Producing a Biblical Atlas

by Hertz, Elizabeth Anne

The purpose of this thesis was to develop a procedure for simplifying the production of a biblical atlas. The atlas was to be designed specifically for those people interested in the geography of the Bible, and looking at the themes and events in the Bible in a spatial way. The procedures used in developing the contents involved the use of interviews with different experts and reviewing different biblical atlases. Telephone and email interviews were given to twelve experts to gain information about producing a biblical atlas. The participants in the interviews were selected based upon their knowledge of the specific topics, including history, theology, and cartography. By answering the interview questions, the experts helped aid in finding the information for producing a biblical atlas. Once the preliminary contents were formulated, the creation of the atlas had to be tested to see if the page layout, contents, and maps would all work together. Biblical atlas production requires a complicated set of steps to create a refined product. Producing a general atlas also requires many steps to complete. Reviews of the methods developed by Jim Anderson and Thomas Sullivan on general atlas production lead to the steps in this atlas for biblical atlas production. The author succeeded in producing a series of steps: a table of contents, a template for pages, as well as an example of what the atlas should look like. The author did not produce all of the contents for a biblical atlas. After the preliminary work has been done, the person producing the atlas still needs to gather a team to research all of the historical, biblical, and cartographic data that they will need in producing the atlas. After the data has been gathered, it has to be put together and a publisher needs to be found. The recommendation of this thesis is not to produce an atlas unless it is profitable enough to warrant a publisher taking ownership of it.