New Book of Interest
February 12, 2021 in Interest, Publication
February 12, 2021 in Interest, Publication
December 1, 2020 in Interest, Publication
June 16, 2020 in E-resource, Interest, Publication
In the TIB series, #13 Bithynien und Hellespont by Klaus Belke was published in April. Its two substantial volumes are accompanied not only by a map at the regular scale for the series (1:800,000), but also by several others, including the Bosporos at 1:100,000. See link here for free online access.
For the latest report about digitizing TIB and progress on extending its coverage, visit here.
March 12, 2020 in Publication
February 13, 2020 in Interest, Publication
January 7, 2020 in Interest, Publication
August 7, 2019 in Interest, Publication
Just published by Oxford University Press. Riggsby examines five technologies including mapping (the others are lists, tables, weights and measures, artistic perspective).
See further: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/mosaics-of-knowledge-9780190632502?cc=us&lang=en&
Just published by De Gruyter, the outcome of a 2017 conference in Zurich organized by Anne Kolb.
See further: https://www.degruyter.com/view/product/509939
February 12, 2019 in Conference, Presentation, Publication
SCS Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA, January 4, 2019
Invited Sesquicentennial Panel
Mapping the Classical World Since 1869: Past and Future Directions
Organizer & chair: Richard Talbert, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
1 Greek and Roman Mapping Georgia Irby, College of William and Mary, VA
2 Modern Mapping Before Digitization Richard Talbert
Panel Overview
A 1980 APA/SCS committee report (Research Tools for the Classics) was correct on both counts to declare cartography at that date “an area of extremely great importance, where the state of our tools is utterly disastrous.” The panel briefly discusses the disappointing lack of progress made during the previous past century, and advances reasons for its limitations (Papers #1, 2). The main focus of the five papers, however, is on the transformation successfully achieved since around 1980, and still ongoing.
Three shifts may be identified as the keys to this transformation. First, as Paper #1 explains, the more open, culturally sensitive approach to pre-modern cartography generated by the geographers Brian Harley and David Woodward has unlocked a fruitful, far-reaching re-appraisal of the purpose and value of ancient maps which is by no means yet exhausted. Second, Paper #2 recalls the decisive insistence by the 1980 APA committee that, in view of the inadequacy of existing efforts worldwide to produce a major classical atlas or equivalent, the APA itself should take the lead in sponsoring one. After initial failure, a decade-long international collaborative project to create such a reference work was successfully launched and funded, resulting in the publication of the Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World by Princeton University Press in 2000. Third, the fortuitous transition from film-based mapmaking to digital during the 1990s made it practical to convert the Atlas and its data – with the use of digital technology – into a far more flexible and versatile resource than previously envisaged.
This technology, which has itself continued to develop, has given cartography a scope, complexity and richness unimagined in 1980. Paper #3 in broad terms appreciates and illustrates this capacity for the advancement of the ancient field. Paper #4 does likewise, but with specific reference to the expanding range of the Ancient World Mapping Center, the first institution of its type to be established (in 2000) for promoting cartography, geographic information science and historical cartography in the ancient field. The Center was an unforeseen, visionary outgrowth of the project to create the Barrington Atlas, one which has amply fulfilled its promise. Paper #5 offers an outstanding instance of how state-of-the-art digital technology can now bring to the study of a Roman monument a depth of insight unattainable until recently. Moreover, this exciting new work on the Forma Urbis Romae fragments and the surviving wall to which they were once attached is a model of collaboration between Rome’s Musei Capitolini and the Ancient World Mapping Center.
The coherent, logical sequence of the panel’s five papers demonstrates to SCS not only that cartography today remains more than ever of extremely great importance to the ancient field, but also that the state of tools for it has now changed from disastrous to extraordinary, with further creative developments to be confidently anticipated.
N.B. Because of more or less certain difficulties in obtaining permissions, the images shown at the panel to accompany each paper are not included here.
December 20, 2018 in Publication
The Center is pleased to announce that the latest entry in the Maps for Texts series, Dionysius of Byzantium, Anaplous of the Bosporus, is now available. The Center’s single, static map is at a scale of 1:100,000. The place names follow the forms as in the text of Rudolf Güngerich (1927, reprinted 1958). Ancient cultural and geographic data follows data derived from Barrington Atlas Map 53 compiled by C. Foss and its Directory. For a link to download the map please email awmc@unc.edu.
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