DEVELOPMENT OF TOPOGRAPHIC MAPPING IN CROATIA 
M. Lapaine™*, I. Landek” 
‘Faculty of Geodesy, University of Zagreb, Kaci¢eva 26, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia — mlapaine@geof.hr 
*State Geodetic Administration, Grugka 20, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia — ivan.landek@dgu.hr 
KEY WORDS: Cartography, Mapping, History, National, Database, Surveying, Geodesy 
ABSTRACT: 
A presentation of the development of topographic mapping in Croatia is given in this paper. The introduction gives a short historical 
overview. The second chapter deals with the topographic survey and topographic mapping in Croatia. It encompasses the description 
of the Croatian Base Map, and all other topographic maps made for the territory of Croatia between the two world wars, after the 
Second World War and especially in the independent Republic of Croatia. At the end there is a short presentation of the goals and 
expected results of the project carried out on the establishment of topographic database in Croatia. 
1. INTRODUCTION 
At the end of the 17th century, the work on topography referred 
to capturing of material and publishing of written and drawn 
presentations of natural and man-made objects along with the 
description of social and economic conditions in an area. 
During the 18th century, the topography became a technical 
activity within the scope of geodesy, first at regional levels, and 
then through a systematic topographic survey of individual 
countries. 
The first Croatian topographers were Ivan Klobutarié, Stjepan 
Glavaé and Pavao Ritter-Vitezovié. The Augustinian monk 
Ivan Klobucari¢ (1550-1605) who was active in Rijeka and 
Fürstenfeld, was collecting very significant topographic 
materials for the maps of Croatian territories that have remained 
manuscripts. The Jesuit and professor Stjepan Glavaé (1627- 
1680) compiled a topographic map of Croatia of that time on 
the basis of information collected in the field, and that map is a 
major work of Croatian cartography in the 17th century (Fig. 
1). Pavao Ritter-Vitezovié (1652-1713), a polyhistorian, left a 
few manuscript maps of Croatian-Turkish border that had been 
made during the demarcation carried out after the peace in 
Srijemski Karlovci in 1699. 
The very first among the topographic maps of a state is the 
Geometric map of France at the scale of 1:86 400 that was 
made in the period between 1750-1793, after very extensive 
geodetic fundamental works and topographic survey had been 
done. The second most important topographic survey in the 
world in the 18th century was the Joseph II Land Survey of 
Austrian lands carried out between 1764 and 1787. The 
topographic map at the scale of 1:28 800 was made on 3589 
sheets (1 Viennese thumb on the map correspond to 400 
Viennese fathoms of 72 thumbs in the nature) The first 
systematic and complete detailed cartographic presentations of 
Croatian lands were made at that time, except those of Dalmatia 
and Istria (Lovrié, 1992). 
Croatia in the 18th, 19th and partly in the 20th century was a 
part of Austria, Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, Venice and 
Turkey or occupied by these countries. During that period, four 
Austrian surveys were made, i.e.: the first or Joseph II land 
survey, the second or Francis land survey, the third or Francis- 
Joseph land survey and the fourth or precise land survey. 
Within the frame of these surveys, the topographic maps of 
Croatian territories were also made. 
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Figure 1. Detail from the map Regni Sclavoniae et Croatiae... 
by Stjepan Glavaé, 1673 
Croatia was not an independent state for almost the whole 20th 
century being first a part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and 
Slovenians, and then of several Yugoslavias. 
The classical detailed topographic land survey was made with a 
polar procedure using planetable and sight rule or alhidade. 
However, in the 20th century, the procedures of a detailed 
topographic survey and the production of topographic maps 
using the photographs taken from the ground or from the air 
were developed. More about the development of photogram- 
metry in former Yugoslavia can be found in the Proceedings 
Savjetovanja o fotogrametriji (Conference on Photogrammetry) 
  
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