The aim of the project is to systematize sources of travels around/into GDL in the 16th-18th centuries and actualize representative travel writings on the basis of the research of early modern society mobility, to create new products (website, virtual map), to prepare collective monograph “Homo Viator. Travelling Lithuania”.

The tasks. 1. Examine the sources of research on the problem of travel, identify the most important travel routes and display them on a virtual map. 2. Identify travel infrastructure objects by linking them with the coordinates of the Geographic Information System (GIS) in a virtual map of present-day Lithuania, accessible via the Internet site. 3. Investigate the concept of travel and typologize trips by their nature, routes, composition of travelers. 4. Reveal the relationship and mutual interaction between the travelling person and the elements of the infrastructure (roads, pubs, mills, sacral objects). 5. Examine the representations of early modern travel in the media, discuss the behavior, experiences and expression of the traveling person applying visitors’ experiences research access and methodology. In this research, mobility is understood as the relationship of the traveller with the characteristic period infrastructure, such as roads, bridges, pubs, defined by the travel space. The term “Lithuania” encompasses the travel space and infrastructure of the GDL, which had continuity in the first half of the 19th century. In order to actualize the research and to apply it to the contemporary tourism sector, a virtual map will be produced on the basis of the present-day territory of Lithuania, however, with an expectation for the future usage of a working travel visualization model for the heritage communication in neighboring countries (for instance, Belarus and Latvia). The scientific problem being solved in the project is based on the fact that the research data on trips into GDL have not been eclipsed, updated and disseminated in the virtual space.

Project leader: prof. (HP) dr. Arvydas Pacevčius

Project duration: from 2021 April until 2023 December

This project has received funding from the Research Council of Lithuania (LMTLT)