NATIONAL PROGRESS REPORT OF THE NETHERLANDS 1988-1990

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Workinggroup for Mapcuratorship, Dutch Cartographic Society (NVK)
One of the members of the board, Mr. R.J .M.J Bertrand of tbe ITC, died on 5 March 1989 after a long illness. With him a lot of valuable experience in and knowledge of the map-field, especially in the field of aerial photographs and remote sensing images, will be missed sorely.

The workinggroup has organized the following study-days:

• autumn 1988: Reconnaissance of reproduction in service of mapcuratorship. The programme dealt mainly with colour-copying, with papers from the ITC and Canon, and the production of facsimiles, with papers from the State Archives and from an author of facsimile-publications.
• spring 1989: Archeology and maps with papers about the Archeological map of The Netherlands 1: 100,000; map-use with archaeologists; cultural history and spatial management; reconstruction of old topographic situations; cartographic reproduction as a means with landscape-genesis; and a demonstration on PC's of the RIA-system (Spatial information through automation) of the State Planning Service.
• spring 1990: Are cartographic documents to be found? with a paper and demonstration of the database KABES and the programme 'Sleutel' (key) of the Geometrical Survey of the 'Rijkswaterstaat', a custom-tailored CARTONET-like programme; a paper about the developments with tbe CCK, and a paper of the mapcurator of the Geographical Institute of the State University Utrecht about the automated accessing of atlases and reproduction-publications.

All study-days were attended by 40 to 50 mapcurators. 
The next study-day in December 1990 will carry the theme: Organization and production of facsimiles and atlases in the framework of the 175th anniversary celebrations of the Dutch Topographic Survey.

The workinggroup did not organize a study-day in the winter of 1989. This happened because the Department of Cartography of the State University Utrecht in cooperation with the Royal Library and the Dutch Cartographic Society organized a symposium titled: Documentation of spatial information. This was organized on the occasion of the leave of Dr. Hans van der Waal as member of the scientific staff of the Department of Cartography. Most papers were addressing the problem of the documentation of cartographic information, inclusive GIS, LIS etc. Sarah Tyacke of the British Library gave her (international) view about the change in the form of the documents ( amongst others from print to digital) and the organisational, legal, and financial problems of policy-making and implementation in this area. This day was attended by about 180 people from the scientific, map-producing, government and library communities.

Summer course Describing Cartographic Materials
Af ter 1½ years of preparation a 4-days summer course took place on 25-28 September 1989 in the Royal Library. The Dutch Cartographic Society tries to organise every year a summer course in a cartographic field and this was the second time that mapcuratorship was the topic. However, unlike in 1982 when the introduction of the Dutch adaptation of the ISBD(CM) was the topic, we concentrated this time on areas which give valuable information to make a good description, whether this is for a library-, an archive- or a museum-collection. 

This means one had to learn to interprete certain data and to learn to chose between alternatives. We concentrated on the mathematical field, the physical description area and on the problem of the multi-part documents. Members of the workinggroup, together with ex-mapcurators and a lecturer at the Department of Cartography of the State University Utrecht, functioned as organizers and teachers during this course, which was attended by 24 people, working in libraries, archives and map-producing agencies. As far as we could ascertain the participants were rather satisfied with the contents of the course and the way in which it was presented to them. Half of the time consisted of practical exercises.

The course started with a lecture by Marianne Kok about the accessibility of cartographic information in the Netherlands. 
In June 1990 a 53 p. report titled Verslag beschrijven kartografische materialen was published. The illustrations are mainly drawn from cartographic textbooks or from Cartographic materials : a manual of interpretation for AACR2.

Education of Mapcurators 
As stated in the last progress-report 1986-1988 the linear 125-hour course Map- and Atlas management of the GO (Foundation for collective schooling for Archive, Library, Documentation and Information-processing) has become modular. This course will have a two-years cycle. The new course has started the 18th of September with 13 participants and consists of the following modules:

If one wants to do a certificate-course one has to choose, besides the nuclear module, between a combination of the supplementary courses A-B-E and C-D-F. It is possible to follow the nuclear course in the first year of this cycle and the combination of supplementary courses in the first year of the next cycle.

However, if one is interested, it is also possible to follow a supplementary course separately as a form of updating course. Of course one only gets then a certificate of attendance. The full course costs DFl. 2,900, supplementary courses only are DFl. 300,- a piece.

As a cycle consists of two years the GO-H-Education Committee is making plans to create in the second year of the cycle special one- or two-day refresher or updating courses. At the moment they are thinking of courses about entry-systems and thesauri.

