Blog Post: From Maps to Data and Data to Maps: Exploring Spatial Histories The ATRIUM Summer School 2026 in Athens

By Anna Aslanoglou

June 29 – July 2, 2026, Rooms T102 and T103, Troias building of the Athens University of Economics and Business (AUEB) in Athens, Greece.

From 29 June to 2 July 2026, researchers and professionals from different academic and cultural backgrounds gathered in Athens for the ATRIUM Summer School , From Maps to Data and Data to Maps: Exploring Spatial Histories. The Summer School was organised by the UNESCO Chair on Digital Methods for the Humanities and Social Sciences as part of the Horizon Europe project ATRIUM , with the cooperation of the Center for Digital Humanities at Princeton and the ATHENA Research Center . Over four days, the programme combined lectures, hands-on sessions, collaborative activities and visits to historical sites and collections.

Throughout the Summer School, participants explored how maps, photographs, texts and other historical sources can be transformed into structured spatial data and used to investigate places, landscapes and stories from the past. The programme followed this process step by step: from understanding historical collections and preparing spatial data to collaborative map annotation, digital mapping and spatial storytelling.

Two case studies provided a common thread across the four days. The first focused on Vrysaki, an Athenian neighbourhood demolished in the 1930s during the expansion of the excavations of the Ancient Agora. Participants worked with historical photographs and maps created by photographer M. Messinesi and preserved in the Visual Resources Collection of Princeton University’s Department of Art and Archaeology, using them to explore and digitally map aspects of this lost urban landscape.

The second case study centred on Rigas Velestinlis’ late eighteenth century Charta of Greece , a complex cartographic work rich in place names, symbols, illustrations, historical references and textual commentary. Through collaborative annotation, participants examined how its different layers of information could be identified, described and connected with structured geographical and semantic resources.

Together, the two case studies offered complementary perspectives on spatial history. Vrysaki invited participants to reconnect archival photographs and maps with a transformed urban landscape, while the Charta raised questions about the interpretation and structured description of a complex historical map.

Setting the scene: collections, maps and spatial histories

After a welcoming session led by Panos Constantopoulos, Professor Emeritus in the Department of Informatics at AUEB and holder of the UNESCO Chair on Digital Methods for the Humanities and Social Sciences, the first day introduced the collections, questions and places that would accompany the group throughout the Summer School. Agiatis Benardou and Bryan Winston opened the Vrysaki case study, presenting the history of the neighbourhood and the Princeton collection that preserves important visual evidence of its past. Maria Ilvanidou then introduced the Charta of Greece and historical map collections made available by ATRIUM partners, setting the scene for the collaborative annotation activities that would follow later in the week.

The programme then broadened the discussion from the individual collections to wider questions about place and spatial research. Elton Barker introduced Pelagios as a community of practice for place based research, while Bryan Winston explored the broader field of the Spatial Humanities. Markos Katsianis approached the city as an archaeological palimpsest, showing how different historical phases, material remains and urban transformations coexist within the same landscape.

The day concluded with a hands-on session led by Bryan Winston, in which participants began working with the Princeton material, organising data and exploring the role of coordinates in reconstructing the spatial history of Vrysaki. In this way, the first day moved gradually from the historical and conceptual background of the two case studies to the practical work of preparing their sources for digital research.

Building spatial data and encountering Vrysaki

The second day focused on the preparation and organisation of spatial data. Bryan Winston and Maria Ilvanidou guided participants through georeferencing, geocoding and geolocation, introducing different methods for connecting historical sources with geographical coordinates. Through demonstrations and hands-on activities, the group examined how maps, photographs, place names and other forms of historical evidence can be prepared for spatial research.

Bryan Winston then led sessions on structuring spatial data and surveying different digital mapping tools. Participants considered how information should be organised before it can be mapped, compared or visualised, as well as how the structure of a dataset influences the questions that researchers are able to ask of it.

The activities also highlighted that preparing spatial data is not a purely technical process. Selecting coordinates, identifying historical places and organising information into consistent fields require interpretative decisions. Historical place names may have changed, locations may be uncertain and different sources may provide conflicting or incomplete information. Recognising and documenting these difficulties is therefore an essential part of working responsibly with spatial data.

Later that day, the group visited the Ancient Agora and the area once occupied by Vrysaki. After working with historical photographs, maps and coordinates in the classroom, participants were able to encounter the physical landscape connected with the material. Walking through the area created a direct link between the archival record and the city.

The visit also encouraged reflection on the layers of Athens that remain visible, those that survive only in fragments and those that have disappeared. In the case of Vrysaki, the relationship between the historical neighbourhood and the excavated landscape of the Ancient Agora demonstrated how maps and photographs can help researchers reconnect traces of a transformed urban environment.

From the original Charta to ATRIUM workflows in practice

The third day began at the Library of the Hellenic Parliament, where Theodoros Koutsogiannis introduced participants to an original copy of Rigas Velestinlis’ Charta of Greece. Encountering the physical object after exploring its digital representation offered a new understanding of its scale, material qualities and remarkable density of information.

The visit demonstrated why the Charta is such a valuable and demanding case study for digital research. Place names, settlements, fortifications, ancient monuments, illustrations, symbols and textual commentary coexist across its sheets. Identifying these elements is only the beginning: researchers must also decide how to describe them, how to distinguish between different types of information and how to document cases in which the interpretation remains uncertain.

