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The Map Collection

The Map Collection at the Saxon State and University Library Dresden (SLUB) is one of the oldest and most significant of its kind in Germany. As early as 1556, Prince Augustus, Elector of Saxony (1528 – 1586), collected not only books, but also maps and drawings, which are listed in the first catalogue from the year 1574. Today, the collection contains ca. 177,000 maps and views, of which ca. 19,000 have been digitalized and made available for users worldwide in the Map Forum.

The Map Collection consists of:

  • 19,767 maps published up to and including 1800
  • 41,220 maps from the years 1801 – 1945
  • 51,347 maps published since 1945
  • 29,224 topographical maps and other views
  • 2,035 historical maps (reproductions)

Additionally, the collection contains:

  • 2,331 atlases
  • 32,936 folio maps
  • 207 maps and atlases on CD,

which previously belonged to the cartographic collection of the Institute for Cartography at the TU Dresden.

This extensive collection of maps, views and atlases makes it possible to address a multitude of questions concerning topics such as historical preservation, landscape architecture, environmental protection, transportation, history of architecture, civil and regional planning and development, as well as the history of castles, palaces, and fortresses

As a further step, since April 2013 the SLUB started, in cooperation with the Professorship of Geodesy and Geoinformatics from the University of Rostock, to connect the digitised map reservoir to the fast growing world of spatial information. Under the label Virtuelles Kartenforum 2.0 (Virtual Map Forum 2.0) the project partner develop infrastructure for the integration, exploration and visualization of historic maps in the context of spatiotemporal issues. Therefore it is necessary, to develop tools which help the user to georeference historic map, to publish them in a standard based spatial data infrastructure (SDI) and to easily visualize them in different manners and arrangements. First results of the project are expected for the beginning of 2014.