this for current documentation and digitization practices. Diana Stört of the Berlin State Archives and Sarah Wagner of the FAU CDI explore these questions in their newly published article, using the Berlin Kunstkammer as a case study.
Between 2019 and 2022, both worked on the DFG-funded project “The Window to Nature and Art,” in which the holdings of the Berlin Kunstkammer were digitally cataloged using the concept of object biography, based on source materials and the CIDOC CRM, within a WissKI-based research environment. The dataset, comprising over 2,000 objects along with associated source, actor, and location information, has now been integrated into the NFDI4Objects knowledge graph where the objects can now form new connections. At the same time, the data model developed serves as the basis for the NFDI4Objects project.
This article examines the historical development of object documentation using the Berlin Kunstkammer and its successor institutions as a case study, from the Early Modern period to the present day. Drawing on selected inventories and documentation media, it demonstrates how practices of cataloging, organizing, and evaluating collection objects have evolved under institutional, scholarly, and societal influences. The analysis ranges from legally mandated ownership inventories of the 17th century, through subject-specific catalogs of the 18th and 19th centuries, to standardized analog and digital inventorying since the 20th century. Particular attention is given to provenance research as well as current requirements for transparent, ethically responsible, and interoperable collection documentation. Using the example of digital object biographies and semantic knowledge graphs based on the CIDOC CRM, the presentation demonstrates how heterogeneous collection data can be interconnected and made usable for research purposes.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.25364/32.2:2026.1.3
Downloadlink: https://unipub.uni-graz.at/musea/download/pdf/13333547