16th International Conference on “Cultural Heritage and New Technologies” Vienna, 2011 545 DATASCAPE Survey and Data Integration in the Amstelland Atlas Project Jaap Evert ABRAHAMSE 1 / Erik SCHMITZ 2 1 Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands / 2 Amsterdam City Archives, The Netherlands Abstract: Researchers of the Cultural Heritage Department of the Netherlands and Amsterdam City Archives are engaged in an interdisciplinary research project on the subject of Amstelland, the area south of the city of Amsterdam. In this project, the result of which will be a GIS-based atlas, an interdisciplinary approach to landscape is followed. The central theme of the Amstelland study is the interdependence of the city and its surroundings, the mutual influence of urban and rural landscapes over time. This article starts with a description of the main characteristics of the Amstelland territory. It is followed by some methodological remarks about the research project, which involves the integration of data from many different sources and historical periods and therefore can be characterized as a ‘survey of surveys’. This multi-layered approach is demonstrated on the basis of analysis of both historic surveying and modern data about the archaeology and built heritage of the Ronde Hoep polder, one of the most remarkable landscape structures of the area. The Amstelland Atlas Project aims to get a grip on landscape dynamics by constructing a multi-layered survey, in which the layers are interconnected. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate historical knowledge by understanding that every layer of archaeological, archival or historical data, has gone through its own process of formation. Only by seeing through this process, a genuine understanding of this complex ‘datascape’ is possible. Keywords: Amstelland, The Netherlands, urban and rural landscapes, peatland archaeology, Ronde Hoep polder. In 2010, the Landscape Research Department of the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands was asked to conduct a research project of the Amstelland area, located to the south of Amsterdam. This request was the direct result of the publication of another landscape study by the department, which was aimed at the Bretten area, west of the centre of Amsterdam (ABRAHAMSE et al. 2010). This earlier study was carried out in close cooperation with Erik Schmitz, researcher at the Amsterdam City Archives, who also agreed to contribute to the Amstelland Atlas project. Both studies are conceived along the lines laid out in recent years by the development of the method of ‘landscape biography’. The Amstelland Atlas project can take advantage of the experience of the Bretten area project, as well as the lessons learned from other recent research projects (see, for instance: NEEFJES et al. 2011). Landscape biography was developed to conduct interdisciplinary research of landscape, with the intention of integrating knowledge and putting research to the use of landscape management (for some more information about the method of landscape biography and its use in the Netherlands, see for instance: SPEK et al. 2006; ABRAHAMSE et al. 2008). The Amstelland Atlas is expected to be published in the autumn of 2012.