Scientific Atlas of the Netherlands
In 1990 the last part of the 20-part Atlas van Nederland was published. This was celebrated by a symposium on 16 March 1990 on the history of this scientific atlas. There were papers about the genesis of national scientific atlases in general, about the first and second edition and about a possible future electronic edition. One of the profitable side-effects of the production of the present atlas was the enormous amount of basic research it generated in the scientific establishments and its impact on modern Dutch cartography. Another benefit was the intersubjectivity in this atlas of geography and cartography. Unfortunately the representative of the Secretary for Education & Science could not oblige the cartographic community by pledging financial aid for the new electronic edition.

Publications
In the past 2 years a remarkable amount of topographical atlases have been published, modern as well as historical, covering the whole of The Netherlands:

• Grote topografische atlas van Nederland 1:50.000 [Great topographical atlas of The Netherlands 1:50,000]. 2nd ed. 4 parts. Original maps published by the Topographic Survey between 1974-1990. 159 p. register containing appr. 50,000 toponyms.
• Grote provincie atlas 1:25.000. [Great province atlas 1:25,000 of The Netherlands. 13 parts (3 parts to be published still). Original maps published by the Topographic Survey between 1982-1990. The registers contain appr. 85,000-90,000 toponyms.
• Historische atlas … [Historical atlas of the province …1:25,000]. 11 parts (3 parts to be published still). Original! maps published by the Topographic Survey appr. between 1885 and 1935.
• Fotokaarten … [Aerial photographs of tbe province …1:14,000]. 12 parts (9 parts to be published still). Original photographs 1:18,000 taken by tbe Topograpbic Survey between 1988 Each photograph covers an area of 4 x 4 km.
• Grote historische atlas van Nederland 1:50.000. [Great historical atlas of The Netherlands 1:50,000]. 4 parts (to be published 1990 ). Origina! maps are the manuscript maps produced between appr. 1840-1850 for the Topografische en militaire kaart van het koninkrijk der Nederlanden 1:50,000, published between 1850-1864.

At the same time another 9 books of cadastral maps 1832 have been published, bringing the total to 20 parts, mainly concerning the provinces of Friesland, Drenthe, Gelderland, Noord-Rolland and Zeeland. Eventually the whole of The Netherlands may be covered, but that would be 1,800 parts! [A steady production made in 2002 the total amount of atlases already 131. Note by Jan Smits on 30 January 2003].

13tb International Conference on the History of Cartography
Af ter 4 years of many committee-meetings, organizing, preparations etc. the '13th International conference on the history of cartography' took place between 26th June and 1st July 1989 in Leiden, Amsterdam and Rotterdam. In Leiden a pre-conference meeting of Curators of collections of old maps was held, resulting amongst others in the founding of the 'International Society of Curators of Early Maps (ISCEM)'. In Amsterdam and The Hague there were only plenary sessions in contrast to former conferences, where there were mainly parallel sessions. In this way all participants could give their undivided attention to the themes of the conference. As the amount of papers read in this way was small, the organizing committee sought to alleviate the need for expression in an 'open market', where participants on a person-to-person base could discuss all research and ideas presented. As far as we could ascertain most participants enjoyed this way of meeting and it will probably serve as a model for later conferences.

Exhibitions 
During the afore-mentioned conference some 6 exhibitions were held concerning cartography or fjelds closely related to it. In 4 of them members of the organizing committee had some part to play. Not only were we very satisfied with the exhibitions themselves, but as a spin-off 4 beautiful catalogues/essays were published. The main exhibitions in this period were:

• Het kunstbedrijf van de familie Vingboons [painters, architects and mapmakers in the golden century], 2 June – 3 September 1989. Catalogue containing essays.
• Russen en Nederlanders [From the history of the relations between The Netherlands and Russia 1600-1917], 3 June -10 September 1989. With catalogue containing essays.
• Kaarten met geschiedenis 1550-1800 [A selection of old manuscript maps of The Netherlands from the Collection Bodel Nijenhuis], 15 June -10 September 1989. With catalogue containing essays.
• Kunst in kaart [Decorative aspects of cartography], 24 June -10 September 1989. With catalogue containing essays.
• Gesneden en gedrukt in de Kalverstraat [The map- and atlas-production in Amsterdam till some time in the 19th century], 26th June -10 September 1989. With catalogue containing essays.
• In de gekroonde lootsman [The map-, book publishing and instrument-making family Van Keulen in Amsterdam 1680-1885], 28-June -20 August 1989. With catalogue containing essays.
• Utrecht in kaart gebracht [cartography of the city of Utrecht 1541-1990], 3 February -18 March 1990. With catalogue containing essays.
• Land in kaart [Maps and cartography by the Topographic Survey of The Netherlands 1815-1990], 22 June -14 September 1990. No catalogue.
• Mirror of empire [Dutch marine art of the seventeenth century]
  • The Minneapolis Institute of Arts: 23/9-31/12 1990
  • The Toledo Museum of Art: 27/1-21/4 1991
  • Los Angeles County Museum of Art: 23/5-11/8 1991

  Catalogue by George Keyes and Dirk de Vries; Minneapolis 1990; XIV, 444 p.
  This was one of the major art exhibitions of 1990/1 in the USA, to which the Leiden University Library gave an extensive loan of 18 maps. The catalogue gives full attention to the cartographical contribution.

