Juskiewicz et al / Journal of Maps
Folklore map of the historic regions of Pomerania and Mecklenburg
Witches, werewolves, demons, dragons, house spirits, giants and elves and other demonic monsters. There is no shortage of mythological figures in central European folklore, now mapped by Polish scientists.
Researchers from the Polish Academy of Sciences created a cartometric map to indicate the locations, extracted from ethnographic and folklore sources, linked to demonic and mythological creatures.
The map is part of a recently published Journal of Mapswhich shows the historical regions of Pomerania and Mecklenburg on a scale of 1:720,000.
The study sought to combine the artistic and symbolic characteristics of Renaissance maps with modern GIS tools, identifying the origins of stories about werewolves, demons, dragons, domestic spiritsgiants and elves, as recorded by German and Polish folklorists.
A total of 1200 supernatural stories written by folklorists from the 19th and early 20th centuries were mapped in 600 locations, each linked to specific characteristics of the landscape, says .
“We were mainly interested in local stories about strange events associated with a specific place,” he explains Robert Piotrowskiethnologist at the Institute of Geography and Spatial Organization of the Polish Academy of Sciences.
“For example, religious legends in which it was imagined that this rock had been thrown by a giant, that the witches met on this mountain in particular, that the devil had built a dam on the lake or that the will-o’-the-wisp had appeared in this swamp”, explains the researcher.
The study authors considered that the aesthetics of Renaissance maps Italian would better reflect the mood of the time, as they were considered works of art, with many of them considered masterpieces of refined craftsmanshipfamous for their representations of monsters.
“In the past, these monsters had to fill in blank spaces — for example, water or locations on maps that were not yet fully known,” he explains. Dariusz Brykałageographer specializing in the history of cartography at the Polish institute.
According to the study authors, these maps can now be based on historical techniques and aestheticsserving at the same time as a lens to explore the evolution of cartography, which has gone, since the Second World War, from a artistic and scientific practice to modern formsdigital and interactive.
