GlobalSeaRoutes
A Historical Geodatabase of European Global Navigation (1500-1900)
Guido Abbattista Project and historical analysis
Team:
Andrea Favretto Geodatabase and digital mapping
Giulia Iannuzzi Research and data entry
Erica Grossi
Filippo Chiocchetti
Department of Humanities – University of Trieste (Italy)
“The
temporal dimension of world connectedness,
or: how
long did it take to travel by sea
to
several overseas destinations and how did that change
over the
four centuries of the modern era?”
GSR - Global Sea Routes is a relational geospatial database aimed at the study of European navigation on a global scale in the modern and contemporary ages, in order to understand how the degree of world interconnectedness from the standpoint of maritime journey times evolved over four centuries (1500-1900).
Project launch: January 2019
Prototype development and fine-tuning: late 2020-1st trimester 2021
Web interface implementation: from second trimester 2021
GSR is
• a relational database with a spatial component (Geodatabase)
• a scientific cooperation between the University of Trieste and the Italian Navy Hydrographic Institute
GSR objectives:
• analysing and representing maritime connections fostered by European navigation
• understanding globalisation as a function of overseas expansion and the connected voyages, explorations and transportations from the late-15th century to the beginning of the 20th century
• collecting data from printed sea voyage accounts and manuscript ship logbooks
• building relational online geodatabase to be accessed on the Web
Software used for the prototype database: PostgreSQL, PgAdmin, PostGIS, QGIS
Online database and data visualization: Nodegoat
Screenshot of the circumnavigation of the Novara (1857-59) in Nodegoat
Ongoing developments
• debug of the database structure
• data entry
• web application
Web application
• enables final users to obtain comparative synoptic visualisations,
e.g. dynamic maps and comparative quantitative tabulations,
designing routes according to specific research interests and needs
• search options based on series of variables, such as:
- time periods
- geographical areas and relations
- vessels nationality and purpose of the voyages
- technical characteristics of vessels and propulsion systems
- navigation techniques, relating to nautical, astronomical and cartographical knowledge and skills
Screenshot of synoptic geo-referenced visualisation in GSR web interface
Presentations at international conferences:
- Guido Abbattista, Andrea Favretto, Marco Pierozzi, GlobalSeaRoutes, An Historical Geodatabase, at Time in Space: Geohistorical Applications, Methods and Theories in GISScience, Pisa, Italy. June 26-28, 2019. Conference programme at this link.
- Guido Abbattista, Andrea Favretto, Global Sea Routes: An Historical Geodatabase of Global Navigations in the Modern Age (a6th-19th Centuries), at Innovations in the Social Sciences and Humanities, Ton Duc Thang University, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, October 4-5, 2019. Proceedings: International Conference on Innovations in the Social Sciences and Humanities ISSH 2019: Conference Proceedings (Ho Chi Minh City: Ton Duc Thang University, 2019), pp. 61-66.
- Guido Abbattista, Andrea Favretto, Giulia Iannuzzi, GlobalSeaRoutes: A historical geodatabase and the temporal dimension of global navigations in the modern age (XVI-XIX centuries), at Colloque Distances (XVe-XVIIIe siècles), Centre Norbert Elias, avec le soutien de l’EHESS et de l’Université La Sapienza de Rome, 5-6 novembre 2020, Marseille.
- Spatial Humanities, NOVA-FCSH, Universidade Nova de Lisboa and Lancaster University Digital Humanities Hub, Digital Humanities hangouts, forthcoming December 10, 2020.
Funding and Awards (2018-2020)
- 1 twenty-eight months research grant a from Italian national project PRIN 2017 “Global Europeanness: toward a differentiated approach to global history 1450-1900”, dir. University of Trieste Research Unit Guido Abbattista;
- one-year research grant from the University of Eastern Piedmont-Unit of Prin 2017;
- one-year research grant in «Social Sciences and Humanities» from the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region;
- financial contribution of the Foreman-Casali Foundation;
- scientific patronage of the Italian Cartographic Association.
CONTACT:
Guido Abbattista: gabbattista@units.it, (+39) 040 558 7501
Update: May 2021
Background image: Hendrik Hondius, Nova totius Terrarum Orbis geographica ac hydrographica tabula, 1630, detail. Copy at the State Library of New South Wales via Wikimedia Commons.
