...somewhere in the misty lands north of the Baltic, during the fabled Minion Period (ca. 3000-2000 BCE), a fiery rock fell from the heavens. When it struck the ground, the earth shook, carving a glittering crater that would later become the heart of a curious civilisation. The locals called it simply the Impact — and around it, life began to hum with yellow energy.
Archaeologists exploring the area centuries later uncovered the remains of Ikea Land, where a giant Allen key, forged in unknown alloys, lay half-buried in the moss. They also found traces of Minions, the small, industrious beings said to have inhabited these northern forests, working side by side with gentle giant kangaroos — perhaps as builders, perhaps as friends. Scattered among the ruins were strange spherical artefacts, which early scholars mistook for celestial stones but were, in truth, Kötbullar: petrified excrements of the ancient kangaroos.
Ancient tracks and circular walls hinted at early settlements — a network of roads and dwellings spread across the landscape like veins of memory. Around them roamed reindeer and elk, drawn to the mineral-rich soils of the crater, while shimmering auroras danced above, preserving the legend of a world where data and dreams once met.
And so, FAIRyland was born — not from stone or soil, but from the imagination of those who believe that even mythical places can teach us how to make knowledge Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable.
- https://www.openstreetmap.org/node/1716194356
- https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felsritzungen_von_Norrfors
- https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Petroglyphs_in_Norrfors,_V%C3%A4sterbotten?uselang=de
- https://www.academia.edu/download/40771195/download.pdf#page=179 pp. 167 ff.
data/fairyland.geojson- Vector features (craters, streets, Kötbullar, Minions, kangaroos)data/fairyland.gpkg- QGIS GeoPackage with styled layers- Coordinates: ~20.026°E, 63.880°N (Norrforsstigen, Sweden)
lod/fairyland.ttl- RDF dataset in Turtle format (CIDOC-CRM, GeoSPARQL, SUNI ontology)lod/transform_rdf.py- Python script for RDF transformation and enrichment- SPARQL endpoint: GitHub Pages Documentation
queries/fairyland_dashboard.py- SPARQL queries + matplotlib dashboard visualizationqueries/fairyland_map.py- Spatial visualization with GeoPandas + OpenStreetMap basemap- Requirements:
rdflib,pandas,matplotlib,geopandas,contextily
queries/fairyland_dashboard.ipynb- Interactive SPARQL query tutorialqueries/fairyland_map.ipynb- Geospatial analysis workflow- 7 example queries: feature inventory, stratigraphy, preservation analysis, spatial distribution
queries/out/- Generated visualizations (dashboards, maps, query documentation)- High-resolution images (300 DPI) ready for publications
from rdflib import Graph
g = Graph()
g.parse("lod/fairyland.ttl", format="turtle")
# Simple SPARQL query
query = """
PREFIX fairyland: <https://github.com/Research-Squirrel-Engineers/FAIRyland/>
SELECT ?type (COUNT(?feature) AS ?count)
WHERE { ?feature a ?type }
GROUP BY ?type
"""
for row in g.query(query):
print(f"{row.type}: {row.count}")cd queries
python fairyland_dashboard.py # Creates 4-panel dashboard
python fairyland_map.py # Creates spatial mapjupyter notebook fairyland_dashboard.ipynb🎓 Teaching & Learning:
- Introduction to RDF/Turtle and SPARQL queries
- Hands-on practice with geospatial Linked Open Data
- Research Software Engineering workflows (Python + rdflib + GeoPandas)
- FAIR data principles in action
🔬 Research:
- Template for LODifying archaeological geodata
- Example of QGIS → RDF → SPARQL pipeline
- Integration with Wikidata and other LOD resources
🛠️ Technical Demo:
- SPARQLing Unicorn QGIS Plugin workflow
- WKT geometry handling in RDF
- Contextily basemap integration
- Logarithmic scales for archaeological datasets
If you use FAIRyland in your research or teaching, please cite:
@misc{fairyland2025,
author = {Thiery, Florian and Danthine, Thibault and Alpino, Luna Watkins},
title = {FAIRyland: A playful dataset for teaching Linked Open Data in archaeology},
year = {2026},
publisher = {GitHub},
url = {https://github.com/Research-Squirrel-Engineers/FAIRyland},
doi = {10.5281/zenodo.18901447}
}- Code & Scripts: MIT License
- Data & Documentation: CC BY 4.0
Research Squirrel Engineers
- Florian Thiery
- Brigit Danthine
- Nadine Alpino
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In FAIRyland, even fictional archaeology can teach real research methods. 🦄✨