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Use the World Historical Gazetteer (WHG) when your project spans multiple periods or regions, or when you want your places to interoperate with other historians' datasets through shared identifiers. WHG is both a place to reconcile against an aggregated index and a place to contribute your own gazetteer in Linked Places Format. It is the wrong tool if you only need modern coordinates for a single country — there, GeoNames or a national gazetteer is lighter. The decision turns on temporal depth and the value of cross-project linking.
What does the World Historical Gazetteer actually do?
WHG aggregates contributed datasets into a union index and mints shared place identifiers, so that a place appearing in your data and in three other projects can all point to one WHG record. It does two jobs: reconciliation (matching your names to existing records) and publication (hosting your dataset with stable IDs and an interactive map via its Peripleo-style interface).
When is it the right fit?
WHG earns its place in projects where breadth and linking matter:
- Cross-period corpora where a single place carries ancient, medieval and modern names.
- Multi-region work that no single specialist gazetteer covers.
- Projects that want their data discoverable and re-usable by others.
- Teams that need a hosted map without building infrastructure.
If none of those describe you, a lighter authority is the rational choice.
When should I not use it?
Be honest about the trade-offs. WHG adds modelling overhead and a publication workflow you may not need.
| Your situation | Better tool | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Modern single-country coordinates | GeoNames / national gazetteer | No temporal depth needed |
| Purely classical antiquity | Pleiades | Deeper, more precise for that period |
| Tiny private project, no sharing | Local SQLite gazetteer | No reconciliation overhead |
| Need full control of hosting | Self-hosted LPF + Leaflet | WHG is a shared platform |
How do I prepare data for WHG?
Convert to Linked Places Format (LPF) or the simpler LP-TSV. A minimal LP-TSV row carries an ID, title, name variants, place types and a coordinate:
text
id title ccodes lon lat aat_types start end
1 Eboracum GB -1.0815 53.9590 300008347 71 400
2 York GB -1.0815 53.9590 300008347 866Run it through the WHG validator before upload; the preview flags missing required fields and malformed geometry early.
How does reconciliation work in practice?
After upload, you launch a reconciliation pass against the union index. WHG returns ranked candidate matches; you accept, reject, or defer each one:
text
your_place candidate_whg_id score action
Eboracum whg:12345678 0.97 accept
Newport whg:00997744 0.61 review
Caer Went whg:01130022 0.88 acceptAccepted links join your dataset to every other dataset sharing those WHG IDs — that network effect is the core payoff.
What are the ongoing costs?
The hidden cost is curation. Reconciliation candidates need human review, archaic spellings under-match, and you commit to maintaining your dataset if you publish it. Budget time for the review queue, not just the upload. For a one-off map of a single shire, that overhead is rarely worth it; for a reusable scholarly resource, it is.
Key Takeaways
- WHG is for cross-period, cross-region projects and for data you want others to re-use.
- It does both reconciliation against a union index and hosted publication.
- Contribute in Linked Places Format or LP-TSV and validate before upload.
- Skip WHG for modern single-country coordinate needs — GeoNames is lighter.
- The real cost is human review of reconciliation candidates, so budget curation time.
- Accepted matches connect your data to every other dataset sharing those identifiers.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the World Historical Gazetteer?
The World Historical Gazetteer (WHG) is an open platform that aggregates contributed historical place datasets and lets you reconcile your own places against them. It assigns shared WHG IDs that link records from many projects to the same place.
When is WHG the right choice over Pleiades or GeoNames?
WHG fits cross-period and global work, and any project that wants to both consume and contribute place data. Pleiades is better for purely ancient-world precision and GeoNames for modern coordinates.
What format do I need to contribute to WHG?
Linked Places Format (LPF) or its tabular cousin LP-TSV. WHG provides a validator and an upload preview so you can fix structural errors before ingestion.
Does WHG host my data publicly?
You control visibility. Datasets can stay private to your account during work and be published when ready, at which point they join the union index and gain stable identifiers.
What does reconciliation against WHG give me?
It matches your place names to existing WHG records and returns candidate links you confirm or reject. Confirmed links connect your dataset to every other dataset that shares those places.
Is WHG suitable for a single-region modern project?
It can be, but if you only need modern coordinates for one country, GeoNames or a national gazetteer is lighter weight. WHG shines when temporal depth or cross-project linking matters.