Subclass of:

• crmsci:S10 Material Substantial
• crm:E92 Spacetime Volume
• crm:E72 Legal Object

Superclass of:

• crm:E19 Physical Object
• crm:E24 Physical Man-Made Thing
• crm:E26 Physical Feature
• frbroo:F7 Object
• crmsci:S20 Physical Feature
• sdh:C49 Amount of Matter
• sdh:C9 Intentional Entity

Scope note:

This class comprises all persistent physical items with a relatively stable form, man-made or natural.

Depending on the existence of natural boundaries of such things, the CRM distinguishes the instances of E19 Physical Object from instances of E26 Physical Feature, such as holes, rivers, pieces of land etc. Most instances of E19 Physical Object can be moved (if not too heavy), whereas features are integral to the surrounding matter.

An instance of E18 Physical Thing occupies not only a particular geometric space, but in the course of its existence it also forms a trajectory through spacetime, which occupies a real, that is phenomenal, volume in spacetime. We include in the occupied space the space filled by the matter of the physical thing and all its inner spaces, such as the interior of a box. Physical things consisting of aggregations of physically unconnected objects, such as a set of chessmen, occupy a number of individually contiguous spacetime volumes equal to the number of unconnected objects that constitute the set.

We model E18 Physical Thing to be a subclass of E72 Legal Object and of E92 Spacetime volume. The latter is intended as a phenomenal spacetime volume as defined in CRMgeo (Doerr and Hiebel 2013). By virtue of this multiple inheritance we can discuss the physical extent of an E18 Physical Thing without representing each instance of it together with an instance of its associated spacetime volume. This model combines two quite different kinds of substance: an instance of E18 Physical Thing is matter while a spacetime volume is an aggregation of points in spacetime. However, the real spatiotemporal extent of an instance of E18 Physical Thing is regarded to be unique to it, due to all its details and fuzziness; its identity and existence depends uniquely on the identity of the instance of E18 Physical Thing. Therefore this multiple inheritance is unambiguous and effective and furthermore corresponds to the intuitions of natural language.

The CIDOC CRM is generally not concerned with amounts of matter in fluid or gaseous states.

Examples:

• the Cullinan Diamond (E19)
• the cave “Ideon Andron” in Crete (E26)
• the Mona Lisa (E22)

Context notes:

In a foundational perspective, this class is equivalent to the Physical Endurant class in DOLCE, cf. Stefano Borgo et al., ‘DOLCE: A Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering’, Applied Ontology, 2022, 1–25 <https://doi.org/10.3233/AO-210259>. It is therefore to be considered as a sibling and disjoint class of the crm:E28 Conceptual Object class, equivalent to Non-physical Endurant in DOLCE. 

In First Order Logic:

• E18(x) ⇒ S10(x)
• E18(x) ⇒ E92(x)
• E18(x) ⇒ E72(x)

Outgoing properties:

• crm:P44 has condition (is condition of) → crm:E3 Condition State
• crm:P45 consists of (is incorporated in) → crm:E57 Material
• crm:P46 is composed of (forms part of) → crm:E18 Physical Thing
• crm:P49 has former or current keeper (is former or current keeper of) → crm:E39 Actor
• crm:P50 has current keeper (is current keeper of) → crm:E39 Actor
• crm:P51 has former or current owner (is former or current owner of) → crm:E39 Actor
• crm:P52 has current owner (is current owner of) → crm:E39 Actor
• crm:P53 has former or current location (is former or current location of) → crm:E53 Place
• crm:P58 has section definition (defines section) → crm:E46 Section Definition
• crm:P59 has section (is located on or within) → crm:E53 Place
• crm:P128 carries (is carried by) → crm:E90 Symbolic Object
• crm:P156 occupies (is occupied by) → crm:E53 Place
• crm-sup:P17 is composed of part of type (is type of part of) → crm:E55 Type

Incoming properties:

• crm:E4 Period → crm:P8 took place on or within (witnessed)
• crm:E6 Destruction → crm:P13 destroyed (was destroyed by)
• crm:E8 Acquisition → crm:P24 transferred title of (changed ownership through)
• crm:E10 Transfer of Custody → crm:P30 transferred custody of (custody transferred through)
• crm:E14 Condition Assessment → crm:P34 concerned (was assessed by)
• crm:E18 Physical Thing → crm:P46 is composed of (forms part of)
• crm:E79 Part Addition → crm:P111 added (was added by)
• crm:E80 Part Removal → crm:P113 removed (was removed by)
• crm:E53 Place → crm:P157 is at rest relative to (provides reference space for)
• crmdig:D2 Digitization Process → crmdig:L1 digitized (was digitized by)
• crmsci:S17 Physical Genesis → crmsci:O17 generated (was generated by)
• crmsci:S18 Alteration → crmsci:O18 altered (was altered by)
• crmsci:S19 Encounter Event → crmsci:O19 has found object (was object found by)
• frbroo:F29 Recording Event → frbroo:R65 recorded aspects of (had aspects recorded through)
• sdh:C15 Epistemic Location of a Physical Thing → sdh:P17 is location of (has location)
• sdh:C19 Physical Thing Life → sdh:P26 is life of (has life)
• sdh:C22 Physical Component → sdh:P27 belongs to (has component)
• sdh:C22 Physical Component → sdh:P28 has part (is part of)
• sdh:C27 Belonging to a Physical Collection → sdh:P55 is about (belongs to)
• sdh:C41 Relative Location of a Physical Thing → sdh:P57 is inside or relative to (is location of)
• sdh:C44 Physical Thing Quality → sdh:P59 is quality of (has quality)
• sdh:C45 Physical Displacement → sdh:P60 moved from (was starting point of)
• sdh:C45 Physical Displacement → sdh:P61 moved to (was landing point of)
• sdh:C45 Physical Displacement → sdh:P62 displaces (is concerned by)
• sdh:C99 Epistemic Phase of a Physical Thing → sdh:P65 is phase of (has phase)