Slovenia on Maps

Abstract

The territory of what is now Slovenia appears on even the oldest maps of Europe, as a constituent part of various sovereign states. Its geographical location, Slavic roots, and long association with the Habsburg Monarchy resulted in constant contact with central and southeast European cultural trends, including in cartography. The Slovenian lands were more frequently depicted on maps from the early sixteenth century onward. Due to its marginal political role and mapmakers’ lack of familiarity with the territory, at first, it was drawn fairly superficially. This changed in the eighteenth century, when Slovenian and other researchers carried out their own field research, surveying and drawing individual parts of Carniola, Styria, Istria, and Carinthia. With the national awakening in the second half of the nineteenth century, the desire for an independent country manifested itself in the first maps of Slovenian ethnic territory. For most of the twentieth century, Slovenia appeared on maps as part of Yugoslavia, and from 1991 onward as an independent country, preserving and developing cartographic practice in line with cartographic standards.