Laying a puzzle in 4D: Mapping administrative geography with a time dimension

Activity: Talk or presentation typesLecture and oral contribution

Description

Præsentation med hovedvægt på DigDag-projektet og digitaliseringen af Danmarks Stednavne.

When absolutist monarchy was established in Denmark in 1660, there was a thorough reform of the local administrative structure as well as the central administration. Medieval fiefs were replaced by more geographically coherent administrative divisions, the "amts", and in general the development up until recent times is characterised by a movement towards larger and more coherent administrative units, as shown by the DigDag project (Digital atlas of the Danish historical-administrative geography). Though the level of complexity has continuously been reduced, latest with a big reform in 2007, the nationwide jigsaw puzzle of administrative divisions is still highly complex, even in a small country such as Denmark. And from a research perspective the constant changes in themselves present a special problem: Archival registers often use geographical/administrative entrances, and as the administrative geography changes, our picture of the past is obscured or confused. Mapping the huge amount of changes over the past 350 years, the DigDag project has established a uniform research infrastructure: a digital cartographical skeleton for thematic mapping and analysis. The first flesh to be added to the skeleton is a topographically coded dictionary of Danish place-names containing historical name variants, analysis and interpretations of more than 150,000 toponyms.
Period10 May 2013
Event titleEUROGEO Conference 2013: Geography: linking tradition and future
Event typeConference
LocationBrugge, BelgiumShow on map