Book excerpt: During the last thirty years profound developments in expe- rimental techniques to measure high temperature and pressu- res and thermodynamic properties of minerals have occurred. This technical development has been matched by an increased sophistication in applying theoretical methods to obtain new data or improve the quality of existing data. Using these newtechniques, Assessed Thermodynamic Data on Oxides and Silicates represents the successful attempt of the authors to develop an internally systematized data base which satis- fies the constraints of calorimetric measurements, phase equilibrium data, measured thermophysical properties of a phase, and heat capacities and entropies estimated from lat- tice vibrational models.