Apart from the maps kept in the Budapest City Archives (BCA) the database includes the data of the maps of Budapest created before 2000 and belonging to public collections. The images of the bulk of the BCA’s maps are accessible. The most crucial maps are available in georeferenced form, which enables one to study simultaneously the conditions of a place noted in several maps created at different times. The change of the identification data (from the end of the 17th century to recent times) belonging to the plots located in those parts of Budapest which built up before 1873 can be traced by the help of the database called The historical topography of Budapest. Furthermore the topographical changes are inspectable in the georeferenced maps as well.
The database of maps contains aside from the actually researchable materials of the Budapest City Archives, the data of the maps (created before 2000) regarding Budapest and its predecessors. The digital photos taken on the most of the BCA’s maps are available in the database. (Those maps mean exception whose digitalization meets technical or conservational barriers. Apart from the maps (in a narrow sense) one can find in the database other topographical documents, such as divisional and partition plans, layouts which are mainly from the materials of the Municipal Council of Public Works and the Plans Archives. The most important maps are available in georeferenced form, which enables one to study simultaneously the conditions of a place noted in several maps created at different times.
Each record refers for a map irrespectively of the fact that the number of the issues, versions and other collections in which the given map has been already recorded. On this website it is possible to run searches for the descriptive data of maps (object, name of area mapped, name of creator, year of creation, type of map, reference number). You can browse in the Map Collection of the Hungaricana Cultural Heritage Portal, moreover the data are researchable in the Combined Database of the Hungarian Archival Portal and on the Online Research of Digital Records of the Digital Archives Portal.
The old maps of Budapest website of the Historical Maps of the Habsburg Empire, MAPIRE includes the most important and most detailed maps of Budapest from the 18th century to the mid-20th. By the georeferenced maps one can step by step trace the change of the city. In this process contribute several services which make the said change visible: the contemporary and the recent maps can be projected to each other; 3-D view; search in the place name database of the Google Maps; area and distance measurement. The study of the alterations of any part of the city is the easiest through this. The database of the maps is worthy in those cases, if one is interested in maps containing special information, thematic maps, plans of land development and maps with minor precision in the field of layout.
It shall be kept in view that in the reference box of the database of maps and other search tools that reference has been marked which the given map received in the Catalogue of the Old Maps of Budapest publication. The exact references of the collections are located in case of the Hungaricana Cultural Heritage Portal in the box called ‘Place of the highlight’, while on the Hungarian Archival Portal these information are contained by the box of ‘Description’. In the event of referring for the source this information must be noted. In the list always those references are the first which start with BFL. These issues kept by the Budapest City Archives. The non-digitalized maps can be ordered to the research room through the said references.
The historical topography of Budapest database contains historical-topographical data for several quarters and districts of Budapest built up or allotted before 1873, specifically the Castle, Krisztinaváros, the Inner City, Lipótváros, Terézváros, Erzsébetváros, Józsefváros, and Ferencváros. It makes possible to retrace the changes in the identification data of the lots in these areas from the late 17th century up to recent times. In the records of this database the current address of a property (street name plus number) and topographical number of a property is linked to the earlier identification data of the same property (number of lot, street number). To the version of the database published at HAP there are geo-referenced city maps attached, from various points in time since the early 19th century till now. From the topographic data we can follow links to get to the given points of the maps selected from a list, identifying the position of a contemporary property on an earlier map. On the Hungaricana Cultural Heritage Portal one can search through place names on the available maps or navigate on them and open the topographical records related to the chosen point (Follow this link). The maps are accessible there through the records found by search as well. Then the chosen place can be studied by selecting from the maps created at different times as ‘layers’.