CCK
In our progress-report 1986-1988 we wrote we hoped to be able to show the results of the developments concerning the CCK (formerly Dutch Union Map Catalogue). Those who attend the Paris-conference have seen them for what they are worth. Here I will tell something about the intervening time. 
In 1988 the Royal Library together with the Department of Cartography of the State University Utrecht took up the challenge to give new life to the CCK. After some management-consultant agencies had researched the possibilities in 1987 the Royal Library produced in 1988/89 a Projectplan CCK 1988-1990 with the aim of 'operationalizing the CCK at the Royal Library and the realization of online facilities.' To effect this a 'projectgroup CCK', a 'panel of experts in cataloguing' and a 'participants assembly' was installed. The projectgroup CCK does the actual work (financing, research, planning etc), the panel of experts in cataloguing supplies background-information and requests necessary changes in the format or system, while the participants- assembly (representing 12 institutions) functions as sounding-board. 
The planning foresaw initially that preparatory work would be finished in January 1989, conversion and operationalization in August 1990, development and implementation of online input-facilities in June 1990, development and implementation of online retrieval-facilities in May 1991, and upgrading subject-retrieval in November 1989. Unfortunately we have some trouble with implementing new hardware and software, mainly because we use UNIX and Unify software and linking between the two software-packages is a hard job. This means that most parts of the project will be delivered on a later date than foreseen. At the moment we have installed a mini-computer for research-purposes in Utrecht. When test-results are good we will install in winter 1990 a mini-computer in The Hague for production. However the planning foresees that implementation of the whole system will take place before the end of 1991.

PICA-map-cataloguing
In the autumn of 1984 the Leiden University Library took the decision of computerizing its map catalogue with the help of the Pica automated cataloguing system. It took more than three years before the approval could be given to a hardcopy output in the form of a list of one hundred titles of maps, sorted according to the CCK area classification. This implied that at long last the starting signal could be given to the project of retro-cataloguing of the Bodel Nijenhuis CoIlection of old maps and atlases. The output will exist of 1) printed lists of the two catalogues (area and names), produced by Pica every year in January; 2) the OPAC for maps, available within two or three years; 3) the printed catalogue in book form, of which the first volume is planned for the end of 1992.

Dutch Cartographic Dictionary 
The Dutch dictionary of technical terms in cartography will be published in 1990. The dictionary contains ca. 1,200 terms and definitions, with English, French and German equivalents. Thanks to the generosity of the publishing firm Wolters-Noordhoff Atlasproductions the dictionary will be offered for free to all members of the Dutch Cartographic society.

Maps in Archives 
In 1989 the Society for Archivists in The Netherlands authorized the addition of 38 terms and definitions concerning archival descriptions of cartographic materials to the Terminologie voor grafische archivalia (Terminology for graphic archivalia).
Also in 1989 the General State Archives (ARA) produced MAIS (Micro Archives-Inventory-System). This system is now in use with several state and municipal archives.
In 1990 Archeion, a system developed with the State Archives, was officially put into use by the Secretary for Public Welfare, Health and Culture. Archeion is an information-system for automatic inventory-recording and to indicate which archives have been stored. It also produces an overview of all archives held by the State Archives and where they are located. In future it will also produce a public- access module. 
In this period the ARA has taken over the archives of the Hydrographic Survey of the Royal Navy 1795-1950 and the Government Building Agency 1830-1940

Cartographic Information Centre of The Netherlands 
The Dutch Cartographic Society has been working since 1987 on the idea of a Dutch Cartographic Information Centre. This mainly for three reasons:

1. The Bibliography of maps produced in The Netherlands has not been published since the annual for 1982.
2. The Guide to map-collections of 1980 needs to be updated.
3. The Catalogue of Maps, in which were published which maps of the main official publishers were published did appear last in 1980

The Dutch Cartographic Society in cooperation with the Royal Library are looking into solutions to all problems. The first task of the Cartographic Information Centre probably will be to produce a new, enlarged edition of the Guide to map-collections. However the intention is to also put the data for this publication into an automated database which then can be used as part of an electronic information-desk.

Jan Smits, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, Map Department

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