Towards a conceptual foundation for documenting tangible and intangible elements of a cultural object

Abstract

This article analyses the concept of intangible/tangible heritage from a documentation perspective, investigating the theoretical framework developed within the various branches of the cultural heritage studies and providing a clear perspective, as well as an alignment, of the various approaches and requirements. The focus provided highlights the prospect of developing a conceptual foundation that would cover the documentation of the tangible and intangible elements of a cultural object. The theoretical assumptions are then analysed from an ontological perspective, and tested using CIDOC-CRM, developing a series of representative mappings, including information about the material, spatial and symbolic elements of a scene in a narrative cycle painted in the narthex of a byzantine church in Cyprus. The result is a formalisation of a set of requirements and a documentation paradigm which help record the tangible and intangible elements of an heritage asset.