Wikimedian in Residence

Supporting the University of Edinburgh's commitments to digital skills, information literacy, and sharing knowledge openly

Tag: scotland loves monuments

Witch Lore and Scottish Castles September Editathon

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On October 10, 2024

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Witch Lore and Scottish Castles: a Wikipedia Editathon

Eilean Donan Castle, by Diliff [CC BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia Commons

On Friday 27th September we were joined by castle buffs and witchcraft enthusiasts to help us improve the representation of Scottish witchcraft and heritage on Wikipedia. Our Witch Lore and Scottish Castles editathon event saw people coming together in the Digital Scholarship Centre of the Main Library to add ‘Witchlore’, stories and information relating to early modern witchcraft, to pages about Scottish castles and heritage locations.

A page created during our September editathon, CC-BY-SA by Ellie Whitehead

A number of Wikipedia pages about castles in Scotland neglected to mention their place in the stories of Scotland’s accused witches. The event looked to remedy this, adding some stories about witchcraft and accused witches to pages such as, Craigmillar Castle, Dirleton Castle, St Magnus Cathedral and Falkland Palace.

We also saw some brand-new pages about Scottish castles and heritage locations created! These include, Bass Castle, Logie House and Steading, and Poldrate Mill. Yet, despite our team’s valiant efforts – as ever – there is still more work to be done. See our worklist to take a look at a list of pages that we didn’t get around to improving and creating and have ago yourself! Some special mentions here would be to improve the mention of folklore in the Forvie Nature Reserve, Crichton Castle and Culross.

A diary from the University of Edinburgh Special Collections, CC-BY-SA by Ellie Whitehead

As part of this event, we also hosted an exhibition of material about Scottish castles and witchcraft that the university special collections hold. It was a great addition to the event to be able to get our hands on these items and see some archival material that linked directly to what we were editing.

We got to see hand-painted watercolours and sketches of castles, hand-written legends from the Outer Hebridies about witches living in Kisimul Castle on Barra. We were able to leaf through architectural plans and drawings of Scotland’s Castles and seventeenth-century demonological books, such as George Sinclair’s Satans Invisible World Discovered.

An exhibition of material relating to witchcraft and castles from the University of Edinburgh Special Collections, CC-BY-SA by Ellie Whitehead

Keeping true to our heritage theme, Ruby Imrie also gave us a presentation on the Wikipedia photography project and competition Wiki Loves Monuments! This is an annual international competition that takes place in September which encourages people to go out and take photographs of heritage locations around them and upload them to Wikipedia. Take a look at some of the 1,645 images that were uploaded this September in Scotland in celebration of cultural heritage!

Overall, at this event saw 16 editors create 4 articles and edit 114! A grand total of 236 edits were made and 6000 words were added.  Articles created or edited at this event have been viewed over 5500 times! See our dashboard for a more detailed insight into what we added.

This was a great event, which added some fantastic information about Scotland’s supernatural history and heritage onto Wikipedia. Thank you to all those who attended. Our next major event that we would like to highlight is the launch of our BRAND NEW Map of Scottish Witchcraft, Map of Memorials and Curious Edinburgh Walking Tour. Join us on the 23rd October between 3-4.30pm at Lecture Theatre 2.35 at the Edinburgh Futures Institute. Hope to see you there!

Written by Ellie Whitehead, Assistant Wikimedian in Residence

Scotland Loves Monuments 2019

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On September 2, 2019

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Get involved in Wiki Loves Monuments!

Wiki Loves Monuments is an international photo competition which takes part throughout the month of September every year, and is supported by the Wikimedia Foundation. The aim is to crowdsource as many high quality, openly licensed photos as possible of scheduled monuments and listed buildings throughout the world. Why? Because documenting our cultural heritage today is so important.
In the UK, there will be prizes for the best photos of a site in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales as well as prizes for the best UK photos overall. The latter will then be put forward for international prizes. 

Why take part?

Portobello and Wikipedia – Great 8 min podcast featuring University of Edinburgh Digital Curator Gavin Willshaw and Dr Margaret Munro of the Portobello Heritage Society discussing the importance of surfacing local heritage online.

Portobello beach by Photochrom Print Collection [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

 
Wikimedia Commons is a free repository of photographs, audio and video content that anyone can use, re-use or distribute. Images on Commons can also be used to illustrate Wikipedia articles – which can then be seen by a global audience.  But not all of our rich heritage is represented – there are a number of gaps when it comes to the coverage of Scotland – and this year, we’d like to do what we can to change that.
Is your organisation or group looking for activities for September?  Wiki Loves Monuments can be a great activity for local social or volunteer groups, not just those those concerned with photography or history.  Why not organise a heritage walk to take pictures of listed buildings in the local area, and visit the local museum or library at the same time?

How do you take part?

Register for an account on Wikimedia Commons. (Individuals only, no organisational accounts.) If you already have a Wikipedia account, no need to register for a new account on Wikimedia Commons, you can use the same account for Wikimedia Commons. To enter the competition you must make sure that your account has a valid email address and that your email is activated. To check that, once you have logged in, look for “My preferences” tab at the top right of the page. Click on it, and then select “enable email from other users.”  This will allow the competition organisers and other registered users on Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons to contact you but will not make your email address publicly available.

