The Chymical Encyclopedia, Database, and Repository Project (CEDR) is creating an integrated resource for information about the human discovery and exploration of mineral and organic materials drawing upon extensive recipe literatures from several cultures, books, and dictionaries written before the nineteenth century. The project itself has a tripartite organization: a series of digitized sources, books and manuscripts dating from late antiquity to the turn of the 19th century; a database of chymical terms, referring to materials, apparatus, and processes; and an edited encyclopedia with definitive articles including videos of replications making the earlier sources intelligible.