LOCATION
Reconstructing Historical Space
Google Maps can tell you a great many things, but it cannot show you the boundaries of Russian provinces as they were in the early 19th century. It can tell you where Moscow is located now, but it cannot show you the edges of Moscow's urban sprawl as it was in 1870. It can tell you the location and precise elevation of the highest mountain in Crimea (Chatyr Dag), but it cannot provide the location of the palace of the Girey khans just outside Bahçesaray. (The palace was a casualty of Russian annexation and has not been shown on maps since 1792.)
There are limits, in other words, to what modern maps can do to help us understand the geographical spaces in which history unfolded. Rather than see this as a constraint, I see it as an opportunity. It is an opportunity to embrace the rich cartographic record of the past, recalibrate our sense of what constitutes "accuracy," and mine an all-too-often overlooked historical source.
That sounds lovely, but what does it mean in practice? [georeferencing]
Assigning Coordinates (or, the art of oversimplifying)
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The Attestation Principle
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