History of Cartography - Early Maps Flashcards
(46 cards)
1
Q
To understand the present and think about the future we must….
A
Have knowledge of the past
2
Q
Purpose and usage of maps have changed through time. What are some recurring themes in maps
A
- Representation/communication of land related information
- Navigation
- Taxation
- Military
- Planning
- Inventory
- Empowerment and influence
- Education
3
Q
How has the purpose/usage of maps changed through time?
A
- Went from showing whats there, to military, to education
- Hand-drawn to printed
- Colourless to colourful
4
Q
What was the role of ‘old’ maps?
A
- Decorative objects of antiquarian interest
- Repositories of information
- Sources for the reconstruction of past events or landscapes
- Important artefacts reflecting the development of science and technology
- History and development of geographic thought
5
Q
Early record of maps
A
- Little evidence
- Early maps easily destroyed
- Drawn in sand or mud
- Made of decomposing material
- Deliberately destroyed on conquest (strategic, Library of Alexandria)
6
Q
What is the importance of a craved map?
A
- Petroglyphs carved for permanency, signifies importance
- Took much effort and tools to create
7
Q
How long ago were people making pictorial representations of our world?
A
~50,000
- Cave art, pictographs, petroglyphs
8
Q
When was the Seradina Petroglyph made?
A
~2500BC
“Map of Bedolina”
9
Q
When did pictorial representations begin to show spatial relationships and what are the examples?
A
- 3500BCE Maiskop Vase
- 600BCE Babylonian tablet
10
Q
What is the Babylonian World Map (600BC)?
A
- Oldest surviving world map
- Carved on a clay tablet
- Very symbolic, religious, world view
- Missing Persians and Egyptians even though they were known to the Babylonians
11
Q
What does it mean that the Persians and Egyptians were left off the Babylonian World Map from 600BC?
A
- Indicates silences and that silences have been around for as long as maps have
12
Q
What is the Relief map of the Crown Prince Islands, Disco Bay Greenland?
A
- Map made on sealskin
- Carved rocks for relief
- Used for navigation
- Disposable, but important
13
Q
What is the Marshall Islands ‘Stick Chart’
A
- Arrangement of sticks indicated patterns of swells or wave masses caused by winds
- Islands marked by shells or corals
- Polynesian navigation
- Only the maker could fully interpret
14
Q
What is the benefit of using a wooden map?
A
- If it falls overboard, it’ll float!
15
Q
Why were there no graticules or grids in the first maps? Why did early mapping assume a flat earth?
A
- Only familiar with small area, not entire globe
- Mapped what they knew well and what was important
- Didn’t need projections
- Gave idea that world was flat
16
Q
What determined older maps creation?
A
- Local necessity, needs, and materials
17
Q
Hecataeus c. 500BCE
A
- Map of mediterranean and surroundings
- Circumference of map is labelled as ocean because the rest was unknown
- Well done for technology of the time
18
Q
Who were the people to change view of world from flat to round?
A
- Greeks (Thinkers, scientists)
-
19
Q
Erathostenes
A
- 250 BCE
- Measured circumference of earth with a stick, a well, and a shadow
- Only off by 1.5%
20
Q
Aristotle
A
- 350 BCE
- Ship and horizon argument
- Hinted Earth was not flat
- Position of Polaris walking from N to S
21
Q
Ptolemy’s Geographica
A
- 90-160 CE
- Series of books and maps
- Writings on all geography, including cartography
- Potentially 1st GIS linking spatial attribute tables to places
- Lost for 1000 years
22
Q
Ptolemy’s world map
A
- Map of Mediterranean and surrounding areas
- Accurate, not precise
- used projections and degrees
23
Q
Ptolemy
A
- Writings on all geography, including cartography
- Started to build projections
- Developed gazetteers
24
Q
What happened to Ptolemy’s Geographica?
A
- Mostly destroyed by church, no actual maps survived
- Lost for 1000 years during Dark Ages
- Some preserved by Arab scholars and scientists that fled from Europe
- Resurfaced in Renaissance and was still ahead of its time
- Maps redrawn by monks from Ptolemy’s works
25
Who and what were Ptolemy's Geographica influential to?
- Columbus
- Colonial Expansion
- Led to reconstructions of the maps that profoundly influenced the cartography in Europe during the Renaissance
26
What was the Romans influence on Cartography?
