Abstract

Spatial humanists and others have long recognized the enormous integrative potential of using places as common points of reference for heterogeneous information. To realize that potential, collections of named places must be abundant, diverse, collectively assembled, and historically deep. In 2017, the World Historical Gazetteer project (WHG; whgazetteer.org) based at the University of Pittsburgh undertook to build a freely available web platform that would facilitate the collaborative development of such a collection, and to provide multiple ways of accessing its continuously growing results. Version 1 of the WHG platform launched in 2019, and the release of Version 3 is due in mid-2024.

The WHG is a Linked Data project, and like all attempts at integrating data from multiple sources faces semantic challenges in establishing shared meanings for terms. The schema for its principal data store is based on the Linked Places model and data format (LPF) developed expressly for the platform, and offered as a potential standard for gazetteer data interconnection. LPF extends the widely adopted GeoJSON format to enable the temporal scoping of entire features, and several specific feature properties: names, geometries, types, and relations. It is also valid JSON-LD, a syntax of RDF. In some ways, embedding temporality in place records can be considered "making (good) trouble for cartographers."

In this presentation I will discuss how we are addressing several difficult cases, with mixed results -- concerning for example place types generally, and the terms "close match," and "certainty." 

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Materials

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References

Berman, M. L., Mostern, R., & Southall, H. (Eds.). (2016). Placing names: Enriching and integrating gazetteers. Indiana University Press.

Goodchild, M., & Hill, L. L. (2006). Digital Gazetteer & Practice Workshop, Summary Report. Retrieved April 12, 2024, from https://escholarship.org/content/qt6fr9g5nv/qt6fr9g5nv.pdf

Grossner, K., Keßler, C. and Janowicz, K. (2016). Place, Period, and Setting for Linked Data Gazetteers. In R. Mostern, H. Southall, and M.L. Berman (Eds.). Placing Names:  Enriching and Integrating Gazetteers. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Grossner, K., Klyne, G., Light, R., & Simon, R. (2017). Linked places format. Retrieved April 12, 2024, from https://github.com/LinkedPasts/linked-places-format

Mostern, R., & Johnson, I. (2008). From named place to naming event: creating gazetteers for history. International Journal of Geographical Information Science, 22(10), 1091-1108.

Worboys, M., & Hornsby, K. (2004, October). From objects to events: GEM, the geospatial event model. In International conference on geographic information science (pp. 327-343). Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer Berlin Heidelberg. 

World Historical Gazetteer. (n.d.). Retrieved April 12, 2024, fromhttps://whgazetteer.org