Preferred Term
"preferred" following a term indicates that the term is the so-called "preferred term" for the record. It is typically the first in a list of terms in the record.

A preferred term or "descriptor" is flagged in order to provide a default term for the thesaurus and other displays. It may also be used by cataloguers who wish to apply AAT as an "authority," and consistently use a single term to refer to a concept. In AAT, the "preferred" term is the commonly used term in American English. British English and other languages may also be flagged. For example, the preferred British English spelling will be marked with a "P", as in "English, British-P."

Diacritics: If a box displays instead of a character in a name or term, this means that your system cannot display the Unicode character represented. You may view the full name or term with correct diacritics by using Vista, Mac OS 10.5, or often by pasting the word into an MS Word document.

Historical flag
Indicates if the term is current or historical. Most terms in the AAT are "current."

Vernacular flag
Indicates if the term is in the vernacular (local) language, or some other language. Currently in the AAT, most terms are flagged "U" for "Undetermined." Diacritics: If a box displays instead of a character in a name or term, this means that your system cannot display the Unicode character represented. You may view the full name or term with correct diacritics by using Vista, Mac OS 10.5, or often by pasting the word into an MS Word document.

Term Type flag
Indicates the type of term. The values for "term type" represent specialized terminology used in thesauri.













Other flags
Indicates various characteristics of the term.

Display name
"display" following the term indicates that the term should be used in displays where natural order is preferred. If the term is marked "index," it means that this form should be used in indexes and other lists where inverted order is appropriate. Currently in the AAT, most values for this field are "not applicable" and do not display in the record on the Web.

Language of the term and preferred flag

The language of the term may be included. If the language is followed by "P" (as in "British, English-P") this means that this is the preferred term for the concept in that language. Multiple languages may be included for a single term, because one spelling of the term may be preferred in multiple languages. See also Preferred Term above.

Note that, even when the term represents a language other than English, the qualifier is still in English. The qualifier is located in a separate field and is not part of the term per se. All information other than the term itself is in English.

Diacritics: If a box displays instead of a character in a name or term, this means that your system cannot display the Unicode character represented. You may view the full name or term with correct diacritics by using Vista, Mac OS 10.5, or often by pasting the word into an MS Word document.

Record Type
Type designation that characterizes the AAT record, expressed in the jargon of controlled vocabularies.

Refers to records in the AAT that represent concepts; records for concepts include terms, a note, and bibliography. Compare Concept with Guide term and Hierarchy name.

Refers to records that serve as place savers to create a level in the hierarchy under which the AAT can collocate related concepts. Guide terms are not used for indexing or cataloguing. They are enclosed in angled brackets.

Refers to the top of a hierarchy. The hierarchy name is generally not used for indexing or cataloguing.

Refers to the top of a facet, which is one of the major divisions of the AAT.















Preferred flag
"preferred" following a place type indicates that the place type is the so-called "preferred" place type for the record. It is typically the first in a list of place types for the place. A preferred place type is flagged in order to provide a default place type for the thesaurus and other displays.

Historical flag
Indicates if the Place Type is current or historical.

 


Non-preferred parents
[N] indicates "non-preferred" parent. Terms may have multiple hierarchical views because AAT is polyhierarchical. One parent is considered "preferred," and other parents are "non-preferred." When places are displaying with their non-preferred parent, an "N" in square brackets appears to the right.

 


Representative Images
A selected small number of vocabulary records have been linked to images in the Getty collections and elsewhere. Further development of this project will take place in 2010 and beyond.












 


Hierarchical historical flag
Indicates if the link to the parent is current, historical, or of another type.

 


Flag for hierarchical relationship type
Indicates the type of relationship between a hierarchical child and its parent, expressed in the jargon of controlled vocabulary standards. An example of a whole/part relationship is Tuscany is a part of Italy (TGN). An example of genus/species relationship is calcite is a type of mineral (AAT). An example of the instance relationship is Rembrandt van Rijn is an example of a Person (ULAN).

LC flag
Indicates if this is a term used in preferred headings in Library of Congress authorities. Also called the "AACR2 flag."

Language Status Flag
Indicates if the term is a loan term from another language, meaning the term in one language is used with little or no change in a second language (e.g., trompe-l'oeil is a French term used in English).

Part of Speech Flag
Indicates the category into which the term would be placed relative to its normal function in a grammatical context. An important use of this flag is to distinguish plural noun descriptors from singular noun alternate descriptors, although other important categories are included.