It’s four years since we first posted about the British Library Georeferencing project. Using historical maps from the archives and Google Maps API the British Library are producing an interesting overlay of historic maps. The project is now 65% complete with thousands of old maps from around the United Kingdom and around the world included in the database.
The project covers large cities such as London through to small towns. Initially the project tagged the Goad maps held by the library to the Google Maps API. That placed 2700 images onto the map allowing then and now contrasts to be made. The project now includes thousands of other maps. These go beyond the United Kingdom and include maps from the archives that relate to all corners of the world. The current database can be searched through a zoomable map found on this page.
With a large database of maps that have been fully linked to the project a easy to search website has been launched. This makes it really easy to find a historical map from around the world. These can be found here http://www.oldmapsonline.org. This site includes links to other archives, making it a very comprehensive database of maps that have been tagged by professionals from archives around the world.