Askaukalis

Magna Germania

Askaukalis (Greek ἀσκαυκαλίς, Latin Ascaucalis) was a place in Central Europe mentioned by Claudius Ptolemy in Geography (Γεωγραφικὴ Ὑφήγησις) and was one of 94 located on Germania Magna. The fourth map of Europe (Γερμανάδα) was identified with today's Nakło, Bydgoszcz or Krusz Zamkowa.

History

Title page of Geographicae Enarrationis published in 1535

Askaukalis was one of the settlements in the Gothic (Gothic-Gepidzki) state, known in Polish archeology as Wielbark culture. This country was founded on the territory of today's Poland in the first century CE by East Germanic tribes.

About 150 A.D. A Greek mathematician and astronomer, Claudius Ptolemy, who lived in Alexandria placed her on Germania Magna, the fourth map of Europe (Γερμανίας Μεγάλης θέσις, Εὐρώπης πίναξ δ´), one of the 26 maps included in the famous Geography (Γεωγραφικὴ Ὑφήγησις.) The ancient researcher himself did not participate in the cartographic measurements that was needed to create them. He owed most of the information to merchants traversing the lands that he was interested in and to military cartographers of the Roman Empire.

Research

Ptolemy, understandably, did not avoid errors resulting mainly from the need to transfer spherical reality to the map plane. He assumed that the countries between the Baltic and the Danube were much narrower, which meant that places from such a distant past were extremely difficult to identify on modern maps. What's more, he was wrong in pointing out the location not only of places difficult to locate but also of such characteristic locations as, for example, Jutland or Schleswig-Holstein.

At the Institute of Geodesy and Geoinformation at the Technical University in Berlin, a group of scientists consisting of classical philologists, mathematicians and cartographers made an attempt to correct these errors and developed the so-called "Geodetic deformation analysis." On its basis, a list of cities (poleis) from Magna Germania was created with their assumed locations in today's Germany and Poland. According to Berlin scientists, these locations also correspond to archaeological sites in which Gothic settlements and burial sites were previously discovered. Also research in Bydgoszcz confirmed that in that period, due to its convenient location and easy crossing through the Brda, there was a significant development of settlements related to lively trade contacts with the Roman Empire through the Amber Route. Askaukalis was included in the so-called group 3, in which the settlements were located. Furthermore, settlements in this group were in the place of today's cities. However, as a result of mass migrations in the late antiquity they are not their direct precursors due to the lack of settlement continuity.

See Also

• The history of Bydgoszcz until 1346
• Aleksandra Cofta-Broniewska - researcher of the settlement team

References

1. The Geography of Claudius Ptolemy. University of Chicago - Bill Thrayer's website. [accessed December 28, 2012].
2. Ascaucalis. Pierer's Universal-Lexikon (1857). [accessed December 28, 2012].
3. Facsimile of the lexicon page 797. www.zeno.org. [accessed December 28, 2012].
4. Ptolemy's map of Germania. "Der Spiegel," January 10, 2010. [accessed December 28, 2012].
5. Archaeological Exhibition ASKAUKALIS Inowrocław. Kujawy Culture Center. [access 2014-02-11].
6. Janusz Ostoja-Zagórski, The oldest history of Polish lands, 1996.
7. Matthias Schulz. Berlin Researchers Crack the Ptolemy Code. "Der Spiegel", January 10, 2010. [accessed December 28, 2012].
8. Deformation analysis and regional adaptation of a historical geodata database, Technical University of Berlin, Institute for Geodesy and Geoinformation Technology, Berlin 2007 - Mathematical model of Christian Marks and Frank Neitzel to correct errors contained in the Geographic Hyphasis of Claudius Ptolemy of Berlin (Technical University). www.geodesy.tu-berlin.de. [accessed December 28, 2012].
9. Gerard Wilke, Prehistory and early Middle Ages in the light of archaeological sources (until the beginning of the 12th century) (in:) History of Bydgoszcz - Volume I, September 6667, p. 52.
10. Elżbieta Dygaszewicz. From Paleolithic to the Middle Ages, in: Calendar Bydgoski Bydgoszcz, Ed. Association of Lovers of the City of Bydgoszcz, pp. 55–62, 2000, ISSN 0209-3081
11. Andreas Kleineberg, Christian Marx, Eberhard Knobloch, Dieter Lelgemann (eds.), "Germania and the Isle of Thule: The Decoding of Ptolemy 'Atlas of the Oikumene,'" ed. Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt, 2010, ISBN 978-3-534-23757-9.

Documents

1. Ptolemy: the Geography (original text with English translation and introduction.) www.penelope.uchicago.edu. [accessed December 28, 2012].
2. Cosmograp of Claudius Ptolemy's Alexandria. Digital National Library. [accessed December 28, 2012].

Bibliography

1. Andreas Kleineberg, Christian Marx, Eberhard Knobloch, Dieter Lelgemann (eds.), "Germania and the Isle of Thule: The Decoding of Ptolemy 'Atlas of the Oikumene,'" ed. Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt, 2010, ISBN 978-3-534-23757-9.
2. Deformation analysis and regional adaptation of a historical geodata database, Technical University of Berlin, Institute for Geodesy and Geoinformation Technology, Berlin 2007 - Mathematical model of Christian Marks and Frank Neitzel to correct errors contained in the Geographic Hyphasis of Claudius Ptolemy of Berlin (Technical University). www.geodesy.tu-berlin.de. [accessed December 28, 2012].
3. Janusz Ostoja-Zagórski, The oldest history of the Polish lands, Bydgoszcz, ed. WSP, pp. 179-180, 1996, ISBN 83-7096-142-8.
4. Gerard Wilke, Prehistory and early Middle Ages in the light of archaeological sources (until the beginning of the 12th century), in: History of Bydgoszcz - Volume I, Warsaw-Poznań, ed. PWN, pp. 49-71, 1991, ISBN 83-01-06667-9.
5. Elżbieta Dygaszewicz. From Paleolithic to the Middle Ages, in: Calendar Bydgoski Bydgoszcz, Ed. Association of Lovers of the City of Bydgoszcz, pp. 55–62, 2000, ISSN 0209-3081
6. Matthias Schulz. Berlin Researchers Crack the Ptolemy Code. "Der Spiegel", January 10, 2010. [accessed December 28, 2012].