Artists and Generals: The Representation of Colonial and National Rule through Street Naming

Abstract

The history of multinational East-Central Europe is increasingly viewed through a colonial lens. This article contributes to the ongoing discourse about the applicability of colonial frameworks by looking at the cultural connotations embedded in urban street names by dominant elites. Between the 1860s and 1914, street naming emerged as a tool for demarcating territories, asserting authority, and popularizing historical narratives. Drawing on a database of 168 towns and cities, this study reveals distinct divergences in official street naming practices between multinational regions of the Austro-Hungarian, German, and Romanov Empires, and overseas exploitation colonies of the British, French, Portuguese, Dutch, German, and Spanish empires. In the latter, street names often accentuated ethnic and racial distinctions, but in the former, they tended to mitigate such differences. Colonial street names frequently evoked the exotic imagery of their surroundings, predominantly focusing on the European conquest in their time map. Unlike the prevalent trend of bestowing high cultural namesakes in Europe, colonial nomenclature also leaned toward military and bureaucratic references. Moreover, colonial streets frequently referenced the metropolitan geography, whereas inhabitants of national peripheries seemed less inclined to tether their identities to the center. Finally, colonial cities typically underwent more extensive renaming in a commemorative vein, contrasting with the more stable street names in East-Central Europe. In this context, distinctive colonial traits are identified in the street naming practices of Russian-ruled Poland. The maps used in this publication are partly based on the following source: © EuroGeographics for the administrative boundaries.