Reference

HIS Registries

The Global.Church knowledge graph uses standardized code systems from hisregistries.org — the Harvest Information System maintained by the missions data community. These registries provide shared identifiers that let different organizations refer to the same people groups, languages, religions, and geographies unambiguously.

All four HIS registries are loaded into the knowledge graph as SKOS concept schemes in the named graph <https://data.global.church/his-registries/>, totaling approximately 172,000 triples.

ROP — Registry of Peoples

The Registry of Peoples assigns a ROP3 code — a 6-digit perpetual identifier — to each people group worldwide. ROP3 is the primary key for people groups across the missions data ecosystem, used by Joshua Project, IMB, and Global.Church alike.

Detail	Value
URI pattern	https://data.global.church/his/rop3/{code}
Example	https://data.global.church/his/rop3/110532
Ontology link	gc:hasPeopleClassification connects a PeopleGroup to its ROP3 concept

ROP3 codes are perpetual — once assigned to a people group, the code never changes, even if the group's name or classification is updated. This makes them reliable join keys across datasets.

ROG — Registry of Geography

Country and region codes organized in a 3-level hierarchy: Region, Subregion, and Country.

Detail	Value
URI pattern	https://data.global.church/his/rog/{code}
Country example	https://data.global.church/his/rog/IN (India)
Region example	https://data.global.church/his/rog/region-asia
Subregion example	https://data.global.church/his/rog/subregion-southern-asia
Ontology link	gc:hasGeographyClassification connects entities to ROG concepts
Concept count	269 (5 regions + 22 subregions + 242 countries)

ROL — Registry of Languages

Language codes based on ISO 639-3, covering 7,083 languages.

Detail	Value
URI pattern	https://data.global.church/his/rol/{iso639-3}
Example	https://data.global.church/his/rol/hin (Hindi)
Ontology links	gc:hasLanguageClassification, gc:resourceLanguage, gc:inLanguage
Concept count	7,083

ROR — Registry of Religions

Religion classification codes organized in a 2-level hierarchy.

Detail	Value
URI pattern	https://data.global.church/his/ror/{code}
Example	https://data.global.church/his/ror/M (Islam)
Other examples	ror:BTH (Buddhism - Theravada), ror:CRC (Christianity - Roman Catholic)
Ontology link	gc:hasReligionClassification connects entities to ROR concepts
Concept count	46

How HIS Codes Connect to the Ontology

Each HIS registry is linked to the knowledge graph through a dedicated classification property:

Registry	Property	Domain	Range
ROP	gc:hasPeopleClassification	PeopleGroup	ROP3 SKOS Concept
ROG	gc:hasGeographyClassification	various	ROG SKOS Concept
ROL	gc:hasLanguageClassification	PeopleGroup	ROL SKOS Concept
ROR	gc:hasReligionClassification	PeopleGroup	ROR SKOS Concept

These properties point to SKOS concepts, so you can use standard SKOS relationships (skos:broader, skos:narrower, skos:notation) to navigate the hierarchy and access raw codes.

Example: Find all people groups classified under Islam

Code
 
PREFIX gc: <https://ontology.global.church/core#>
PREFIX ror: <https://data.global.church/his/ror/>

SELECT ?pg ?name WHERE {
  ?pg a gc:PeopleGroup ;
      gc:name ?name ;
      gc:hasReligionClassification ror:M .
}
LIMIT 10

Accessing raw codes

Each SKOS concept carries its raw code as a skos:notation value:

Code
 
PREFIX skos: <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#>

SELECT ?concept ?label ?code WHERE {
  ?concept a skos:Concept ;
           skos:prefLabel ?label ;
           skos:notation ?code ;
           skos:inScheme <https://data.global.church/his/rog/scheme> .
}
LIMIT 10

Sync Cadence

HIS registry data is synced quarterly from hisregistries.org. The bridge process clears and reloads the <https://data.global.church/his-registries/> named graph each cycle.