Page 115 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2018 Vol. 43

XIA Cuijuan / The opening and application of Chinese historical geography data in Digital Humanities projects of libraries 115

CHGIS. Another example is the China Biographical Database (CBDB) which uses the historical
geography data of CHGIS and integrates the spatial analysis into the organization and display
of the biographies. The birth, life, tenure, travel, land and real estate, death, burial, and other
activities are placed in the multidimensional spatial-temporal structure. The CBDB provides brand
new methods and means to researchers for them to identify and solve problems. This successful
case vividly shows how to provide historical geography data support to other thematic databases.
Similarly, under the support of CCTS, the Academia Sinica has developed a large number of
specialized-field application systems to provide data and platforms for special subjects such as the
analysis of Yellow River flooding, the research on the Jiangnan towns in Ming and Qing Dynasties,
the name authority database (authority file of names) in Fu Sinian Library, the literary map of
Sushi. These are typical illustrations on how modern historical geography is applied to humanities
and social sciences.

1.2 The construction and application of the historical Geographic Information System
(GIS) in China

The construction of historical geographic information systems has been the focus of governments
both at home and abroad. Foreign cases are the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) by
the Board on Geographical Names (BGN) of the United States Geological Survey (USGS),
Canadian Geographical Names Database (GNBC), the Gazetteer of Australia Place Name by
Geoscience Australia, the New Zealand Gazetteer of Place Name by the New Zealand Geogrphic
Board (NZGB). As for the domestic cases, the Ministry of Civil Affairs urged each province
and city to establish the local place names database. The National Administration of Surveying,
Mapping and Geoinformation of China has also built the national geographic names databases of
various scales (Cao, 2009). Chinese Academy of Social Sciences released Chinese Social Sciences
Integrated Geographic Information Service Platform System in September 2009. The system
demonstrates the changes of rivers, the migration of previous populations, the development and
decline of economic zones, and the process of integration and separation of various ethnic groups
using GIS technologies (Wu, 2009). Some university departments and research institutes have also
made remarkable achievements in the construction of historical geography databases. CHGIS,
CCTS and THCTS mentioned above are the main representatives. Nanjing Normal University’s
Sino-family-tree Geographic Information System (Sino-family-tree GIS for short) was developed
for the organization and presentation of genealogical documents under a unified spatial-temporal
model, similar to the library’s consideration of utilizing historical geographic information system
to display the collection visually on the map with a interactive time-line.
With the advent of Internet era, historical GIS system has encountered its bottlenecks and
difficulties. Scholar Chen Gang summarized that one of the key factors was historical geography
circle’s inadequate understanding, acquirement, and application of new technologies (G. Chen,