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. 16 shown for “Richard Franklin (Polk) Bell” — 46 records examined, 20 dropped by the rights gate.

Archives queried 2026-09-06 06:06 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.
Water cooler, by Richard Franklin (Polk) Bell

Water cooler

Richard Franklin (Polk) Bell · 1870–90

Public domainThe Met
Statesmen and Generals, Confederacy, by Unidentified Artist

Statesmen and Generals, Confederacy

Unidentified Artist · c. 1863

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Whalers, by Joseph Mallord William Turner

Whalers

Joseph Mallord William Turner · ca. 1845

Public domainThe Met
Persicaria hydropiperoides (Michx.) Small

Persicaria hydropiperoides (Michx.) Small

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Aug 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Antoine Laurent Lavoisier (1743–1794) and Marie Anne Lavoisier (Marie Anne Pierrette Paulze, 1758–1836), by Jacques Louis David

Antoine Laurent Lavoisier (1743–1794) and Marie Anne Lavoisier (Marie Anne Pierrette Paulze, 1758–1836)

Jacques Louis David · 1788

Public domainThe Met
Ranunculus sceleratus L.

Ranunculus sceleratus L.

Artist not stated in the record · 6 Apr 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
The Musicians, by Caravaggio (Michelangelo Merisi)

The Musicians

Caravaggio (Michelangelo Merisi) · 1597

Public domainThe Met
Mentha spicata L.

Mentha spicata L.

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Aug 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Schoenoplectus californicus (C.A. Mey.) Soják

Schoenoplectus californicus (C.A. Mey.) Soják

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Aug 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Potamogeton nodosus Poir.

Potamogeton nodosus Poir.

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Aug 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Eriocoma hymenoides (Roem. & Schult.) Rydb.

Eriocoma hymenoides (Roem. & Schult.) Rydb.

Artist not stated in the record · 18 Aug 1947

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Ludwigia stolonifera (Guill. & Perr.) P.H. Raven

Ludwigia stolonifera (Guill. & Perr.) P.H. Raven

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Aug 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Phacelia strictiflora (Engelm. & A. Gray) A. Gray

Phacelia strictiflora (Engelm. & A. Gray) A. Gray

Artist not stated in the record · 6 Apr 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Persicaria coccinea (Muhl. ex Willd.) Greene

Persicaria coccinea (Muhl. ex Willd.) Greene

Artist not stated in the record · 19 Aug 1931

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Epilobium brachycarpum C. Presl

Epilobium brachycarpum C. Presl

Artist not stated in the record · Sep 1983

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Solidago canadensis var. salebrosa (Piper) M.E. Jones

Solidago canadensis var. salebrosa (Piper) M.E. Jones

Artist not stated in the record · 11 Aug 1980

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. 6 matched · 6 examined · 2 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where isPublicDomain === true and a file URL was published.4 shown
  • Smithsonian Open Access API (api.si.edu)Rights field: content.descriptiveNonRepeating.metadata_usage.access. 102663 matched · 40 examined · 18 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 06:06 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.