region

http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region

as defined in The Literal Reification pattern

bibliographic citation
Gangemi, A., Peroni, S., & Vitali, F. (2010). Literal reification. Proceedings of WOP, 2010, 65-66. https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.5555/2878924.2878933.
changes
* **v1.1.0**: Added new documentation, including annotation properties (e.g., `bibo:doi`, `schema:codeRepository`, etc.), term properties (e.g., `vann:example`, `vs:term_status`, etc.), exemplary competency questions with their respective SPARQL queries, and a Grafoo diagram. Changed prefix from `litre:` to `literal:`.
code repository
contributor
Sebastian Barzaghi (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0799-1527)
created
2011-03-23
creator
Aldo Gangemi (https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5568-2684)
Fabio Vitali (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7562-5203)
Silvio Peroni (https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0530-4305)
date
2026-09-16
description
The **_Literal Reification pattern_** is an Ontology Design Pattern that addresses scenarios in which it is needed to bless particular literals, usually when applying data properties, in order to use them as subjects and/or full-fledged objects of semantic assertions. ![The main architecture of the Literal Reification pattern.](literal.png) More specifically, this pattern promotes any literal as “first class object” in OWL by reifying it as a proper individual of the class `literal:Literal`. ## Examples of use In the following subsections, we introduce some examples to showcase how to use the Literal Reification pattern. The prefixes that are used in all the examples provided below are defined as follows: @prefix : <http://www.sparontologies.net/example/> . @prefix literal: <http://www.essepuntato.it/2010/06/literalreification/> . @prefix rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#> . @prefix xsd: <http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#> . @prefix dcterms: <http://purl.org/dc/terms/> . ### Making assertions on values A reified literal can be enriched with metadata, such as provenance, which cannot be attached directly to plain RDF literals. :paper-title-en a literal:Literal ; literal:hasLiteralValue "Literal Reification in OWL"@en ; dcterms:creator <https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0530-4305> ; dcterms:issued "2026-09-16"^^xsd:date . :paper literal:hasLiteral :paper-title-en . ### Modelling domains concerning descriptive tags Literal reification allows linking synonyms, shared values, or contextual tagging without duplicating string logic. :tag-ai a literal:Literal ; literal:hasLiteralValue "Artificial Intelligence" ; literal:hasSameLiteralValueAs :tag-ai-alias . :tag-ai-alias a literal:Literal ; literal:hasLiteralValue "Artificial Intelligence" . :paper-1 literal:hasLiteral :tag-ai . :paper-2 literal:hasLiteral :tag-ai-alias . ## Competency Questions Literal Reification can be sed for answering several questions related to literals' context. In the following subsections, some of them are introduced together with their respective SPARQL queries. The prefixes that are used in all the SPARQL queries provided below are defined as follows: PREFIX literal: <http://www.essepuntato.it/2010/06/literalreification/> PREFIX dcterms: <http://purl.org/dc/terms/> ### CQ1 What is the literal value associated with a given entity, along with the creator of that reified literal? SELECT ?entity ?value ?creator WHERE { ?entity literal:hasLiteral ?lit . ?lit literal:hasLiteralValue ?value ; dcterms:creator ?creator . } ### CQ2 Which distinct reified literals share the exact same literal value? SELECT ?lit1 ?lit2 ?value WHERE { ?lit1 literal:hasSameLiteralValueAs ?lit2 ; literal:hasLiteralValue ?value . FILTER(?lit1 != ?lit2) } ### CQ3 Which entities are annotated with a literal that has a specific value? SELECT ?entity WHERE { ?entity literal:hasLiteral ?lit . ?lit literal:hasLiteralValue "Artificial Intelligence" . }
doi
https://doi.org/10.25504/FAIRsharing.d7f0a9
image
imports
included in data catalog
is backward compatible with
issued
2011-03-23
keywords
ontology design patterns
literal values
license
logo
modified
2026-09-16
preferred namespace prefix
literal
preferred namespace uri
http://purl.org/spar/literal
prior version
publisher
see also
source
status
title
The Literal Reification pattern
version
version info
1.1.0
Other visualisation
WebVOWL Source
Export
Turtle RDF/XML JSON-LD N-Triples

region
c

IRI: http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region

comment
Any region in a dimensional space, which can be used as a value for a quality of an entity.
en
is defined by
http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#
is in domain of
has region data valuedp
is in range of
has regionop
label
region
en

@prefix owl: <http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#> .
@prefix rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#> .
@prefix region: <http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#> .

region:Region a owl:Class ;
    rdfs:label "region"@en ;
    rdfs:comment "Any region in a dimensional space, which can be used as a value for a quality of an entity."@en ;
    rdfs:isDefinedBy region: .


<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<rdf:RDF
   xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#"
   xmlns:rdfs="http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#"
>
  <rdf:Description rdf:about="http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region">
    <rdfs:label xml:lang="en">region</rdfs:label>
    <rdf:type rdf:resource="http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#Class"/>
    <rdfs:comment xml:lang="en">Any region in a dimensional space, which can be used as a value for a quality of an entity.</rdfs:comment>
    <rdfs:isDefinedBy rdf:resource="http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#"/>
  </rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>

[
  {
    "@id": "http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region",
    "@type": [
      "http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#Class"
    ],
    "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment": [
      {
        "@language": "en",
        "@value": "Any region in a dimensional space, which can be used as a value for a quality of an entity."
      }
    ],
    "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#isDefinedBy": [
      {
        "@id": "http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#"
      }
    ],
    "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#label": [
      {
        "@language": "en",
        "@value": "region"
      }
    ]
  }
]
<http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region> <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#label> "region"@en .
<http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region> <http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#type> <http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#Class> .
<http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region> <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment> "Any region in a dimensional space, which can be used as a value for a quality of an entity."@en .
<http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#Region> <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#isDefinedBy> <http://www.ontologydesignpatterns.org/cp/owl/region.owl#> .
← Back to full documentation