Back at AUEB, Elton Barker opened the afternoon programme by exploring how places and spatial relationships can also be identified and investigated within texts. The session broadened the discussion beyond cartographic sources and demonstrated that mapping is not limited to information already presented in geographical form.

Back at AUEB, Elton Barker opened the afternoon programme by exploring how places and spatial relationships can also be identified and investigated within texts. The session broadened the discussion beyond cartographic sources and demonstrated that mapping is not limited to information already presented in geographical form.

The focus then shifted directly to research methods and resources developed within ATRIUM. Maria Ilvanidou introduced collaborative map annotation and the Collaborative Reusable Map Annotation Workflow , explaining how a map annotation project can be planned, carried out, reviewed and prepared for reuse. The workflow encourages researchers to define the scope of their work, identify the map features they want to record, agree on annotation practices, select appropriate gazetteers and document how uncertainty and quality control will be handled.

Anna Aslanoglou then presented the Controlled Vocabulary for Annotation of Historical Maps Workflow . The session addressed a challenge that frequently arises in collaborative annotation: a shared list of tags does not necessarily mean that all annotators understand or apply those tags in the same way. Participants explored how terms can be organised into meaningful categories and supported by definitions, scope notes, examples and usage rules. They also considered when existing vocabularies could be reused and how locally developed concepts could be connected with external semantic resources.

Together, the two workflows demonstrated how outputs developed within ATRIUM can function as reusable training and research resources. They provided a common methodological framework while leaving space for the different research questions, source materials and interpretative challenges that each project may encounter.

 

The day concluded with a collaborative workshop led by Maria Ilvanidou and Anna Aslanoglou. Working in small groups in RecogitoStudio , participants applied the methods discussed during the previous sessions to the Charta of Greece and to selected maps curated for the workshop by the ATHENA Research Center from historical collections provided by the Poznań Supercomputing and Networking Center and the Austrian Academy of Sciences .

Participants identified and annotated place names and cartographic features, tested controlled terms and explored possible connections with gazetteers and other authoritative resources. They were also encouraged to discuss difficult cases and to record when a term or rule was unclear, missing, too restrictive or difficult to apply.

This process highlighted that ATRIUM workflows are not fixed sets of instructions. They are living research resources that can be tested, questioned and refined through use. The workshop therefore functioned both as a training activity and as an opportunity to reflect on how collaborative annotation methods operate when applied to complex historical material.

From spatial data to spatial stories

The final day turned from the preparation and annotation of spatial data to its interpretation and communication. Maria Ilvanidou introduced StoryMapJS as a platform for combining maps, images and narrative, while Bryan Winston offered a gentle introduction to Leaflet and to working creatively with existing code. The two sessions presented different entry points into digital mapping, from accessible storytelling platforms to the development of customised interactive maps.

Markos Katsianis then discussed digital cartographies for the archaeology of Athens, reconnecting the practical work of the Summer School with wider questions about the representation of archaeological and urban landscapes. His session reinforced a central theme of the programme: digital maps are not neutral containers for information but interpretative outputs shaped by the selection, organisation and visualisation of data.

Later in the day, Natalia Ermolaev led participants in revisiting the Vrysaki and Charta of Greece projects. The discussion brought together the work of the previous days and encouraged participants to reflect on what had been gained, what challenges had emerged and what new questions had arisen through data preparation, collaborative annotation and digital mapping.

The formal programme concluded with a keynote by ATRIUM Project Director Toma Tasovac, titled ‘Digital Humanities in the Age of Algorithmic Confidence’. Tracing a path from the emergence of print culture to contemporary computational environments, Tasovac examined how different media shape the production, interpretation and authority of knowledge. The keynote offered a thought provoking conclusion to the week, highlighting the continuing importance of critical interpretation, transparency and human judgement in digital humanities research.

Participants reflecting on the methods, challenges and outcomes of the four day programme.

ATRIUM in the ‘atrium’: conversations beyond the sessions

True to the name of the project, many of the conversations continued in the university’s own atrium. During the coffee breaks, participants and instructors gathered in the courtyard to exchange ideas, compare experiences and continue discussions about maps, data and digital research practices in a more informal setting.

These moments became an important part of the Summer School. They created space for questions that extended beyond the individual sessions, for conversations between participants working in different disciplines and for further reflection on the practical challenges encountered during the activities. Ideas introduced in the classroom were often revisited over coffee, while observations from one exercise opened new discussions about other collections, projects and research contexts.

In this sense, the university atrium became more than a place for a break. It was another space of collaborative learning, an appropriate meeting point for a project built around connecting research communities, methods and infrastructures.                                                  

From training to reusable practice

Across four days, the Summer School brought together historical collections, digital methods, research infrastructures and people from different disciplinary backgrounds. Participants followed a complete research journey: from examining maps, photographs and texts to preparing spatial data, making collaborative annotation decisions and transforming the results into maps and spatial stories.

For ATRIUM, the Summer School offered an opportunity to bring project outputs into a real teaching and research environment. The workflows were not simply presented as completed resources, they were applied, discussed and tested against complex historical material. In this way, the Summer School demonstrated how reusable methods can connect research development with practice, while creating new opportunities for collaboration and exchange. The journey from maps to data and from data back to maps continues through the resources, ideas and connections developed during these four days in Athens.