FISH Terminology
FISH and Historic England (formerly English Heritage) take a lead role in continually developing and updating standardized terminology for anyone interested in recording the built and buried heritage. Adopting consistent indexing practice facilitates accurate and fast information retrieval and we encourage anyone wanting to share their historic environment information to use the free FISH Terminology tools.
The thesauri and wordlists may be consulted online via the Historic England website: http://thesaurus.historicengland.org.uk/frequentuser.htm; as pdf files, or be downloaded as .csv files and incorporated into collections management systems. Contact Historic England's Data Standards Unit (DSU) for advice on integrating the thesauri into your database: rdsuinfo@historicengland.org.uk.
The thesauri and wordlists may be consulted online via the Historic England website: http://thesaurus.historicengland.org.uk/frequentuser.htm; as pdf files, or be downloaded as .csv files and incorporated into collections management systems. Contact Historic England's Data Standards Unit (DSU) for advice on integrating the thesauri into your database: rdsuinfo@historicengland.org.uk.
The FISH vocabularies consist of a number of structured terminologies for recording heritage assets such as monuments, buildings, maritime craft, historic aeroplanes, archaeological objects, components and landscapes. They also cover professional management and archaeological event terms (interventions), types of evidence and archaeological sciences (samples, ecofacts).
The vocabularies have been developed over many years, in collaboration with organisations such as Historic England (formerly English Heritage), ALGAO, Collections Trust and the National Trust. References are made to international ISO standards and other relevant terminologies where applicable.
The vocabularies have been developed over many years, in collaboration with organisations such as Historic England (formerly English Heritage), ALGAO, Collections Trust and the National Trust. References are made to international ISO standards and other relevant terminologies where applicable.
Key to thesaurus abbreviations
Use Preferred Term
UF Use For
SN Scope Note
CL Class name
BT Broad Term
NT Narrow Term
RT Related Term
Use Preferred Term
UF Use For
SN Scope Note
CL Class name
BT Broad Term
NT Narrow Term
RT Related Term