Photogrammetric techniques and surveying applied to historical map analysis

Abstract

Since historical maps are kept in digital format archives, they have not only the planimetric errors attributable to the cartographer but also those transferred during digitalising. This paper describes a methodology based on photogrammetric techniques and surveying applied to evaluate the accuracy of historical maps. The aim of the study is to take reference points on tracing paper from the original map and ground control points in order to use photogrammetric techniques to recover the metrics of the digitalised map. This ensures that the historical map in digital form has the same metric quality as the original map, since the errors arising from scanning are removed. This method is applied to 1775 map of the Real Sitio de Aranjuez (Spain), demonstrating that the application of photogrammetric techniques are useful tools for correction and analysis of historical maps. Consequently, photogrammetric techniques applied to the analysis of historical maps open up new perspectives for the study of the historical Cartography.

Keywords:

• Historical maps
• Ground control points
• Planimetric accuracy
• Rectification
• 2D scanning

Acknowledgements

This work was been financed with the Forma urbis of the Real Sitio de Aranjuez in historical cartography: graphical analysis, transcription and planimetric restitution research project, granted under the National Scientific Research, Development and Technological Innovation Plan research projects, financed by the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science. The authors are grateful to Prof. Dr Branko Bozic, University of Belgrade (Serbia), for providing information for this manuscript.