What's really neat about this isn't just the visualization, but that they’ve packaged the whole dataset as open GeoJSON/CSV mirrored on Hugging Face and GitHub—plus an MCP endpoint for AI agents.
Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
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Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#32This is off by many degrees of magnitude for Ireland at least: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1nkvqd7/oc...
Same for Scotland - there are 3 castles within 2 km of where I live, not including a couple of really old ruined hill-forts... which I don't think is an unusual density of these things for this part of the world.
Edit: And of course there is also the huge castle 13km away across the sea sitting on its volcanic plug and very visible from here.
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#33Is a palace a castle? If so then there are a huge number missing in India.
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#34Invading Australia is looking pretty tempting right now.
Invading Australia in 1500s is looking pretty tempting, you mean.
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#35Château de Saint-Cloud, near Paris, reported as "renowned ruin" ??? What a joke! Only the gardens remain.
Even more ridiculous : Bastille also reported as "renowned ruin". Nothing remains. All stones have disappeared centuries ago.
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#36This dataset is bad. The North Carolina state capitol is a castle?
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#37This is off by many degrees of magnitude for Ireland at least: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1nkvqd7/oc...
Seems like your map lists pre-historic ring forts, not castles?
I'm not sure what the 'official' definition of a castle is, but I personally wouldn't consider a crannóg or something like Dún Aonghasa a castle. Nor would I consider a stand alone tower house a castle, although they might (along with gate lodges and great houses), sometimes be colloquially referred to as castles.
Surely a castle is a fortified building, specific to the middle ages. Wikipedia agrees - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castle
Which would put the number of Anglo-Norman castles in Ireland much lower, probably something around 100.
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#38Why nothing in North America but forts? There are lots of ancient structures that should be considered. Ex: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montezuma_Castle_National_Monu...
> # Etymology
> Neither part of the monument's name is correct. ... was not a "castle" in the traditional sense, but instead may have functioned more like a "prehistoric high rise apartment complex".[8]
My understanding was always that aside from vanity castles like Craigdarroch (https://thecastle.ca) there aren't castles in North America because they're only practical in a pre-cannon world
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#39Slop
Re: Map of the world's great castles and fortresses
#40Why nothing in North America but forts? There are lots of ancient structures that should be considered. Ex: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montezuma_Castle_National_Monu...
There's at least a couple on the map, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapultepec_Castle That one you linked definitely merits inclsion, tho. Had never heard of it. Thanks. Edit: Or maybe not: apparently it's not considered a castle, despite the name.
Castle means fortified stone building then? What are you considering? Wikipedia has many more. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_castles_in_the_United_...