Maps and Mapping I
Map Project || Maps and Mapping, Part II || Maps "Guide" and web excursions 
 
Outline
  • Case 1: Mercator's map -- T-O maps, portolan charts, the projection problem
  • Case 2: Marshall Island stick-maps
  • How does a map a represent?: petroglyphs, pictures, connection patterns and schema
  • What makes a map faithful or "realistic"?: more projections and perspectives

    VISUALS - - - [ corresponding figures in Turnbull marked in brackets ]
      Mercator's map
    1. Ptolemy map, 1482 -- as reconstructed by Germanus [ British Library ] [7.1]
    2. Ebstorf map, 1234 [7.3]
    3. Ebstorf map, detail
    4. Vesconte map, 1321
    5. Vesconte map, rotated 90 deg.
    6. T-O map w/ Noah [ 15th c. Bibliotheque Royale Albert I, Brussels ]
    7. basic T-O map [7.2]
    8. Calatan Atlas #1, 1375 [ Bibliotheque Nationale de France ]
    9. detail from Calatan Atlas [ Bibliotheque Nationale de France ]
    10. Calatan Atlas #3 [ Bibliotheque Nationale de France ]
    11. portolan map, Maggiolo, 1512 [2.5]
    12. detail, rotated
    13. 1482 copy of Ptolemy (Nicolaus Germanus version)
    14. world map, Eastern hemisphere [ British Museum ]
    15. Laon globe, 1493
      Gerhard Mercator
    16. Mercator map, 1569 [2.1]
    17. diagram of Mercator's map [2.2]
    18. Jocobuis Hondius and John Dee
    19. map using Mercator's projection (1599?)
    20. Vermeer, Lady with a Lute [ Metropolitan Museum of Art ]

      Marshall Island Stick-Maps

    21. Pacific atoll
    22. native sailboat in sout Pacific
    23. navigator and sailor from the Marshall Islands [ Steve Thomas ]
    24. Marshall island mattang, or stick chart [4.3]
    25. meddo, 2nd type of stick chart
    26. meddo #2
    27. meddo #3
    28. rebbelith, 3rd type of stick chart
    29. rebbelith #2 [ Smithsonian Institution ]
    30. teaching navigation in the Marshall Islands [ Steve Thomas ]

      How does a map a represent?

    31. clay tablet from Nibbur (Bablyonia) [3.4]
    32. tablet with cuniform labels translated
    33. Giadighe petroglyph, Valmonica, Italy, ~2300 BCE [3.2]
    34. photo of Bedolina petroglyph [3.1]
    35. rubbing of Bedolina petroglyph
    36. detail of Bedolina petroglyph
    37. Chinese coastal defenses, c. 1705 [~3.7]
    38. Lake Garda, Italy [~3.6]
    39. map of the London underground [2.8]

      What makes a map representation "real"?

    40. direction Mecca, on a Mercator map [ Philadelphia Inquirer ]
    41. direction Mecca, on a globe [ Philadelphia Inquirer ]
    42. MSP-HKG route, on Mercator projection
    43. MSP-HKG great circle route [ airline service ]
    44. Mercator projection [2.3]
    45. Gall-Peters projection [2.2]
    46. Carre projection, with Washington DC as a "pole"
    47. Peters projection, inverted, recentered [2.4]: How does this map represent reality? How does this map also reflect an ideological perspective?
    48. Pioneer 10 plaque [2.7]

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