Cartography is perhaps not entirely uncontroversial, but it is a well-proven method in geolinguistics because it serves both the documentation and the visualisation of spatial relations (cf. the contributions in Lameli 2010). The interactive map, which can be used in a variety of ways, also plays a very central role for the VA-website. It was developed by Florian Zacherl and David Englmeier and is expanded continuously over the course of the entire project.

Base maps and overlays

VA offers several virtual and geo-referenced base maps (layers) for selection. They differ in their graphic representation (with/without relief, background colour, satellite photos, labelling, etc.) and can be selected via the icon on the interactive map (top right):

All layers have very high resolution. The selected base map can optionally be combined with different overlays. These primarily include retro-digitised and geo-referenced historical maps that reflect former state and ecclesiastical territories.

The following overlays are currently available:


Thematic maps


On the base map with its key data, project-relevant content information can be displayed. The area of the Alpine Convention appears automatically (but can be changed through clicking) as the study area with the municipalities’ affiliations to the respective language areas, as the following map shows. The layer 'CartoDB : Carto Light', which is well suited for texts to be published on paper, was chosen:

Map 1: The area of the Alpine Convention with its assigned language areas and its municipality borders hidden (interactive original map)

The polygons of the municipalities’ surfaces form the primary units of the geo-reference. In addition, each polygon's geometric centre point has been calculated for each polygon. This results in two modes of visualisation, namely through point symbols (at the respective centre point) on the one hand and through the area of the polygon on the other hand.

Point symbol maps

Point symbol mapping is used to show the distribution of individual linguistic or non-linguistic features. The following example map shows the distribution of terms belonging to the base type lat. excocta:

Map 2: The base type lat. excocta; legend incomplete (interactive original map)

At first glance, point symbol maps seem to correspond to the so-called synthetic maps of the linguistic-geographical tradition. The symbols facilitate a very quick comprehension of spatial relationships. On map 2, for instance, it is immediately visible that the documented definitions (concepts) are not randomly distributed, but mostly form relatively large contiguous areas.
These are opposed to the so-called analytical maps, on which (partial) linguistic utterances are displayed in detail, leaving it up to the reader to uncover the underlying relationships between the documented forms. In VerbaAlpina's cartography, however, both traditions are brought together, as each point symbol is interactive and conveys the exact form as well as further information about the record, such as dictionary references and norm data about the community. Here is an individual record from the map shown above:

Map 3: A Lombard record of the base type excocta from Albosaggio (interactive original map)

The heuristic potential of cartography is remarkable. Therefore, VerbaAlpina users are not only offered the option to combine or accumulate different categories from the 'linguistic core data' (e.g. several base types or several morpho-lexical types), but furthermore to combine them with non-linguistic data from the 'linguistic periphery' on synoptic maps. For example, the distribution of the type fra. tomme/ita. toma in the Western Alps on both sides of the main Alpine ridge (easily recognisable on the following map due to glaciation) corresponds with the fact that the western and eastern sides were already connected in Roman times (and probably earlier) by important pass routes. The courses of the routes can be well identified by the place names which have been passed down from antiquity in the Tabula Peutingeriana:

Map 4: Distribution of the type tomme/toma 'cheese' and Roman pass routes as reflected in ancient place names (interactive original map)

Polygon maps

The mapping of community polygons, on the other hand, is well suited for the visualisation of quantitative relations. For example, the following map uses a so-called heat map to show the participants in VA's online survey:

Map 5: Quantitative map of participants in the VA online survey (as of 17.07.2023) with reference to the municipal level (interactive original map)

We can see that one municipality – Colle Santa Lucia in the southern Dolomites – managed to reach 51 participants. The place is difficult to discover due to the small size of the municipal polygon. Therefore, a highly magnified section of the map will be provided. It also illustrates that all polygons (as well as the points of the point symbol maps mentioned above) are interactive. The polygon activated in this case is that of Colle Santa Lucia (near Cortina D'Ampezzo). The opened window also leads to information about the municipality, such as the respective Wikipedia entry (if available), via the embedded service geonames.org (icon 🌐):

Map 6: Colle Santa Lucia – the municipality with the most participants in the online survey surrounding the Dolomites (interactive original map)

Maps 3 and 5 show that the municipalities of the study area mostly are covered rather fragmentarily. This applies to linguistic records (map 2) as well as, e.g., the participants in the online survey (map 5). For this reason, it makes sense to group the municipalities into larger units in order to convey a more synthetic (though also significantly more suggestive) spatial impression. VA uses the NUTS 3 divisions of the European Community defined for statistical purposes, roughly corresponding to the Swiss cantons. The information on map 5 then presents itself as follows:

Map 7: Quantitative map of participants in the VA online survey (as of 17.07.2023) with reference to the NUTS 3 level (interactive original map)

The grouping of the municipalities according to language areas is even more synthetic. Against these reference areas, the same content as in maps 5 and 7 presents itself as follows:

Map 8: Quantitative map of participants in the VA online survey (as of 17.07.2023) with reference to the language areas (interactive original map)

As can be seen, the distribution of participants is fairly balanced between the two largest language areas; the Romance area has 987 participants and the Germanic area 1108.
The suggestiveness of this cartography is obvious when comparing maps 5 and 7 (based on identical data). While the quantitatively strongest place (Colle Santa Lucia) can hardly be found on map 5 (the area needs to be enlarged strongly, as shown on map 6), its area is very prominent on map 7. This effect is particularly noticeable, not least due to the fact that the four prominent NUTS 3 divisions are rather large – much larger than some Swiss cantons, in any case. This is because the perceived size of the area automatically creates the impression of quantitative weight. Also, the demographic relevance of a polygon is unrelated to its size. For this reason, an alternative kind of visualization, based on hexagons of equal size, has been developed. See the hexagonal equivalent of map 7 for illustration:

Map 9: Quantitative hexagon map of participants in the VA online survey (as of 17.07.2023) with reference to NUTS 3 level (interactive original map)

Of course, the exact geographical position of the individual NUTS 3 units in relation to each other cannot be exactly visualized by hexagons, but at least their approximate positions are reflected.