Wikidata:Provenance Research: The clients of W. O. Oldman and W. D. Webster
Introduction
[edit]This is an organising page for the Provenance Research: The clients of William Ockleford Oldman and W. D. Webster Wikiproject, which started in October 2025.
The project aims to improve information on and connect the clients of two of the most prolific dealers in indigenous items trading between the 1890s and the 1910s. The aim is to assist in easing the provenance research that is occurring in museums around the world. Proveance research into collection items that passed throught the hands of these two dealers assists in identifying the source communities of these collection items and permits the museums to, hopefully, reconnect people with the treasures their ancestors created.
The clients of W. O. Oldman and W. D. Webster are often well known in their own right as they often donated their collections to museums and galleries.
Information source
[edit]The project will use the sales registers and letter books of both traders held by the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa.
Client Schema
[edit]New items
[edit]For some kinds of items, including people, Wikidata has changed in 2024 to allow a 'mul' label. Mul stands for multiple languages, and adding a 'mul' label rather than an 'en' label when you create an item means that users who look at Wikidata in another language will still be able to see the item label, without us filling up Wikidata with 300 labels that all read the same. You can read more about which items this refers to here. You set the language of the label on the new item creation page in a dropbox (you may need to type mul if you can't find it in the list). If you create a new item with a mul label, you should also add a name in native language (P1559) statement (this tells users the language of the original name).
| property ID | property label | value(s) | example use | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| P31 | instance of (P31) | human (Q5) | Olive Cotton (Q7087144) | |
| P21 | sex or gender (P21) | female (Q6581072) or see property constraints on property page for other values | Ellen Wright Blackwell (Q5365071) | |
| P18 | image (P18) | filename of image of this person on Commons | Helen Connon (Q16030754) | |
| P735 | given name (P735) | given name, with qualifier series ordinal (P1545) of 1, 2 etc to distinguish first, middle names | Lucy May Cranwell (Q6698259) | |
| P734 | family name (P734) | surname, may have more than one value. Use qualifier object of statement has role (P3831) with maiden name (Q1376230) or married name (Q30232378) or series ordinal (P1545) for compound names. Can also add start time (P580) to a married name to show likely start of usage | Lucy May Cranwell (Q6698259) and Harriet Dyke Acland (Q75276326) | |
| P1559 | name in native language (P1559) | Enter the full name and add the appropriate language tag (for most it will be English). Especially important if the item has a label in 'mul' rather than English (as most people items now should) | Deborah O'Connor (Q130311610) | |
| P27 | country of citizenship (P27) | Watch out for assigning citizenship to countries that didn't officially exist until after the subject's birth date | Jessie Buckland (Q6187736) | |
| P106 | occupation (P106) | collector (Q3243461) | Henry Watson (Q106831103) | |
| P569 | date of birth (P569) | date, can add qualifier sourcing circumstances (P1480) with circa (Q5727902) near (Q21818619) presumably (Q18122778) see P1480 property constraints for many more possible ways to express doubt or uncertainty | Emma Meluish (Q118330063) | |
| P570 | date of death (P570) | as above. Can enter more than one possible value, with same or different sources, and can have values with different precision. In the case of different precision it is normal practice to make the more precise date preferred rank, with a qualifier reason for preferred rank (P7452) most precise value (Q71536040) |
Frances Isabella Blanche Shakespear (Q82587029) | |
| P19 | place of birth (P19) | location. If place has more than one name or the Wikidata label doesn't match the name used in the source (e.g. a place that does not have a Wikidata item so you matched to a region instead), use qualifier object named as (P1932) to record name used in source | ||
| P20 | place of death (P20) | as above | ||
| P119 | place of burial (P119) | as above | ||
| P1317 | floruit (P1317) | Date flourished, if birth/death dates aren't known but you know when they were working | Gretchen Albrecht (Q5607682) | |
| P937 | work location (P937) | Location work took place. Can be qualified with dates in work period (start) (P2031) and work period (end) (P2032) or point in time (P585) | Isa Genzken (Q462325) | |
| P108 | employer (P108) | Organisation or Institution employing the subject | Mary Ann Bloomfield (Q107332602) | |
| P3342 | significant person (P3342) | Use this to link the person with the traders William Ockleford Oldman (Q8016309) or William Downing Webster (Q7945439). Should be qualified with object of statement has role (P3831) and correspondent (Q3589290) | Henry Watson (Q106831103) | |
| P69 | educated at (P69) | Institution the subject attended. Can be qualified with start time (P580) and end time (P582) | Ruth Watson (Q5412317) | |
| P11146 | collection items at (P11146) | Institution holding items collected by the subject. | Eva Amarantha Cutter (Q136576442) | |
| P485 | archives at (P485) | Institution holding the subject's own archives, such as letters, drafts, diaries | ||
| P5008 | on focus list of Wikimedia project (P5008) | Provenance Research: The clients of W. O. Oldman and W. D. Webster (Q136644030) | ||
| P373 | Commons category (P373) | Wikimedia Commons category | Marti Friedlander (Q286465) |
Queries
[edit]Main queries
[edit]- Focus List for Project
- With Significant Person matching William Ockleford Oldman
- With Significant Person matching William Downing Webster
Subpages
[edit]