EN
The Austro-Hungarian and interwar-Polish military survey manuals issued by K. u. k. Militärgeographisches Institut and Wojskowy Instytut Geograficzny definied the way a topographer had to conduct his toponymic work. The examined Austro-Hungarian manuals (dating 1875, 1887, 1894, and 1903) and Polish (1925, 1936, 1937) include numerous paragraphs concerning the way a topographer should collect and note toponyms on topographic survey sheets. The military purpose of the maps that were to be based on the survey had an impact on the formal properties of the toponyms collected by a topographer. The registered names had to be correct and to reflect the real toponymic usus of local people. The toponymic material collected by a topographer had an essential influence on the names placed on published maps. The main finding of the article is that the studied regulations do not impose a linguistic adaptation of local-language toponyms to the politically dominating official languages.