Canonical identity
Each publishable subject has one stable Topic ID, canonical title, public display title, slug, page treatment, parent relationship, and set of aliases. An alias can help search or redirect to a canonical record; it never creates a second topic.
Parent relationships describe hierarchy. Cross-links describe reviewed relationships. A topic may appear in several curated views without being duplicated.
Page treatments
Normal topics, parent hubs, claim reviews, source texts, profiles, and connection records share one research shell but use different treatments. Claim Reviews remain analytical rather than receiving a single dramatic true-or-false stamp. Source Text pages distinguish composition, witnesses, editions, translation, influence, and later claim use.
Evidence and interpretation
Evidence records separate what an observation supports from what it does not establish. Assessment labels are written in words and never communicated by color alone.
The interface keeps archaeological and scientific evidence, historical sources, traditions, active debates, modern interpretations, unsupported claims, and unknowns visibly distinct. A relationship never transfers the evidence status of one topic to another.
Claims
Compound claims are divided into inspectable subclaims where the source data supports it. A fair account records the claim's strongest form, origin, cited sources, supporting and conflicting evidence, missing evidence, alternatives, current assessment, cultural influence, and what would change confidence.
Claim genealogy traces documented source, author, publication, media, and internet transformations as nodes and edges. Popularity and creator influence are historical data, not scientific or archaeological evidence.
Reviewed connections
A public connection is an eligible reviewed relationship record between public canonical endpoints. It retains relationship type, subtype, direction, strength, basis, caution, evidence boundary, sources, and review metadata when recorded.
The graph may visually bundle parallel relationship records to stay readable, but bundling never changes their authority or meaning. Evidence route finding traverses eligible reviewed records only. Canonical hierarchy remains available as taxonomy and is not manufactured into a reviewed evidence route.
Connection strengths
Strong, moderate, weak, thematic-only, and disputed are navigational summaries of reviewed records. They do not grade the general importance of a topic. Thematic-only relationships can support comparison while explicitly not demonstrating contact, transmission, ancestry, or causation.
Knowledge graphs, not geographic maps
Map, Atlas Map, Topic Map, Local Map, Global Map, Path Map, Personal Map, Network Map, and Connection Map all mean node-and-connection knowledge graphs. Node distance and screen position are interface layout decisions, not evidence.
Country, region, archaeological location, civilization region, and site-network text can be searched, filtered, and compared only where canonical records actually provide that metadata. Missing geographic metadata remains visibly unrecorded rather than being inferred. The site does not turn metadata into GIS, world-map, globe, pin, coastline, terrain, or satellite navigation.
Chronology
Chronology records preserve their date basis: geological, archaeological, biological, historical, textual, traditional, claimed, discovery, modern interpretation, or publication. Approximate dates and ranges remain approximate. Derived numeric positions help ordering but never replace visible uncertainty.
Contemporaneity is not a connection. When two subjects overlap in time, the interface still distinguishes same broad period, same region, potential network, no known contact, and disputed relationships where the structured data allows.
Sources and rights
Source records identify role, citation, access, verification, rights, limitations, and correction or retraction state. Ancient Inquiry explains why a source is used and what it does not establish where that information is recorded.
A source page is a bibliographic and research-use record, not a reproduced paper. Citation and links do not imply that full text was acquired or reviewed. No paper, image, manuscript, or documentary asset is reproduced without record-specific rights clearance.
Guided paths and comparisons
Paths reuse canonical topics. Every transition identifies a reviewed relationship when one exists. A curated sequence without a matching reviewed edge is labeled as a sequence transition, not added to the public graph.
Compare and Connection Test use exact structured overlap and reviewed records. Missing evidence is reported as missing; thematic resemblance is not upgraded to demonstrated transmission.
Personal research
Anonymous saves, path progress, and personal connection notes remain in the visitor's browser during this static phase. Personal edges are always marked personal and unreviewed and cannot enter the public graph. The interface does not simulate sign-in or cloud persistence.
Corrections, retractions, and updates
Material public corrections identify what changed, why, the supporting source, assessment impact, and affected relationships when a public correction record exists. Retractions and corrections in source metadata remain visible and can trigger review of dependent topics and connections.
Technical readiness, public eligibility, and owner release are separate states. Local build readiness is not public deployment authorization.
Living traditions and respectful representation
Traditions are represented as traditions rather than caricatured, silently historicized, or treated as lesser evidence by visual style. A tradition's account, historical attestation, material evidence, modern interpretation, and contested claims remain distinguishable.
What Ancient Inquiry does not claim
A connection is not proof. Chronological overlap is not contact. Geographic proximity is not transmission. Motif resemblance is not shared origin. A real site does not validate a speculative theory connected to it. A popular author does not become an evidence source through influence alone.
When no reviewed route exists, saying so is a result rather than a failure.