- Drive was conquest and administration
- Surveyors more than cartographers
- Had survey equipment for perfect lines and 90 degree angles
- Techniques is same today, only technology has changed
27
What is a Groma?
- Roman Surveying instrument
- Vertical staff with horizontal cross pieces mounted on a bracket
- Each cross piece has a plumb line and plumb bob
- Purpose was to survey straight lines, squares, and rectangles
28
Tabula Peutingeriana
- Roman road map on a scroll
- Can be unrolled at any point
- Relative location is best characteristic
- 7.5m long, 30cm wide
- Scale of building size relates to settlement size
- Roads as straight as possible
- Demonstrates Roman power and control
29
What is a benefit to the Tabula Peutingeriana model of road map?
- Unrolling is more efficient than flipping pages around like modern road map booklet
30
Why did the Roman empire fall?
- Empire became to big to administer in 5th century
| - Contained too many non-roman conquered people within
31
Mappae Mundi
Roman circular maps of the known world
32
Why did the Babylonians use a base 60 model?
- 60 is easily divisible and multipliable
- Good/easy for trade
- Used for degrees of circle, long and lat, etc.
33
What changed in the Dark Ages?
- Became Holy Roman Empire and church took control
- Church made science to fit doctrine
- World was flat in doctrine, not actually thought of as flat
- People didn't move as much, travel difficult
- Era of threat, horizons closed in, poor communications
- Maps became more local
34
Mahmud al-Kashgari map
- 1074 world map as viewed y Turkish mapmaker Kashgari
- East on top, Mountains red, Sand yellow, Rivers grey-blue
- Mountains in centre represent heart of Asia
35
Who kept scientific cartography growing in the Dark Ages?
- Arabic scholars who retained Ptolemaic principles
| - Idrisi is a famous example
36
Tabula Rogeriana
- Drawn for Roger II of Sicily
- World map 12th century by Idrisi
- Masterpiece of late Islamic cartography
- Abundance of detail and clarity surpasses all of its medieval predecessors (Christian and Muslim)
- Climatic zones outlined
- South at top of map
37
Why was north not at the top of early maps?
- Maps were more localized and didn't need a global scale or orientation
- North simply wasn't important, maps were oriented by what was important
38
Hereford Mappa Mundi
- Biggest extant medieval map
- 158cm by 133cm
- T in O map
- East on top, centered on Jerusalem
- Biblical events, Mythical events, in geographic locations
39
What is the translation of Mappa Mundae
Cloth World
| - Map = Cloth
40
What was the purpose of many maps in the 12th-ish century and who commissioned them?
- Purpose was interest and administration, not navigation
- Commissioned by royals and novels who had their own cartographers
- Power and control theme again
41
T in O map
- Mediterranean is vertical part of T
- Don and Nile rivers are the T crosspiece
- T centered on Jerusalem
- T represents crucifix
- Whole is inside circular ocean O
- East is on top, where Heaven/paradise is
42
What was happening to cartography in Europe during the Dark Ages?
- A slow regression from the Roman and Greek attempts at accuracy to abstraction
- Back to Flat Earth, but only in doctrine
- Went from scholarly contemplation of projections and measurement to representing Earth as a graphic, not a map with Heaven at the top (the East)
- T in O maps, interpreted through Scriptures
43
What results from hand copying of maps over and over again?
- Mistakes that become thought of as truth because eventually the same mistake ends up on everything
- Some mistakes were purposeful in order to enforce doctrine
44
Map by Isidore of Seville
- T in O map
- 12th century
- East at top
- 3 continents are identified by Noah's 3 sons (Europe with Japheth, Africa with Ham, Asia with Sem)
45
Ebstorf Mappa Mundi
- Simple circular world map
- Destroyed in WWII air raid
- Measured 3.5 square meters
- Biblical stories placed in geographic locations
- Religious Doctrine
- Oriented to east
- Center design depicts Resurrection in Jerusalem
- Head of Christ at top, feet at bottom, hands at the sides
46
Bunting Clover Leaf Map
- 1500's
- World in a 3 leaf clover
- Jerusalem at centre surrounded by Europe, Asia, Africa
- Bit of America in corner of map
- 'Here be mermaids and seamonsters' design
- Modern clover design puts modern images into clover leaves
