DigitalSEE (Digital South-Eastern Europe) is a digital research initiative and virtual repository dedicated to documenting, interpreting, and contextualizing textual and visual representations of artifacts and monuments across the Balkans from the Early Modern period to the late 19th century. By bringing together diverse sources, the project provides an integrated environment for exploring how cultural heritage has been recorded, transmitted, lost, and reimagined in a region shaped by complex linguistic and political dynamics. A central aim of DigitalSEE is to connect dispersed materials, foster scholarly interaction, and encourage reflective engagement with how past observers encountered the landscapes and monuments of the Ottoman Balkans.

Research begins with the systematic collection of evidence related to a monument, site, or theme, followed by cross-verification through source tracing and comparison with archaeological and historical data. The corpus spans multiple languages, including Latin, German, French, English, and Ottoman Turkish. This multilingual range reveals how descriptions of the same artifact or location were shaped by linguistic choices, cultural expectations, and the positionality of individual travelers. By integrating original and modern place names alongside multilingual metadata and gazetteer links, the project enables navigation across textual traditions while remaining attentive to translation and historical nuance.

A distinctive feature of DigitalSEE is its focus on small-scale, heterogeneous datasets. Rather than aggregating large corpora, the project prioritizes carefully curated entries that preserve uncertainty, contradiction, and interpretive openness. The dataset currently includes approximately 150 records drawn primarily from 17th and 18th-century travelogues. These observations,often fragmentary or uneven,form a layered record of how monuments were perceived over time. Comparing repetitions, omissions, and inconsistencies provides insight into processes such as destruction, reuse of building materials, altered travel routes, and shifting scholarly or antiquarian interests.

Particular attention is given to ancient monuments, which frequently appear in early travel narratives as incidental curiosities. Although systematic archaeological research in the region developed only in the late 19th century, earlier accounts preserve descriptions of monuments that no longer survive. One example is the reconstruction of the history of the arch at Trajan’s Gate, destroyed in 1835. Through the combined analysis of textual and visual evidence, the project identified the creator of a long-misattributed engraving as the Augsburg artist Jeremiah Wachsmuth, whose work likely relied on an earlier traveler’s sketch. This case demonstrates how archival fragments shape the memory and interpretation of monuments across centuries.

DigitalSEE’s infrastructure supports both exploratory research and sustained engagement. The system offers filterable search, query functions, and an interactive geospatial interface. Required metadata fields ensure consistency, while the data model accommodates uncertainty in dating, provenance, and description. The public-facing website allows users to browse entries, inspect high-resolution images, view location maps, and connect to external authoritative resources.

The project follows standards such as TEI EpiDoc and CIDOC CRM. Computational methods, including topic modeling and spatial analysis adapted to small datasets, support interpretation without flattening complexity. DigitalSEE promotes collaborative scholarship and public engagement with the cultural heritage of Southeastern Europe by sharing its software, models, and resources via GitHub, Zenodo, and a Linktree portal.