The following elements emerged as the ones required in a minimum set. They were dubbed the Dublin Metadata Element List(DMEL).
subject: words or phrases indicative of the information content. If the value comes from a controlled vocabulary, the SCHEME sub-element is used to indicate the particular vocabulary.
title: the title, name or short description of the object.
author: the name of the creator of the content: order of names according to the culture.
otherAgent: the name of any other entity responsible for the content of the object: the role sub-element describes the responsibility.
publisher: the name of the entity responsible for making the object available.
date: the date of publication.
identifier: a character string or a number used to distinguish this object from other objects: a SCHEME sub-element identifies the authority.
object-type: conceptual description of object.
form: physical, logical, or encoding characteristics.
relation: important known relationship to other objects; the TYPE sub-element describes the nature of the relationship; the SCHEME sub-element identifies the notation used to identify the related object(s).
language: natural language of the content of the object; the SCHEME element identifies the controlled vocabulary edition: a free-text identification of the version.
source: object from which derived; contains a nested object description.
coverage: characterizes parameters to specify the audience, or the time or space (instance or span).