Transfer HisGIS to KNAW Humanities Cluster

On 21 October, the Fryske Akademy and the KNAW Humanities Cluster signed a cooperation agreement to ratify the embedding of the Historical Geographical Information System (HisGIS) in the national infrastructure. The signatures were made by Leo Lucassen (director International Institute of Social History, on behalf of the KNAW Humanities Cluster) and Nelleke IJssennagger-van der Pluijm (managing-director Fryske Akademy).

With the transfer of the data, software and code from HisGIS to the KNAW Humanities Cluster, steps can now be taken to further roll out the infrastructure in the Netherlands to be included in CLARIAH, the national research infrastructure for the humanities in the Netherlands.

About HisGIS

HisGIS was started more than 20 years ago at the Fryske Akademy as a programme to digitise, for the Frisian or Friesland-related regions in the Northern Netherlands, the oldest cadastre (1812-1832) by plot for spatial placement of various historical and archaeological and developments.

The aim of the HisGIS project is to create an infrastructure for analysing and presenting historical geodata for the Netherlands, based on the smallest geographical unit: the plot. From the outset, HisGIS was intended as a capstone for linking and displaying spatial datasets for numerous themes and eras, from medieval gallows and leasehold development to social segregation and mobility in nineteenth-century inner cities.

Cadastre 1832

The basis of HisGIS is the 1832 Cadastre, which covers the whole of the Netherlands. The design of HisGIS stems from a project set up in 1988 at the Fryske Akademy by Hans Mol and Paul Noomen: the Kadastrale en Pre-kadastrale Atlas van Friesland. This was an analogue publication, published in 17 volumes between 1988 and 2003.

In 1998, work began on digitising the Frisian sections of the 1832 Kadaster, a project completed in 2005. Following this, numerous new maps and information layers were added. The methodology and design of the digital Frisian HisGIS was progressive and based on the technical possibilities of the time. During the Delta Plan project (2016-2019), which aimed to understand the revision of the 1887 Cadastre, a start was made to first geo-reference the 1832 map. This would then serve as the basis for the 1887 Cadastre. The whole process of improvements eventually led to the map being ready in early 2020.

Other provinces

After the province of Friesland was successfully digitised, the other Dutch provinces were approached by the Fryske Akademy's HisGIS project team. The province of Groningen was the first to be put into the HisGIS system in 2010, followed by the other provinces: Utrecht (2011), Overijssel (2012), Noord-Holland (2013), Drenthe (2016), Noord-Brabant (2017), Gelderland (2018), Limburg (2019), Zeeland (2020), Zuid-Holland (2020).

Due to the growing interest in Spatial Humanities, the success and importance of HisGIS was noticed by the KNAW, which proposed a collaboration with the Fryske Akademy to host the HisGIS Netherlands infrastructure. As the Dutch HisGIS had grown outside the research area of the Fryske Akademy, this request was welcomed.  

Future

The Fryske Akademy will now focus on building a Geoportal Fryslan and make steps in the management and further development of the enrichment layers related to the Frysian case. The national geo-portal contains a lot of scientifically valuable knowledge thanks to HisGIS; for the Fryske Akademy, it is now important to ensure the sustainability of the existing HisGIS research products and thus keep these data open for future research through a new Geoportal.