National progress report of Switzerland 2000-2002

Activities of the Map Curators' Group
The Map Curators' Group held two meetings each in 2000 and 2001 and thus far one meeting in 2002. In 2000 the meetings took place on 15 May in the Pilgrim's Mission (Pilgermission) in St. Chrischona near Basle, and on 13 November in the Federal Military Library (Eidgenössische Militärbibliothek) in the Federal Building (Bundeshaus) in Berne; in 2001 on 30 April in the Central Library (Zentralbibliothek) in Zurich with a visit to the Institute of Cartography (Institut für Kartographie, ETH Zürich) of the Federal Institute of Technology in the afternoon, and on 5 November in the renovated Swiss National Library (Schweizerische Landesbibliothek) in Berne; in 2002 on 29 April in the Central and University Library (Zentral- und Hochschulbibliothek) of Lucerne.

The Group's cataloguing section submitted a report on 24 October 2000 concerning the implementation of the Anglo American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd ed. (AACR2) for the cataloguing of cartographic material in Swiss libraries. The report was accepted by all Swiss libraries, so that maps are now catalogued in accordance with these rules.

Activities in map libraries

• Schweizerische Landesbibliothek (Swiss National Library), Berne
  The renovation of the National Library in Berne is now finished.
• Stadt- und Universitätsbibliothek (City and University Library), Berne
  In 2002 a printed catalogue of the Ryhiner Collection will be published. About 900 maps of this collection are accessible on the Internet. It is planned to put a total of 2,200 images on the Internet.
• Bundesamt für Landestopographie (Federal Office of Topography; official abbreviation: Swisstopo), Berne
  Alfred Oberli donated his map collection consisting mainly of topographical maps of the 19th and 20th centuries to the office and cataloguing is now underway. With regard to the topographical maps of Switzerland, the Internet now provides index sheets for graphic searching.
• ETH-Bibliothek (Library of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology), Zürich
  The electronic index sheets Toporama allow a map search by co-ordinates. The spatial search in a graphical catalogue will be possible with a new software module.
  A project for the digitisation of the Topographic Atlas of Switzerland (scales 1:25 000 / 1:50 000), 1870-1950, with about 4,000 sheets was initiated by the ETH Map Library and will now be completed by Swisstopo during the next three years.
• Zentralbibliothek Zürich (City, Cantonal and University Library)
  A new classification system has been created for the reference library of the map department and by the end of 2002 all volumes will have new classification numbers.

Orbituaries
On 28 December 2000, Arthur Dürst (6 October 1926), one of the most important Swiss map historians, died in Zürich. Georges Grosjean (17 January 1921), former professor of geography at the University of Berne and author of various publications on map history died in Berne on 8th April 2002 and Viola Imhof (12 April 1923)), widow of the famous cartographer Eduard Imhof and a geographer in her own right, died in Erlenbach (Canton of Zurich) on 9th June 2002.

Activities of the Work Group for map history (Arbeitsgruppe für Kartengeschichte) within the Swiss Society of Cartography
Under the presidency of Martin Rickenbacher various visits to exhibitions were organised.

Foundation of a new Society für the History of Geodesy in Switzerland
On 23rd November 2001 the Gesellschaft für die Geschichte der Geodäsie in der Schweiz was founded in Aarau.

End of an important Swiss map editor
On 6th December 2001 the cartographic firm Kümmerly and Frey of Berne went bankrupt after almost 150 years in business. The rights were taken over by the map publisher Hallwag AG and the name will change to "Hallwag Kümmerly+Frey".

Papers:
At the 10th Colloquium for map historians in Bonn on 14th September 2000 Hans-Peter Höhener and Thomas Klöti presented one of the main papers on the subject of old map usage in libraries (Altkartennutzung in Bibliotheken).
At the map curators' meeting of the German Society of Cartography in Salzburg on 5th October 2001, Jürg Bühler presented a paper on text-free spatial search in the graphic catalogue (Textfreie räumliche Suche im graphischen Katalog).

Exhibitions:

• Panoramen = Augen reisen: 23rd November 2001 to 1st May 2002: Schweizerisches Alpines Museum, Berne
• Dem Sarganserland und Glarnerland in die Karten geschaut: 21st April to 31st October 2002: Museum Sarganslerland, Sargans.
• Dufour - General und Kartograph: 14th May to 27th October 2002: Gletschergarten, Lucerne
• Strassenszenen: Wege und Karten in der Luzerner Geschichte: 29th May to 1st September 2002: Historisches Museum, Lucerne
• In the Gletschergarten Lucerne on 23rd November 2002 the renovated Relief of Central Switzerland by Pfyffer was presented for the first time.

New publications

• Monographs
  • Augenreisen - Das Panorama in der Schweiz: Katalog zur Ausstellung Panoramen = Augenreisen. Bern, 2002
  • Brandenberger, René. Hans Conrad Escher von der Linth, 1767-1823: die ersten Panoramen der Alpen: Zeichnungen, Ansichten, Panoramen, Karten = the first panoramas of the Alps: drawings, views, panoramas and maps. Mollis, 2002 (with CD-ROM)
  • Dürst, Arthur: Ingenieur Johannes Müller 1733-1816: Der Zürcher Stadtplan von 1788-93. Zürich, 2001 (with CD-ROM)
  • Germann, Thomas. Zürich im Zeitraffer. Von 1621 bis zur ersten Stadtvereinigung 1893. Zürich, 2000
  • Gurtner, Martin. 50 Jahre Skitourenkarten Swiss-Ski. Muri, Wabern, 2000
• Facsimiles and Reproductions
  • Atlas des Feldzuges der kaiserlich russischen Truppen in der Schweiz unter dem Oberbefehl von Generalissimus Fürst Italijskij Graf Suworow im Jahre 1799. Hrsg:: Arthur Dürst. Zürich, 2000
  • Karte des Kantons Schaffhausen, ca. 1:25 000 von Heinrich Peyer 1684. Murten, 2000 (reduced to 50 %)
• CD-ROMs
  • Swiss Map 50. Wabern. Bundesamt für Landestopographie, 2000. 4 CD-ROMs
  • Swiss Map 100: Version 3.0. Wabern: Bundesamt für Landestopographie, 2001
  • A CD ROM of the Dufourkarte is being prepared by the Bundesamt für Landestopographie.

Hans-Peter Höhener, Zentralbibliothek Zürich