OpenGlyph — Catalogue of the American Public DomainJurisdiction: United StatesRev. 2026.08
Images / art

Two archives, queried live.

Every record below comes from The Met or Smithsonian Open Access and was filtered on that archive’s own rights field before it reached this page. 13 shown for “Dona Juana Becerra, possibly” — 41 records examined, 28 dropped by the rights gate.

Archives queried 2026-09-06 06:33 UTC · fetched live for this request

Object
Public domainThe Met’s isPublicDomain field is true for this object.
CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian’s metadata_usage.access reads CC0 — a waiver, not an expired term.
Not shownAnything failing its archive’s rights field is dropped server-side and never appears here.
Margaret of Austria, by Jean Hey (called Master of Moulins)

Margaret of Austria

Jean Hey (called Master of Moulins) · ca. 1490

Public domainThe Met
Dona Juana Becerra, possibly

Dona Juana Becerra, possibly

Artist not stated in the record · ca. 1825-1850

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Catopsis nitida (Hook.) Griseb.

Catopsis nitida (Hook.) Griseb.

Artist not stated in the record · 25 Sep 1988

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Vandenboschia radicans (Sw.) Copel.

Vandenboschia radicans (Sw.) Copel.

Artist not stated in the record · 15 Jul 1965

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Paspalum orbiculatum Poir. in Lam.

Paspalum orbiculatum Poir. in Lam.

Artist not stated in the record · Transcribed d/m/y: /2/41

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Begonia pastoensis A. DC.

Begonia pastoensis A. DC.

Artist not stated in the record · 15 Dec 1944

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Begonia pastoensis A. DC.

Begonia pastoensis A. DC.

Artist not stated in the record · 15 Dec 1944

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Combretum fruticosum (Loefl.) Stuntz

Combretum fruticosum (Loefl.) Stuntz

Artist not stated in the record · Feb 1841

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Setaria geminata (Forssk.) Veldkamp

Setaria geminata (Forssk.) Veldkamp

Artist not stated in the record · May 1841

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Rhamphidium macrostegium (Sull.) Mitt.

Rhamphidium macrostegium (Sull.) Mitt.

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Jan 1940

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Hyophila involuta (Hook.) A. Jaeger

Hyophila involuta (Hook.) A. Jaeger

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Jan 1940

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Rhamphidium macrostegium (Sull.) Mitt.

Rhamphidium macrostegium (Sull.) Mitt.

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Jan 1940

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Fissidens polypodioides Hedw.

Fissidens polypodioides Hedw.

Artist not stated in the record · 18 Jan 1940

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
What was queried

Where these records came from.

Two archives are wired, and only two. Each one is filtered on its own rights field — never on a title match, and never on the presence of an image file.

  • The Met Collection API (Open Access)Rights field: isPublicDomain. 1 matched · 1 examined · 0 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where isPublicDomain === true and a file URL was published.1 shown
  • Smithsonian Open Access API (api.si.edu)Rights field: content.descriptiveNonRepeating.metadata_usage.access. 49708 matched · 40 examined · 28 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where metadata_usage.access === "CC0" and an image resource was published.12 shown

These figures describe the pass run at 2026-09-06 06:33 UTC, during this request. A completed pass is kept for 24 hours and replayed for an identical search, which is what keeps repeated queries inside Smithsonian’s 30-requests-per-hour allowance. A pass in which either archive failed to answer is never kept — an outage must not be replayed as though it were a finding about the catalogue.

Wikimedia Commons and the Library of Congress are deliberately not wired. Wikimedia was confirmed, on a live query, to return CC-BY material inside the same result set as genuine public domain works, and filtering it safely has not been designed yet. loc.gov was blocked by bot detection during the source evaluation, so its rights vocabulary has never been observed — and nothing here is built on a field nobody has read.

An image file is a rights claim. It never travels without its field.