Wiki Loves Monuments – dynamic map of Edinburgh showing listed buildings requiring an image (in red).

What should you photograph? How do you upload it?

In Scotland, the subjects eligible to be entered in Wiki Loves Monuments are those designated by Historic Environment Scotland references for Listed Buildings and Scheduled Monuments. If you’re not sure what buildings or monuments are classed as listed, don’t worry! We’ve got a great tool for you to use to upload your photos which includes an interactive map.

Blue pins on the map indicate monuments which already have a photo on Wikimedia Commons, whereas red pins indicate where they are missing. Select your town or city then wander around your local area and look for buildings or monuments with red pins. You can take photos on smartphones, tablets or cameras and then upload them by selecting the appropriate pin on the map and clicking upload. Make sure that you are logged into your Wikimedia Commons account and follow the basic instructions. Every photo uploaded via the interactive map will be entered into the Wiki Loves Monuments.

You can take more than one photo of a building or monument. Preferably one should be a photo of the building or monument as a whole, but also use your photographic flair to add photos of key features, inside views or behind the scenes features that the public doesn’t normally get to see. Doors Open Day runs throughout September and is a great opportunity to organise a photography tour of a building or a tour of the local listed monuments in your town.

Last year I had the pleasure of visiting and snapping pictures of the Glasgow City Chambers, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Anchor Line bar, Garnethill Synagogue and the Arlington Baths among many other locations as part of Glasgow Doors Open Days 2018.

Other tips:

  • Not sure that your photo skills are up to the competition? Don’t worry about it, the important thing is to take part. The more photos we can crowdsource, the more we can improve the coverage of listed buildings and monuments in Scotland, which is our ultimate goal. You can also check the Wiki Loves Monuments blog for tips on how to best take architectural photos.
  • Wiki Loves Monuments is aimed at everyone! You don’t have to be an expert photographer, or have prior experience with any of the Wikimedia projects.
  • The competition runs through the whole of September from the 1st till the 30th and any entries uploaded during that time will be part of the competition. Photos don’t have to have been taken during September though, so you can add old photos, as long as they’ve not been previously uploaded to Wikimedia Commons. Doors Open Day is a great opportunity to tie in with Wiki Loves Monuments, so if you know local DOD venues or if you work with a local heritage officer, please advertise it with them too.

How can you take part?

National Museum of Brazil, by Paulo R C M Jr. [CC BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia Commons

The grief that comes from lost buildings

In 2017, Scotland was voted the most beautiful country in the world in a Rough Guide readers’ poll.

There’s nowhere quite like it.

Yet, we can take it for granted that our beautiful locations, listed buildings and monuments will always be there… something that can never be fully guaranteed. Political and economic tides change  and forces of nature can have devastating effects as we have seen with the destruction of Palmyra in Syria, the devastating fires at the National Museum of Brazil, Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris and, more closer to home, the Mackintosh building fire at the Glasgow School of Art, Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s masterwork. There is a grief that comes from these lost buildings, their histories and what they had come to represent & symbolise. Recognising that there can be a profound regret and sadness at the cultural losses and a significant connection with the past means we can act today to look around us and appreciate the cultural heritage all around us. Many of us have access to a camera or camera phone and may even walk past these buildings every day. All it takes is looking up, taking a snap and uploading it in seconds and you’ve done something amazing to help document our cultural heritage for all time.

That’s why it’s so important that we take the opportunity to document our cultural heritage now for future generations before it is too late. Share your high quality pics of listed buildings and monuments to Wikimedia Commons and help preserve our cultural heritage online. After days out, weekend breaks and holidays at home & abroad, there will be gigabytes of pics taken in recent months and years. These could remain on your memory card or be shared to Commons and help illustrate Wikipedia for the benefit of all.

Aside from being great fun, Wiki Loves Monuments is a way of capturing a snapshot of our nation’s cultural heritage for future generations and documenting our country’s most important historic sites. Don’t wait till it’s too late, do your bit today! Click here to view a map of your local area to get started.

You just take a quick look at the map, take a pic and upload. It takes seconds and is the easiest way to take part in this year’s competition.

If each one of us took just 1 pic, we’d have this sewn up in a couple of weeks. Which is when Wiki Loves Monuments closes – end of 30 September 2019. But if you can do more then great.

#ScotWiki #WikiLovesMonuments

ps. If nothing else, let’s give our counterparts in Ireland, England and Wales a run for their money in terms of how many images we can upload. A little friendly rivalry never hurts, right?

Scotland uploaded 300+ images in 2016. That rose to 2,100 in 2017 with 1,351 of those uploaded by staff at the University of Edinburgh. In 2018, Scotland smashed it with 4,411 images uploaded. Let’s smash it again this September!

Let’s see if we can get pics from ALL over Scotland this year. Everyone is welcome to take part and every picture helps.

You can check out the images uploaded so far for Wiki Loves Monuments in Scotland here.

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