The documentary heritage of the ex Institute of Geography of the University of Rome Sapienza: Educational applications in GIS environment.

GIScience plays an increasingly important role in the humanities, being a powerful tool for research purposes and in the educational field. Using documentary heritage for didactic purposes through GIS is a valid example of the enhancement of different geographical sources. The ex Institute of Geography of Sapienza University of Rome preserves cartography, images, globes, relief maps, volumes and manuscripts, glass plates and different instruments collected since 1877 when the Cabinet of Geography was founded. The use of GIS therefore helps to give visibility to the history of geography through the spatialization of geohistorical information. The main educational values of this application are the possibility to carry out diachronic studies and analyses in order to visualize the evolution of the territory through different types of documentary sources. Moreover, the students are actively solicited both on the level of visual involvement, both on the experiential level as GIS allow high levels of interaction and to produce personal representations. For this purpose it is possible to use “L’esposizione digitale” web site (carried out by the Department of Modern Letters and Cultures of Sapienza University of Rome) which allows such applications by making available on line the geographical material of the ex Institute of Geography. In addition to the visualization on interactive maps of visual material and geo-referenced maps, it is possible to freely download the images that will set the information layers within a GIS software. The portal supports the spread of the knowledge of the documentary heritage of the ex Institute of Geography. This patrimony has his own value as historical document and an additional value that concerns both the application-planning, both the didactic field. GIS technologies are particularly useful in this sense as well as supporting further research developments.