Places Named in British Periodical Writing on the Levant, 1750–1829

Map title

Places Named in British Periodical Writing on the Levant, 1750–1829

Author

Omer Shadmi

Owner

Zoe Beenstock

Publication date / version

Version 1 (publication date to be added)

Geographic coverage

Europe, the Mediterranean and the Near East: from the British Isles and the Baltic Sea to the Caspian Sea, Arabia and North Africa

CRS

Lambert azimuthal equal-area, centred on 38°N, 25°E (+proj=laea +lat_0=38 +lon_0=25 +x_0=0 +y_0=0 +datum=WGS84 +units=m); no EPSG code

Dimensions

Two panels of 102.5 × 90.6 mm each

Map file

Zoe m0.png

Software

QGIS 3.34 and 3.40; Claude (Anthropic); Kepler.gl (data exploration)

Documentation date / method

29 October 2026. Written in retrospect from the project files and the records of the Claude conversations. Documented by The Spatial Studio (spatial-studio.net)

Permanent link

https://spatial-studio.net/maps/british-periodicals-places/

Stage

What was done

AI / Human

1.

Dataset of mentions of the Levant in a list of British periodicals by keywords

Human (Inna Kizhner)

2.

Creating a spatialized dataset of places included in the original dataset: geocoding the database by automated reconciliation with Wikidata and other datasets with constant review and decisions making about what places to include, right reconciliation, and right names to use.

Human (Omer Shadmi, Zoe Beenstock)

3.

Visualizing the spatialized database using Kepler.gl

Human (Omer Shadmi)

4.

Exploring insights in the visualization

Human (Zoe and Omer)

5.

An AI agent created by Zoe to search for insights in Kepler.

AI (Claude)

6.

Exploration of important insights using Claude and in dialogue with Omer. Three different maps were chosen for production

Humans (Zoe)

7.

Creation of map drafts by Zoe’s Claude

AI (Claude)

8

Omer sent Zoe a prompt to produce a QGIS project he can design.

Human (Omer)

9

Zoe’s Claude produced a QGIS project

AI (Claude)

10

Review of the AI-generated QGIS project for CRS, locations, layers sources, labels, and data

Human

11

Initial design rounds using a Claude skill Omer created: options for the basemap (colour, relief, sea texture), fonts and symbols, shown on all three maps, while the data is locked. After each round Omer chose and refined the options.

AI (Claude) generates options; Human (Omer) selects

12

Change of CRS from an equirectangular projection (true scale at 40°N) to a Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection centred on 38°N, 25°E. Claude proposed it and rendered both versions for comparison; Omer chose it.

AI (Claude) proposes and renders; Human (Omer) decides

13

Further design rounds on basemap colour, symbols (rings for places, full circles for the M0b regions) and labels. Omer asked for a calmer, lighter look: sea ripples removed, thinner coastlines, quieter labels.

AI (Claude) generates options; Human (Omer) selects and gives feedback

14

Layout: a QGIS project with a 16:9 slide layout for the M0 diptych, with scale bar and north arrow. Label colours, sizes, legend and label positions were then adjusted in QGIS.

AI (Claude) builds the project; Human (Omer) adjusts in QGIS.

15

Writing a style guide for the series (labels, colours, typography, slide grid, CRS) from the saved M0 project, to reuse for M1 and M2.

AI (Claude), at Omer's request

16

Check of data and font licenses.

AI (Claude)

17

Several rounds of changing minor issues

AI and Human (Zoe and Omer)

18

Final Human review by a premade map publication check list

Human (Omer)

Data

Source

Places and other data

Researcher’s dataset of place-mentions in four British periodicals, 1750–1829: The Gentleman’s Magazine, The Monthly Review, The London Magazine and The Universal Magazine. Data mining: Dr. Inna Kizhner.

Land and sea polygons

Natural Earth 1:50m (public domain)