Tangible Historical Maps

Territorial shifts are a vital part of a country’s history, mostly caused by wars, uprisings or other political processes. The most commonly used method to teach that matter, is to bring huge pull down maps to class and give verbal explanations while pointing at the map. Those maps are limited to one static image and therefore need a significant amount of imagination on the student’s side. This thesis suggests a new approach based on 3D printed models. The target is to visualise the changes in the influential sphere of a country in a more dynamic and interactive manner. For the purpose of this thesis two prototypes of tangible historical maps were created. They were built from standardised 2D historical maps and feature territorial shifts in xand y-direction and time on the z-axis. In the course of the work, the impact of today’s limited low cost 3D printing techniques on this approach became clearer. Printing is still time-consuming and consumer-level devices have only limited build volumes. Therefore, an application is suggested, which offers users the chance to manipulate certain years in the final 3D model. This results in a custom-defined quantity of detail in the created tangible historical map. The application can enlarge or reduce height in the chosen area and also makes recommendations for certain printer settings based on the user’s input. The latter aids the use of this approach for people without background in 3D printing. In total, this approach proved useful when only a small number of countries with a significant amount of changes over a short period of time is considered.