Atlant and Slovene national consciousness in the second half of the 19th century

Abstract

The geographic literature made an important contribution to the development of national consciousness among Slovenes in the 19thcentury, as well as to the reinforcement of Slovene identity after Slovenia's independence in 1991. A typical example of this kind of geographic publication is Atlant, the first atlas of the world in the Slovene language, which was published in installments from 1869 to 1877. Atlant followed the concept of a Unified Slovenia, and this idea boosted the confidence of Slovenes, the bulk of whom were incorporated into Austria-Hungary as they entered the stage of European politics as a nation for the first time. With the publication of Atlant, a number of geographical names were trans-lated into Slovene or Slovenized for the first time. The geographic, linguistic, and political conditions in which Slovenes lived, as well as the relations at the time between Slovene, German, and Slavic languages, are reflect-ed in the way foreign place names were adapted. The reprinting of Atlant in 2005 is also associated with a critical period in history, since it was published after the independence of Slovenia and its inclusion in the European Union, a time when the young state has been seeking its identity among all the world's nations.

Keywords

• historical geography
• cartography
• atlas
• map
• slovenia
• austria-hungary
• geographical name
• endonym
• exonym
• identity
• nation building
• national consciousness