What Is an Authority?
An authority is a controlled value for a subject, person, place, or organisation — one that resolves to a URI in a published vocabulary. When you describe a photograph as being about Derby County Football Club, you can use the string "Derby County Football Club", or you can use the authority record with the FAST URI http://id.worldcat.org/fast/532119.
The Archiver does both — every entity the AI extracts is offered the chance to be linked to an authority. This unlocks faster cross-collection discovery, machine-readable subject access, and round-tripping into systems that speak the same vocabularies.
The vocabularies The Archiver links to
| Vocabulary | What it covers | Example |
|---|---|---|
| LCSH | Library of Congress Subject Headings — broad subject terms | "Football—England—Derby" |
| FAST | Faceted Application of Subject Terminology — refined LCSH | "Derby County Football Club" |
| Getty AAT | Art & Architecture Thesaurus — object types, materials, techniques | "figurines", "resin" |
| Getty TGN | Thesaurus of Geographic Names — places, historical and current | "Derby (Derbyshire, England)" |
| VIAF | Virtual International Authority File — people and organisations | "Bloomer, Steve, 1874–1938" |
| GeoNames | Geographic features, populated places | "Pride Park Stadium" |
| Wikidata | Pan-disciplinary entities | Q14910 (Derby County F.C.) |
The full source list with attribution is on the marketing site's Sources page.
Why it matters
Cross-collection discovery
Search for "Derby County FC" by authority (clicking the pill) and you get every appearance of that subject across every accession, fond, and dossier — regardless of how the term was written in the original material. Free-text search can't do this.
Standards-compliant export
Every authority-linked field carries its URI into EAD3, Dublin Core, ArchivesSpace, and AtoM exports. Receiving systems can map straight onto their own authority records — no manual reconciliation.
Discovery beyond your archive
National aggregators and academic search platforms link on these URIs. Authority-linked records in your finding aid become findable on Archives Portal Europe, Wikidata-linked institutional dashboards, and library discovery interfaces.
Where you see authorities
- As pills on item cards — both on the item review screen and in search results
- On the Authorities tab of each accession — verified, unresolved, and needs-review groups
- In Data Model — fields can be bound to one or more vocabularies, controlling which sources are queried during processing
The verification cycle
When the AI suggests an authority, the link is initially Unresolved — a candidate the model proposes. You verify it on the Authorities tab; once verified it becomes Verified and the link is permanent.
Three states:
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Needs review | The model is uncertain or has conflicting candidates |
| Unresolved | A candidate has been proposed but not yet verified |
| Verified | A human has confirmed the link |
See Reviewing authorities for the workflow.
What's next?
- Reviewing authorities — accepting, rejecting, and editing the AI's proposals
- Applying domain packs — turning on bulk vocabulary bindings for a specific subject area