POINT-IN-TIME QUERY METHOD AND SYSTEM

Embodiments of the present invention include storing a plurality of subtrees in a database, the plurality of subtrees representing one or more structured documents. At least one subtree has a birth timestamp indicating a time at which the at least one subtree was created. If a subtree has been obsoleted, the subtree has a death timestamp indicating a time at which the subtree was obsoleted. Embodiments further include receiving a database query comprising a query string and a query timestamp, the query timestamp indicating a historical time for which the query is to apply, and determining an intermediate result list of subtrees. The intermediate result list is filtered to generate a final result list responsive to the database query, the filtering comprising removing subtrees that do not have a birth timestamp, have a birth timestamp later than the query timestamp, or have a death timestamp earlier than the query timestamp.