Mapping Avicenna: A Geospatial Bio-Bibliography for Animated Visualization and Analysis
Overview
In my doctoral dissertation, I employed GIS-based mapping as a digital humanities method to engage with the complex corpus of Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā, 10th–11th c. CE), much of which was produced during his lifelong itinerancy. I extracted his whereabouts — recorded as placenames with latitude and longitude — and his scholarly output across time and space, structuring this data as a CSV. I also digitized roads and the shifting borders of ruling dynasties during Avicenna’s lifetime from historical print maps.
These data layers were visualized in a time-enabled map using ArcGIS Pro, then published to ArcGIS Online and converted into a web-based map application via ArcGIS Instant Apps. I further used this dataset to conduct geospatial, quantitative analyses in ArcGIS Insights, revealing where, when, and how intensely Avicenna was active in writing on subdisciplines of physics and mathematical astronomy.
Project deliverables include
- An animated survey map of Avicenna’s datable works
- A map-graph tool (ArcGIS Insights workbook) visualizing genre-specific scholarship across place
- A geodatabase of the works, designed for reshaping, expansion, and reuse by historians interested in Avicenna’s corpus or the historical context of his era
Software
ArcGIS Pro 3.1, ArcGIS Online, ArcGIS Instant Apps, ArcGIS Insights
Data
- Temporal point data in CSV format extracted from biobibliographical sources
- Raster data of digitized print maps
- Temporal line and polygon data extracted from georeferenced raster
Skills used
Data extraction from unstructured sources, Temporal point data structuring in CSV format, Georeferencing raster maps, Data digitization and feature extraction, Vector data creation (points, lines, polygons), Temporal attribute encoding, Geodatabase design and management, Feature class creation, Time-enabled map creation in ArcGIS Pro, Web map deployment via ArcGIS Online, App configuration using ArcGIS Instant Apps, Geospatial analysis in ArcGIS Insights, Spatial-temporal pattern analysis