Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter 11
The HGIS Experience of Drawing Sub-county
Unit Boundaries in the Jiangnan Region of Late
Imperial China
Ka-chai Tam and Kee-long Billy So
11.1
Introduction
During the late imperial period (1100-1911), the Chinese documented local
information on almost every part of the imperial realm into generations of local
gazetteers (difangzhi
). “Local gazetteers are chronicles
of the history, present conditions, and noted people of local areas, arranged by
topic (Brook
1988
: 49-72).” In addition to the detailed accounts of taxation and
population records, local customs, governmental policies, biographies of native
notables and local historical events, these gazetteers also include primitive maps
of towns and other local landmarks. However, there are two obvious limitations to
consulting these highly specialized sources when performing geographical and his-
torical research. First, the primitive maps and diagrams of these gazetteers provide
insufficient coordination for modern cartography, and give few hints related to spa-
tial analysis (Fig.
11.1
). In other words, it would not be worthwhile to handle them
directly as secondary sources to be converted into Geographical Information System
(GIS) raster data by computer scanning. Second, although much of the information
provided by the gazetteers is extremely precise in spatial terms, without a reliable
unit platform for sub-county divisions and landscape structures, they can only be
analyzed verbally at the county (xian
or fangzhi
地方志
方志
) and even provincial
levels. It used to be almost impossible to conduct a meso-level analysis of the indi-
vidual households and the county, i.e., the basic units of Chinese imperial control.
), prefectural (fu
縣
府
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