Historical Cartographic Information for Cultural Heritage Applications in a Semantic Framework

Abstract

Historical maps are a valuable tool in historical research, since they store spatial information reflecting geographic literacy, ideology, and geopolitical concerns at the time of their creation, often not available in other sources. Historical maps are also a fundamental element of cultural heritage and digital humanities applications since they provide, as base maps, the picture of historical space on which other resources are projected and the names of the historical places, which permits the organization and geocoding of various information. Historical maps should be managed following a semantic approach that considers data models and standards from the different disciplines of cultural heritage and Digital humanities. In this spirit, this research extends previous efforts to implement an application profile for documenting historical maps based on the CIDOC model and to develop an annotated database of historical maps. This profile handles the concepts that define a map and the map’s relationships with cultural objects, persons, events, and processes. For data creation and visualization, a Web application was developed using Arches, an open software platform for cultural heritage management that supports both CIDOC and geographical information standards.