Large volumes of biographical text collections have been digitized and developed into structured research databases in recent years. In order to strengthen the historiographical relevance and acceptance of these data collections, this paper discusses two interdependent technological objectives. First, it summarizes advanced visual analysis techniques that can support formal and distant reading approaches to individual and aggregated biography data from multiple perspectives. On the other hand,

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... t suggests to continuously improve structured data collections through an interplay of visual interfaces, manual procedures, and semi-automated annotation techniques. This aims at closing the operational gap between data analysis and data curation, and at developing new tools for the creation and maintenance of biographical data even for historians without computer-linguistic skills.